This Bert Jansch adaptation of a folk song, “Black Waterside,” sounds an awful lot like “Black Mountain Side,” does it not? And here’s the original “Dazed and Confused.” (MP3)
Well, that’s not all that Jimmy Page was ripping off from other musicians.
(via MeFi)
The Lemon Song = Killing Floor
Dazed & Confused = nicked from some un-celebrated folk dude
Whole Lotta Love = lyrics nicked from You Need Love
How Many More Times = The Hunter
That’s just off the top of my head, and doesn’t include the credited ones. There are others that went uncredited. They went to the Robert Johnson well numerous times (although I did see once a fascinating interview with Page & Plant where they claimed they actually nicked the most from some obscure blues guy I’d never heard of).
However, it didn’t matter. Led Zeppelin’s interpretations were hugely original and just plain kicked ass.
File this one under ‘Old News’, dude. 🙂
Oh, there’s D&C right there. How convenient. 🙂
You’re kidding right? Led Zeppelin was a blues based band, half the concept of the blues was sharing chords, riffs, lyrics etc. It was fairly obvious at the time of each songs’ release that some parts were borrowed from other songs, and if you take a listen to the so-called “original” versions of those songs you’ll find the music isn’t even close to being the same and the lyrics are pretty different as well. If this constitutes plagiarism, then Robert Johnson, Leadbelly, Muddy Waters and the like are all plagiarists too. And by the way, a fair portion of the hit songs you hear on classic rock radio stations are cover tunes as well.