Did Led Zeppelin rip off "Stairway to Heaven"...

[Willie G. Moseley]

I've heard about this one for a long long time (and this isn't an April Fool's prank), and earlier today had pulled out Spirit's first album from '68...aspiring guitar players of any age should hear this, as (the late) Randy California was unbelievably good at about age 17-18. Harmony (overdubbed) double-leads several years ahead of the ABB and Wishbone Ash, and a jaw-dropping oozing tone that was more in-your-face than Nugent or Bachman ("American Woman"), and he used an old Silvertone/ Danelectro.

At any rate, it was reported that after the Yardbirds broke up, Page went to see Spirit when they toured England and was on the front row at one of their shows when Randy did "Taurus", an instrumental on the first album, pretty much as a solo piece. A few years later, here comes the intro to "Stairway" sounding just like it.

Unsure if "Taurus" is downloadable from a music source but it would be worth the fee just to compare. Granted, fifty-somethings like me might remember this better than younger folks, but Spirit's first album holds up almost 40 years after it was released.

California was swimming in Hawaii in '97 with his son when they were caught in an undertow; he shoved his son out of the flow, but was swept out to sea himself. His body was never found. R.I.P. to someone who was a real-life hero in addition to being a guitar hero.

[wyldbil]

You're killing me Willie! I gotta check it out now...

Thanks for tipping me to my next mystery to investigate!

[LordOfTheThighs]

Pagey lifting a riff ... I don't believe it!

Kind of coincedental ... I'm sitting here listening

to a Zep bootleg (Dallas 1975), when this comes up.

[atquinn]

Just checked it out on www.allofmp3.com. The first 4 chords of the progression are the same, but the last chord is different. Sounds pretty close to a rip off to me.

-Austin

[marcnorth]

Sure sounds a lot like the intro to Stairway.

I went to cdnow and had a listen, you only get about 20 seconds but it's enough to tell.

[mrhamerman]

Though I love Led Zep and consider Page one of my idols, his list of stolen riffs is long. I hadn't heard of this one, but one of the more famous ones was "Dazed and Confused". There was a show about that one on television.

[mrhamerman]

I just found this:

http://experts.about.com/q/Led-Zeppelin-50...in-rip-offs.htm

It's only rock and roll...

[Luke]

Almost all music is product of ripping off various riffs and melding them together. The amount of true inovators is very small.

[tomteriffic]

When I was a kid, I was trying to learn to improvise and everything I played was reminiscent of something else. My piano teach told me: "Don't sweat it. One or another of the Bachs wrote everything. It's all in there, maybe backwards or upside-down on the chart, but the Bachs wrote everything, and everything since then is a rip from them. Don't sweat it". I don't anymore.

Damn shame about Randy California. That band clobbered me as hard as Hendrix when they first came out.

[wil50n]

Taurus I believe is another 'borrowed' chord progression. Zeppelin used to throw Fresh Garbage into their live set in mid '69 within their version of I Fought My Way Out Of Darkness, originally done by Garnett Mimms.|I love Zeppelin to death, but I really wonder what they were thinking when they borrowed all these riffs and lyrics. Was it a homage to the blues originals, or were they thinking "No-one listens to this stuff any more, lets just take it and not credit the songwriter". They DID credit some stuff, but a lot went uncredited.

One that really sticks in my mind at the moment, and I'm starting to find it uncomfortable to listen to, is Custard Pie. The lyrics are from Shake 'Em On Down and Drop Down Mama, but I recently became aware that the basic rhythmic pattern is a slight variation on the Bo Diddley "Shave and a hair cut, two bits' beat. It's one of my favourite Zeppelin riffs, but as I said, I'm starting to find it really awkard to listen to knowing that they've taken all these lyrics and rhythms, and credited it to themselves.

David

[MARKVECTOR82]

So after reading all of these posts i can only surmize is that Zep was the greatest highest paid cover band of all time! And i love'm

[unclefred]

I have heard that Spirit opened for Zep on several shows as well. Don't know if that is true or not. Got to remember that Page never expected Zep to become a huge phenomenon, and by the time they did it the die was cast!

Don't even get me started about the Stones, Beatles, Cream, Mayall and Hendrix... let alone Allmans, Police, Johnny Winter, SRV and everyone else. The British bands are the biggest theives of all! Most of these artists whole shtick can be directly linked to some semi-obscure (particularly in England) black performer. Of course even those guys were "borrowing" things.

