Were it any other band, it would be easy to scoff at the prospect. Three old dudes and a replacement for the now-apparently requisite missing dude, but this is Led Zeppelin

Released in the shadow of an acknowledged classic in IV, Led Zeppelin’s Houses of the Holy found the band experimenting with an entirely new palette of sounds.

What’s the continuing attraction, in 2012, for the long-gone Led Zeppelin? From movie trailers to “American Idol,” these long-haired, often-shirtless heavy-metal rock-gods — disbanded since the turn of the 1980s, mind you — remain front of mind.

Led Zeppelin’s image, dating back to the band’s debauched 1970s heyday, has grown so outsized that it sometimes obscures, well, the music.