"Kashmir" (Led Zeppelin)

Since the previous two posts were about classical pieces, it only seems appropriate to talk about a rock track that incorporates elements of classical music: "Kashmir" by Led Zeppelin.
In music journalist and filmmaker Cameron Crowe's liner notes for The Complete Studio Recordings boxed set (1993), he states that guitarist Jimmy Page had been working on portions of the song for almost three years before the track was released on 1975's Physical Graffiti.  It essentially was a warmup piece that gradually evolved into a full-blown composition with layers of guitars, mellotron, as well as actual strings and brass, arranged by the band's bassist/keyboardist/resident Swiss Army knife, John Paul Jones.
Crowe notes that it's also one of Robert Plant's proudest lyrical moments, inspired by the vocalist's travels along a long desert road in Southern Morocco.  
Quoting Crowe's interview with Plant: "It was a single track road which cut neatly through the desert.  Two miles to the East and West were ridges of sandrock.  It basically looked like you were driving down a channel, this dilapidated road, and there was seemingly no end to it. 'Oh, let the sun beat down upon my face, stars to fill my dreams...' It's one of my favorites...It was so positive, lyrically."
In the interview, Plant also praises drummer John Bonham's contributions to the track, citing Bonham's "thrift" as the key factor that makes the song work.  
And I completely agree.  So many of Bonham's contemporaries from the late 60s and 70s were "busy" drummers; I'll put Keith Moon in that category (although, his wild man style was perfect for The Who), as well as Ginger Baker (curmudgeonly egomaniac who still has no sense of groove.)  It's Bonham's straightforward, driving groove and tasteful use of fills and punctuating cymbals along the way that give the song its sense of journey.  There's no showboating; there's only a deep respect for the song itself that comes through in every lick.
Although it is hard to pick a favorite track from the Zep canon, "Kashmir" is definitely up there for me.  Let's call it my favorite epic track of theirs.  (I far prefer it to "Stairway to Heaven," which--don't get me wrong--is a finely wrought piece of music.  It also has been played to death by FM radio and co-opted as a stoner anthem because of its veiled drug references wrapped in Olde English mysticism.  It was cool in high school, but now it can be a little too much tie-dye and Tolkien to digest.)  "Kashmir" is unique in that it perfectly combines a sense of mystic beauty and light with Page and Bonham's signature thundering crunch.  It embodies the very name of the band: Led Zeppelin.