Still, I enjoy all of those artists, but don't view them with the same reverence that so many people seem to. Yes, it has all been done before, and sometimes that's why it's good!

By the way... if you want to hear where Cheap Trick got their whole thing...

Fred

[hamerhead]

Zep is one of my all-time favorite bands, but not giving proper credit for a lot of the stuff they did is sad. Wasn't there a court case concerning that?

[tafkathundernotes]

There's a Little Richard song (Keep a' Knockin', IIRC) that has the same opening drum beat as "Rock and Roll" by LZ. It could have been intentional given the subject of the song.

[hardheartedbill]

Custard Pie is Mickey's Monkey riff w/ blues popourri lyric

Lemon Song is Killing Floor w/ Robert Johnson lyrics

How Many More Times is The Hunter

Blk Mountain Side is a Bert Ganch(sp) piece

listen to Buddy Guy's 50's output to hear the sonic blueprint

Dazed and Confused is a Terry Reid song

and on and on and on, it's rather disturbing to hear the same exact riffs years after the fact

[Willie G. Moseley]

Earlier thread on these boards RE re-mixing and re-mastering ZZ TOP stuff reminds me: Randy C. was hyper-pissed that the drums on the first few Spirit albums (played by his step-father, Ed Cassidy) were "buried" in the mix, according the guitarist, and the percussion does indeed a bit sublimated. It would be interesting to hear versions re-mixed to R.C.'s standards, which were pretty exacting; he was a consummate musician.

+1 on what Wyldbil said RE the initial personal impact of the band. First track I ever heard was the loping, machine-like "Mechanical World" which was a definitive Spirit track with the aforementioned oozing double-lead guitars, an oddball beat and a string arrangement. Damn sure couldn't dance to it, and in 1968 most people had probably never heard anything like it. The first album and third album (CLEAR) were definitive tone-fests. The Kentucky Headhunters' Greg Martin is a huge fan, still gets excited about the guitar tone and the "siren" (actually a WEM CopyKat that's had its motor turned off on "Dark-Eyed Woman".

More people ought to know about Randy California. He was more of an innovator than many folks will ever realize.

[tbabinec]

Keith Shadwick has written terrific musical biographies of both Zep and Jimi Hendrix. Of Stairway to Heaven, Shadwick says that Randy California often mentioned that the opening guitar pattern sounds "exactly like" Taurus, and that California's explanation was that Zeppelin opened for Spirit on their first American tour. Shadwick then indicates that Taurus begins with the same 4 chords against the same descending lower line, but then goes into a rather awkward resolving chord before returning to the top of the progression. In Shadwick's view, Page's version supplies a simple but more elegant and emotionally satisfying two-chord resolution that is aligned with Stairway's peaceful opening.

Randy California got his name from Jimi Hendrix. Randy played in Hendrix's band in mid-1996 in New York before Chas Chandler whisked away Hendrix to England and fame.

[jujisque]

I'm sure he did rip it off and plenty of other things too. But everything that he did rip off or imitate he did better than the original and put his own stank on. I applaud him for most of it really. I don't know that I agree with the general feeling that music has to be completely original to be expressive or that performer's own work (this isn't a potshot at anyone)

[custom53]

Listen to the Small Faces / Steve Mariott "You Need Loving" (BBC Sessions - 1966) then listen to "Whole Lotta Love"

[md2020]

Did Page say "the history of music is the history of theft", or did he borrow that one, too?

[JohnnyB]

Randy California got his name from Jimi Hendrix. Randy played in Hendrix's band in mid-1996 in New York before Chas Chandler whisked away Hendrix to England and fame.

From the Wikipedia article about Jimi Hendrix:

"Greenwich Village:

In the summer of 1966, Hendrix formed a new band named Jimmy James and The Blue Flames, comprised of various friends he would casually meet at Manny's Music Shop, including a 15-year old runaway from California named Randy Wolfe. Since there were two musicians named "Randy" in the group, Hendrix dubbed Wolfe "Randy California" and the other "Randy Texas". Randy California would later co-found the band Spirit with Ed Cassidy."

[hardheartedbill]

for the record I'm a HUGE Zep fan

[Michael_]

Interesting fact...

The new RHCP single is called 'Randy California'. Wonder what it's about. Could be the same subject.

[Brooks]

here's a clip on amazon. its similar, but i don't hear the upper extentions of the chords, just the descending lower voice on the D string.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000002AE...v=glance&n=5174