Android Lollipop also broke the led indicator at the bottom of my Nexus 5. I can no longer count on it to reliably indicate if I have messages/emails pending on silent mode.
That's intentional. Lollipop no longer has silent mode; instead it has "no interruptions" mode, which considers the LED indicator an interruption. I suspect there are third-party apps that can do a pseudo-silent mode that may work for you.
Yeah I realize that and it's broken. There's clearly a use case that the LED served between ZERO interruptions and buzzing/ringing.