re: Unabashed rip-off artists

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when the levee breaks was a 20's blues song dog

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you think led zeppelin knew about levees?

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Songs That Led Zeppelin Stole


The songs that made the Zeppelin famous are not their own. They plagiarised songs and most of the time without even giving credits. What proceeds below is 101% authentic material that many people don't know about Led Zeppelin.

1.  "Whole Lotta Love" - Who hasn't heard this song. Perhaps it is the best example of the classy Zeppelin riff. Released on the album Led Zeppelin II, this song was the band's first hit single. Page tries to impress us with his catchy riff and Plant tries to hide the reality with his high range singing but hey you can't always hide, can you? The song is not an original composition as the album credits suggests. The lyrics are heavily borrowed from poor Willie Dixon's song "You Need Love".

Page's riff was Page's riff. It was there before anything else. I just thought, 'well, what am I going to sing?' That was it, a nick. Now happily paid for. At the time, there was a lot of conversation about what to do. It was decided that it was so far away in time and influence that...well, you only get caught when you're successful. That's the game.
—Robert Plant, Robert Plant's manic persona [1]
Oops!

2.  "Dazed and Confused" - Dazed and Confused is one of the Zeppelin's signature songs. However, it was not written by Jimmy Page although the song was originally credited as Page's composition on the Led Zeppelin's first album. "Dazed and Confused" was written by folk singer Jake Holmes. Page recorded a new version of the song for The Yardbirds and released the song in 1969 with Led zeppelin. What worries me is that Jake Holmes never did take legal action against this theft. It is surprsiing that Dazed and Cofused became the signature song of Zeppelin through out their career while most people did not know the reality.

3.  "Stairway to Heaven" - Stairway to Heaven is another Zeppelin's classic song. Page's solo in the song is frequently considered as one of the best solos ever played in the face of the planet. But hey, doesn't this song sound familiar? The main guitar riffs in the song sound very much alike with "Taurus", a song by Spirit. What is more astounding is that Zeppelin toured with Spririt in 1969 before Page and Plant wrote the song. Can we consider this a coincidence or theft?

4.  "Babe I'm Gonna Leave You" - Led Zeppelin included this song in their debut album and was originally credited to Jimmy Page. Well actually it turns out that the song was a cover. Babe I'm Gonna Leave You is a folk song written by Anne Brendon in the 1950s and Joan Baez too recorded this song in the 1960s. Later on the 1990s Zeppelin gave the credits for this song to Anne Brendon. What the hell? It seems like Zeppelin used the song as their original throughout their career to gain popularity and later on after the work had been done they threw the song back again to Anne Brendon.

5.  "Black Mountain Side" - Who can forget the classy eastern influenced acoustic guitar playing of Jimmy Page in this song. Actually this song too was a traditional folk song called "Blackwaterside" that was recorded by Bert Jansh in 1966. Again this song was credited to Jimmy Page on their first album. What were people doing at that time? Were they just lost in the magical guitar playing of Jimmy Page completely oblivious of reality? I mean idiot Page did leave a clue behind. He just changed the "mountain" to "water" and people couldn't even figure out! What the hell?

6.  "Since I've been Lovin' You" - Well thank god that this time Zeppelin didn't steal the whole song. They just stole the lyrics. This song heavily borrows lyrics from "Never", a song by Moby Grape. Page has frequently cited as Moby Grape as one of his influences.

7.  "Moby Dick" - The guitar riff in this song is extremely similar to "Watch Your Step" a Bobby Parker's song. Again Page was a huge fan of Bobby Parker and one time he even considered Parker to sign in Led Zeppelin. Shame! Shame!

8.  "When The Levee Breaks" - Don't get washed away with the riff of this song. I know the riff sounds good but don't you want to have a look at the dirty side of this song. Zeppelin again managed to gain fame through a cover song and again without any credits specified in the album. This blues song was originally written by Kansas Joe McCoy and Memphis Minnie in 1929. Zeppelin reworked the song and released it on their fourth album in 1971.

