Dec 152007
 

UPDATED AGAIN AGAIN!
UPDATED AGAIN!
UPDATED!

mrclean: Thanks for the Dazing and Confusing post on Jimmy Plage-rist. Like loophole I’ve always thought this subject would make an interesting post. I’m a big ZepHed but definitely not an apologist, especially considering that I’m also Sillie for Willie Dixon.

Here is a down and dirty collection of songs that some might say strike a resemblance to some Zeppelin compositions. Since Willie Dixon sued, he now shows up as author or co-author on all his tracks here. I leave it to a better man than I to dig out his vinyl and tell us which one(s) were not credited until after the lawsuit. I believe Howlin’ Wolf, post-lawsuit, is now credited on The Lemon Song. Gallows Pole is listed as a “Traditional” yet Huddie Ledbetter/Alan Lomax are credited on Leadbelly’s version.


Willie Dixon
Bring It On Home
I Can’t Quit You Baby
You Shook Me
You Need Love

Howlin’ Wolf
Killing Floor

Leadbelly
The Gallis Pole

I read in mrclean’s link and in other places that Communication Breakdown is derived from Eddie Cochran’s Nervous Breakdown. I personally don’t hear it but maybe some of you do?

Eddie Cochran
Nervous Breakdown

These are the ones I own, if anyone has any of the others mentioned in the Thieving Magpies article or elsewhere, let me know and we can toss them up here as well. I would especially be interested in hearing the Annie Briggs stuff.

Here are some more from the mailbag.

Thanks Townsman saturnismine:
Small Faces- You Need Loving

Thanks Townsman hrrundivbakshi:
Little Richard- Keep A Knockin’
Bert Jansch- Blackwater Side

Thanks Townsman Me:
Memphis Minnie & Kansas Joe- When The Levee Breaks

Thanks NEW Townsman kjk:
Ritchie Valens- Ooh! My Head

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  11 Responses to “Zeppelin Thievery Supplemental”

  1. saturnismine

    Great work, Sammy!

    If you can find the Small Faces version of “You Need Lovin'” put it up there. Marriott’s vocals are clearly the source for Plant’s soaring ending of “whole lotta love”.

    btw, my download box says of Gallis Pole: “file doesn’t exist”.

    I agree with you about “nervous breakdown”, although the chorus modulates up to the 4 and then the 5 from the root, the same way the Zeppelin song does.

  2. sammymaudlin

    I think I fixed The Gallis Pole. If you, or anyone’s, got that Small Faces tune, you can email it to The Back Office and he’ll see to it that it gets posted.

  3. saturnismine

    back office, check email. you need some lovin’.

  4. Mr. Moderator

    This is great stuff! Nice work, Townspeople.

  5. saturnismine

    the way i hear it, there are different degrees or varieties of taking from others in this songs.

    Reusing the intro from the little richard song aint no big thing (this is why that “thieving magpie” article is so damn funny…there’s no need to get bent out of shape about something like that. it happens all the time).

    It’s not even so bad for Plant to recycle Steve Marriott’s interpretation of “You Need Lovin” (even though it’s pretty damned blatant, it’s not as if Marriott wrote it). Still, Marriott could’ve been acknowledged as the arranger. “whole lotta love’s” credits would have read “Dixon, arr. S. Marriott”).

    But the Bert Jansch song, the Jake Holmes song, and the Spirit song make Page look pretty bad: they aren’t just snippets of earlier tunes, or someone else’s arrangement. These are *highly original* tunes (not just riffs) that Page lifted nearly intact and embellished with his own parts.

    Weird; Spirit’s drummer played with Page later on in The Firm, so there was apparently no bad blood.

  6. sammymaudlin

    I forgot I also had When The Levee Breaks, so I tossed it up as well.

  7. Interesting stuff. Thanks. Looks like Willie Dixon got the worst of it, but at least he got paid something after suing.

  8. sammymaudlin

    Willie himself was often accused of acquiring songs of hungry blues musicians in exchange for a meal and then passing them off as his own.

    Karma?

  9. saturnismine

    well, they clearly didn’t “steal” the great drum sound from the memphis minnie version of “when the levee breaks”.

    in fact, the only thing they took were the lyrics. all those great riffs are nowhere to be found on the original, not even in nascent / embryonic form.

    and my original vinyl pressing says “page, plant, jones, bonham, memphis minnie”. so in this case at least, they seem to have credited themselves and the old blues composer in the proper fashion.

  10. I figured Willie probably did some of the same, but didn’t have time to research it.

    Here’s a pretty good resource on the topic of Led Zeppelin’s borrowing:

    http://www.turnmeondeadman.net/Zep/Originals.php.

    (Click on the song links within the main article for more info on each song.)

  11. maybe it was already mention, but “boogie with stu” comes by way of ritchie valens’ “ooh my head.” i believe there was some legal wrangling with the valens estate, but i do not know the outcome.

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