Led Zeppelin poll and discussion thread

which is your favourite Led Zeppelin album ?

  • Total voters
    23
I voted for Physical Graffiti. It's the most colourful one. I like the mix of genres and I've always had nothing but love for the overlooked but amazing and emotional In the Light, for the subtle and gentle, blink-and-you'll-miss-it Bron-Yr-Aur, the oriental and mystical Kashmir, the nostalgic yet heavy Ten Years Gone and so on and so on. The album has an atmosphere of its own and it will probably remain my LedZep favourite.

However, let's not forget about Presence, which is often overlooked and which contains my favourite Zeppelin song ever - yeah, it's the magnificent Achilles Last Stand (at least some bands know how to make an epic album opener with the word Achilles in it - yes, I'm looking at you, Joey DeMaio).

Houses of the Holy (which houses my second favourite LZ track - No Quarter) and the debut share the third spot.
 
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I love Zeppelin, they have a very strong discography and they were a very unique band!

I prefer III the most, and IV close behind
 
Forostar said:
Led Zeppelin, the greatest cover band in rock n roll history (plain stealing)!
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Some of those are more persuasive than others (and a couple don't even sound close to the same). For others, "Traditional, arranged by..." seems like a totally appropriate credit.

The important thing is, none of the supposedly "covered" songs have the riffs and power that made Zeppelin legendary. There is a lot of creativity on the Zeppelin songs, even if Plant borrowed a few lyrics from old blues standards. These accusations don't diminish my respect for Zep in the least, any more than Maiden's stealing from Beckett (this is more obvious than anything Zep did), Thin Lizzy and UFO.

Besides, as a musician friend told me, everyone who started recording after 1965 is basically just stealing from The Beatles.
 
Yeah, this downplaying was predictable.

Sure! Maiden "borrowed" as much as Zeppelin did.

No way, man. No way. No quarter.
 
Yeah and Led Zep, Purple, Maiden in turn inspired hundreds of other bands who then "borrowed" ideas and sound and composition and song structures etc from them....Power metal, thrash metal etc..All those bands who were inspired and who took ideas from Purple, Zep, Maiden they are not worth anything then? ;) .How many actual original ideas do you find in metal today?
 
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I haven't counted it for all bands. I have followed it in Edguy and Gamma Ray. Actualy, I wasn't looking for it. It suddenly became very obvious. With some bands it is not that difficult to find out, especially not when the "taking" is done from some of my favourite bands. These days, it's more difficult to realize what older bands have done. They took from people who made music aeons ago, music from (an) earlier generation(s). Some of these (often) uncredited acts are not active or dead. I am glad these vids show how little these gigantic classic rock bands have done their best to make original songs. Literal fragments copied have been!

Some bands hardly or do not do that. Some do it a couple of times, and some have done often. In the cases of these two bands, this is a "little" too often, for me.

As long as no such string of blatant examples are given as in these Purple and Zep vids, I can't take the downplaying very seriously. If someone can enlighten me with any other band having done something of the same nature, go ahead. And if these are modern metal copy cats, then they deserve a fitting recognition.

Purple and Zeppelin, these are two legendary bands, but that aspect doesn't mean we should overlook it or can judge their excellent (ha!) songwriting qualities by different merits.
 
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Cornfed Hick said:
The important thing is, none of the supposedly "covered" songs have the riffs and power that made Zeppelin legendary.
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This is the correct response. Zep borrowed some old vehicles and blazed new roads with them.

Forostar said:
Yeah, this downplaying was predictable.
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Yes, it was - because most of the rock world has been on board with this "downplaying" for a few decades. In my experience, people who call Zep a "cover band" are hipsters determined to find something wrong with widely-loved music. It's an ignorant simplification.
 
Forostar said:
They took from people who made music aeons ago, music from (an) earlier generation(s). Some of these (often) uncredited acts are not active or dead. I am glad these vids show how little these gigantic classic rock bands have done their best to make original songs. Literal fragments copied have been!
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Well, Zep and Purple took inspiration from blues and folk...Maiden took inspiration from Purple and Zep, Helloween took inspiration from Maiden...That's musical evolution....

"I am glad these vids show how little these gigantic classic rock bands have done their best to make original songs"

Bit of an overreaction here maybe my friend :) You've seen a video by some guy on you tube who highlights a few songs (some of them very dodgy) and then the few resemblances overshadows everything else that the band did on their own? :confused:
 
SixesAlltheway said:
Well, Zep and Purple took inspiration from blues and folk...Maiden took inspiration from Purple and Zep, Helloween took inspiration from Maiden...That's musical evolution....
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Taking inspiration from is something else as taking (more or less) literal parts (have Maiden done that as often as these bands? No they have not).

Bit of denying what I said my friend.
 
Forostar said:
(have Maiden done that as often as these bands? No they have not).
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You clearly have a selective memory...

"Life's Shadow" by Beckett had lyrics stolen in "Hallowed", and a huge chunk of music directly stolen for "Nomad". The opening riff of "Wicker Man" comes from Priest's "Running Wild". "The Ides of March" was co-written by Thunderstick, and his band had their version out first, yet Maiden gives no credit. The ending of "To Tame A Land" is stolen from a classical composer.

And, since what got "stolen" from those old blues musicians was nothing more than their lyrics, let's look at the long string of Maiden songs taken from literature and movies. For instance, the lyrics of "Rime" are mostly adapted from the side-notes prepared by Coleridge himself for the poem's second edition, with Maiden only giving credit for the two quotes taken from the main poem.