9.  "In My Time Of Dying" - Led Zeppelin really did a stupid thing while it came to this song. "In My Time Of Dying" is a traditional gospel song that has been covered by many musicians most popularly by Charlie Patton, Josh White and Bob Dylan but Zeppelin's rendition of the song is probably the most popular. Why is it that people love Zeppelin so much after all the artists who covered the song credited as “trad. arr." but Zeppelin credited this song as “Page, Plant, John Paul Jones, John Bonham”. Are Zeppelins really illiterate monkeys who don't know how to write credits?

10.  "Bring It On Home" - This song was featured on the Zeppelin's album Led Zeppelin II. This song was written by Willie Dixon and the first recording was by Sonny Boy Williamson II in 1963. The Zeppelins version of the song sounds deliberately similar to the original. Guess what? Zeppelin didn't give the credit to Willie Dixon and rather it was credited as "Jimmy Page/Robert Plant".
In an interview in 1977, Page commented :
The thing with "Bring It On Home," there's only a tiny bit taken from Sonny Boy Williamson's version and we threw that in as a tribute to him. People say, "Oh, 'Bring It On Home' is stolen." Well, there's only a little bit in the song that relates to anything that had gone before it, just the end. [2]
What can we say of the great Jimmy Page? I'm tired. Really tired of this shite.

11.  "The Lemon Song" - I literally call it stealing when it comes to this song. This song awfully sounds similar to "Killing Floor" a song by Howlin' Wolf. The credits on the album Led Zeppelin II for "The Lemon Song" reads solely to Plant, Page, Jones, and Bonham. Do Zeppelins think that they can get away with anything?

12.  "Nobody's Fault But Mine" - This is a traditional blues song that has been recorded by many artists....Well i'm tired of explaining the Zeppelin crap. You know what happened, don't you?

These songs were only the big ones. Other songs covered by Led Zeppelin include :

"Around and Around" by Chuck Berry
"Blueberry Hill" by Fats Domino
"Gallows Pole" by Leadbelly
"Hey, Joe" by The Leaves
"I can't quit you baby" by Willie Dixon
"Nadine" by Chuck Berry
"Sugar Mama" by Howlin' Wolf
"Something Else" by Eddie Cochran
"As Long As I Have You" by Garnet Mimms
"You Shook Me" by Muddy Waters
"Woodstock" by Joni Mitchell
"Travelling Riverside Blues" by Robert Johnson

THE SONGS THAT MADE LED ZEPPELIN FAMOUS WERE ALL COVERS.

It's not true that I don't like Led Zeppelin just because I'm a narcissit or something. It's that I don't like overrated artists, Led Zeppelin being one of the most overrated. The thing the Zeppelin was doing in the 70s was not new. Believe me Zeppelin was just messing around with classical blues songs by Howlin Wolf, Willie Dixon, Chuck Berry and others to make sounds that were more catchy. These guys are the ones who we should worship not Led Zeppelin.

References
[1] Young, Charles M. (June 1990). "Robert Plant's manic persona". Musician 140: 47. Cited in "The thieving magpies". Led Zeppelin Official Forum. 13 February 2010.

[2] Dave Schulps, Interview with Jimmy Page, Trouser Press, October 1977.

© 2011 SinisterHipster Inc. All rights reserved.

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There was only ONE original song on Led Zeppelin (1969)

ALL other songs were STOLEN. The album is essentially a cover album of blues and folk songs but the original artists and writers were not given credit. This whole album with the exception of Good Times Bad Times is blatant plagiarism.

Babe I'm Gonna Leave You - original by Joan Baez
You Shook Me - original by Willie Dixon
Dazed And Confused - original by Jake Holmes
Your Time Is Gonna Come - the guitar riff sounds like the one in "Dear Mr. Fantasy" by Traffic, and the melody and chord progression of "Can't Find My Way" by Blind Faith
Black Mountain Side - "Black Water Side" by Bert Jansch
Communication Breakdown - "Nervous Breakdown" by Eddie Cochran
I Can't Quit You Baby - original by Otis Rush
How Many More Times - "How Many More Years" by Howlin' Wolf

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