My thing with Zep is that the drummer in my old band was a huge LZ fan, and was constantly calling ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic a “ripoff artist”. He seemed to honestly believe LZ was completely original in everything they did.
But really, what artist doesn’t “borrow”, at least a little? Even my favorite band, Rush, is guilty. Compare this:
LZ flat-out stole other people’s music–music by artists they ostensibly revered. Furthermore, they stole some well known and GREAT music. Howlin’ Wolf made music for adults. LZ made music for adolescents.
I’m taking my brother and his wife to the show at Staples Center as a birthday/Christmas present. The AMEX presale tickets weren’t that great (Sect 102), but I plan on being in the first 10 rows for one or two of the other shows.
I saw the Fathom screening of the Quad documentary on Tuesday night. Being a Who geek, I had already seen it online, but it was great to see them on the big screen, larger than life and blasting away.
Funny stuff, but I’m not buying it. The Spirit song, “Taurus”, has a brief descending line played on the guitar that is the same in “Stairway”, but the “upper” melody notes don’t exist in the former. Zep took a short musical idea, expanded on it greatly, and created a whole new song that has nothing to do with Spirit’s song, which doesn’t even have lyrics. I’m not saying Zep never stole, but you have to come up with a lot more than this to prove it.
Feh. You’re walking right past the OP, which asserts that both bands are great and asks which do you prefer on a player-by-player basis, and are trying to resposition the discussion about how Zep are ripoff artists. That has been covered as a topic in other threads. Let it go and quit threadshitting.
Docta G, you’ve made your point – you don’t like Led Zeppelin. Please drop the subject so that others can discuss the OP. The fact that you don’t think it’s worth discussing doesn’t give you the right to hijack the discussion.
I’m on the fence on the Spirit song. I think there clearly was influence in Stairway to Heaven, but it’s original enough that I don’t think it’s wholesale reappropriate.
But they did completely lift or substantially borrow a good number songs without credit. Did you see my examples? Here they are again.
If you just want one example, here’s Jake Holmes’ Dazed and Confused. Led Zeppelin’s version should have at least credited him. The lyrics and main chord progression is pretty much a dead ripoff.
Thanks, Wordman. I don’t mind the thread being resurrected and morphing into a “who’s better” thread, but I do love both bands and this is not about trashing either. Truth be told told, I’d pick the** Kinks**, but that’s another topic…