My life is a lie. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2AhPZx7AedE"]Howard Stern interview the truth behind Led Zeppelin Part 1 - YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cdr8PtUPIPo"]Howard Stern interview The Truth Behind Led Zeppelin Part 2 - YouTube and for any songs they missed https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JyvLsutfI5M"]Led Zeppelin Plagiarism Part 1 - YouTube Someone apparently hacked part 2 and fucked it up since I found it a few weeks ago. People get pissed about the truth. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5uMQDlKn8g"]Led Zeppelin Plagiarism Part 3 - YouTube I can't seem to find pt. 4 anymore either. They were all there only a few weeks ago. People really don't want this out there, but there's enough here that the other two hardly matter.
But not because they 'borrowed' stuff so much I think. Who cares, do you know how many rock bands in those days searched for ideas in the music before them? Most just like to making it sound as if it's all their own. Just because they borrowed so much from the blues doesn't mean Led Zeppelin didn't make it their own. Wether you like it or not is a different thing. It doesn't bother me in the slightest, they and others took both blues and rock to a new level.
The blues is an open form.It's largely a hand idiom.Artists have borrowed from each other from time immemorial.The early rhythm and blues boom that spawned the like of The Yardbirds and the Stones and later Led Zeppelin,basically evolved from groups of young teens listening to a few vinyl blues cuts and copying what they heard by ear.If Led Zeppelin copied riffs or lyrics it was generally an act of homage to their heroes rather than trying to rip anyone off.No one owns a chord progression or a cry in the night.Let sleeping dogs lie and enjoy the music.
They didn't just "borrow" chord progressions or riffs. They stole entire songs, sometimes splicing two or more songs, and they definitely weren't paying homage. Any "heroes" that tried to get compensation were screwed over, and they weren't even all old blues artist in a position to be called heroes. Many were contemporaries who had their music re-released by Zeppelin only months after they released it themselves, and were overshadowed by the might of Zeppelin and their promoters and never given a chance to gain their own recognition for their songwriting.
One the one hand, this is interesting from a legal, musicological perspective. On the other hand, it doesn't effect my enjoyment of Stairway or Kashmir or ... On the third hand, who are those artists whose music got stolen? The other songs that they wrote, that weren't stolen, might be worth a listen or two. "There is a tendency for people to deify someone and then declare them a fraud for having feet of clay." Lazarus Long
God this is so retarded. Listen to any of the songs that Led Zeppelin "stole", and compare them to the originals. They are all RADICALLY different. Yes, they should have credited the musicians with the lyrics, but think of how many blues artists are recycling the same old blues chord progressions over and over. It's been done to death. How is that any different than stealing lyrics? Led Zeppelin cannot be touched by anyone. They used the blues as a foundation and pedestal to take rock into a completely new direction. And anyone who finds them boring is completely just listening to the music go right over their head. They are masters.