Maiden might borrow less often - but when they do, they plagiarize mercilessly and are far less willing to give credit than Zep ever was. Led Zeppelin were carrying on a blues tradition; Iron Maiden, especially Steve Harris, are unrepentant thieves by comparison.

Edit - look at the songwriting credits on any Led Zep CD manufactured since the mid-90s. Zep has been giving full credit to the bluesmen they borrowed from for about 20 years now. Steve Harris, by comparison, still claims to have written all the lyrics to Hallowed, which is an outright lie.
 
SinisterMinisterX said:
Edit - look at the songwriting credits on any Led Zep CD manufactured since the mid-90s. Zep has been giving full credit to the bluesmen they borrowed from for about 20 years now.
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Despite my defense of Zep, I don't think they can get FULL credit for this attribution -- which is probably the result of lawsuits and from other people like Foro who called them out on their borrowing.

I do agree with this statement, though:

SinisterMinisterX said:
Led Zeppelin were carrying on a blues tradition; Iron Maiden, especially Steve Harris, are unrepentant thieves by comparison.
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I actually think the Zeppelin guys didn't think there was anything wrong with what they were doing, because there is a lot of borrowing in that tradition. Hell, some of those old blues standards may have been public domain in Europe. Steve Harris's "Life's Shadow" plagiarism, in contrast, is pretty blatant and can have no innocent explanation.
 
Do we know who was in charge of crediting the material on the original albums? Wouldn't that be a record company responsibility rather than the band themselves?

Zeppelin comes from the oral tradition of Blues. Taking existing melodies/chord progressions/lyrics and putting a new twist on them. It's something that Jazz adapted and embraced but Rock seems to shun. Or more accurately, rock fans will ignore it until a band they don't like does it and then they get torn apart. Which is what is happening in this thread.

There's a strange obsession with being original when very little music truly is original.
 
Mosh said:
Or more accurately, rock fans will ignore it until a band they don't like does it and then they get torn apart. Which is what is happening in this thread.
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I didn't like these bands much before I found out about this. This issue comes on top of not liking them much.

However, I have not ignored it with other bands. On the contrary, I am more annoyed about it when bands I do care about do it. Gamma Ray, Edguy, remember?

I am not shunning away from the Maiden examples, but find a bigger amount of blatant taking in Zep (and the Ides/Thunderburst example is a complex matter: Ides is older than Thunderburst).

It's noble from Zep that they gave credits (the list is so big, they really had to come over the bridge), but they still have made all these unoriginal songs.

And did they (already) give all the credits? Check:
http://www.warr.org/zep.html

Now by popular demand! A list of some of the songs Zep stole from other artists:
  • "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You" - A folk song by Anne Bredon, this was originally credited as "traditional, arranged by Jimmy Page," then "words and music by Jimmy Page," and then, following legal action, "Bredon/Page/Plant."
  • "Black Mountain Side" - uncredited version of a traditional folk tune previously recorded by Bert Jansch.
  • "Bring It On Home" - the first section is an uncredited cover of the Willie Dixon tune (as performed by the imposter Sonny Boy Williamson).
  • "Communication Breakdown" - apparently derived from Eddie Cochran's "Nervous Breakdown."
  • "Custard Pie" - uncredited cover of Bukka White's "Shake 'Em On Down," with lyrics from Sleepy John Estes's "Drop Down Daddy."
  • "Dazed And Confused" - uncredited cover of the Jake Holmes song (see The Above Ground Sound Of Jake Holmes).
  • "Hats Off To (Roy) Harper" - uncredited version of Bukka White's "Shake 'Em On Down."
  • "How Many More Times" - Part one is an uncredited cover of the Howlin' Wolf song (available on numerous compilations). Part two is an uncredited cover of Albert King's "The Hunter."
  • "In My Time Of Dying" - uncredited cover of the traditional song (as heard on Bob Dylan's debut).
  • "The Lemon Song" - uncredited cover of Howlin' Wolf's "Killing Floor" - Wolf's publisher sued Zeppelin in the early 70s and settled out of court.
  • "Moby Dick" - written and first recorded by Sleepy John Estes under the title "The Girl I Love," and later covered by Bobby Parker.
  • "Nobody's Fault But Mine" - uncredited cover of the Blind Willie Johnson blues.
  • "Since I've Been Lovin' You" - lyrics are the same as Moby Grape's "Never," though the music isn't similar.
  • "Stairway To Heaven" - the main guitar line is apparently from "Taurus" by Spirit.
  • "White Summer" - uncredited cover of Davey Graham's "She Moved Through The Fair."
  • "Whole Lotta Love" - lyrics are from the Willie Dixon blues "You Need Love."
I'm not listing covers that the band credited to the actual authors ("You Shook Me") or the less blatant ripoffs (the "Superstition" riff in "Trampled Underfoot"). If you have anything to add to this list, please tell me. (DBW)
 
You can find these YouTube claims everywhere...if you trust this particular Youtube user..Maiden copied The Trooper from Rush...

 
That's a vid with 300 something hits. Check the amount of hits on that Zep vid, made by a Blackmore fan (who also made that Purple vid). More important, I'd say the riff is pretty different.

This one is a bit more obvious, although Adrian said he never heard that WS song:
 
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