The Last Bass Outpost

Main Forums => The Outpost Cafe => Topic started by: gweimer on January 21, 2010, 08:50:08 AM

Title: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: gweimer on January 21, 2010, 08:50:08 AM
The Beatnix.  Move over Roger and the Goosebumps.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WfoccRna6I
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: godofthunder on January 21, 2010, 10:22:59 AM
 I like it better than Zeps. version  :thumbsup:
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: drbassman on January 21, 2010, 10:34:49 AM
Cool!  I like that variation.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Highlander on January 21, 2010, 03:16:13 PM
Anyone ever heard Rick Nelson's song "Promises", or Randy California's "Spirit" instrumental called "Taurus" - both predated Zep's tune iirc
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Aussie Mark on January 21, 2010, 03:40:56 PM
There's an entire album of Aussie tribute bands doing Stairway to Heaven, recorded on a weekly TV show called "The Money Or The Gun".  There are probably YouTubes of the others as well.  From memory (I have the VHS tape somewhere) other bands include The Australian Doors Experience, a country and western version, an AC DC tribute, Rolf Harris playing his wobbleboard, and an actor (Leonard Teale) doing a William Shatner style recitation.  Worth Googling if you have the time and are interested in seeing more of these.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Highlander on January 21, 2010, 03:46:05 PM
Rolf Harris released it and had a No.1 hit over here... even played a festival or two... went down a storm...
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Basvarken on January 21, 2010, 03:52:49 PM
Brilliantly done. Every little detail is right.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: OldManC on January 21, 2010, 04:49:03 PM
Anyone ever heard Rick Nelson's song "Promises", or Randy California's "Spirit" instrumental called "Taurus" - both predated Zep's tune iirc

Haven't heard the Rick Nelson song but Taurus is pretty damning. Nothing new for Jimmy Page though...
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Highlander on January 21, 2010, 05:05:24 PM
I had a live version with Randy Meisner on bass; can't miss his harmonies - it's part of a doubled up tune called "Who Cares About Tommorrow - Promises" ... the "riff" kicks in at about 3.13 but wait for the harmonies at 4.10 - always seemed like a direct lift to me, just change the lyrics and jam... found this - total surprise... see what you guys think... I don't want to knock Mr Page's writing, but...
James Burton was a Page influence and he worked with RN around this time and before, too

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_LnAux3WEc4

I thought he was a great artist that went out tragically...

This is the Spirit track - intro to "stairway" starts at 45 seconds - this was released a few years before...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ogTFdlbup24

Take a piece from here, take a piece from there, build yourself a stairway to be proud of... one piece at a time, to cue another classic...
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Denis on January 21, 2010, 05:57:48 PM
Don't forget Zappa's version!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qP1OsoHjUPA

Or Dread Zeppelin's reggae version!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M7DqjyNGHJU
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: PhilT on January 21, 2010, 06:32:11 PM
I had a live version with Randy Meisner on bass; can't miss his harmonies - it's part of a doubled up tune called "Who Cares About Tommorrow - Promises" ... the "riff" kicks in at about 3.13 but wait for the harmonies at 4.10 - always seemed like a direct lift to me, just change the lyrics and jam... found this - total surprise... see what you guys think... I don't want to knock Mr Page's writing, but...
James Burton was a Page influence and he worked with RN around this time and before, too

I thought he was a great artist that went out tragically...

This is the Spirit track - intro to "stairway" starts at 45 seconds - this was released a few years before...

Take a piece from here, take a piece from there, build yourself a stairway to be proud of... one piece at a time, to cue another classic...


Interesting, though I don't think it would stand up in court  ;D   Spirit, though, great band.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: sniper on January 21, 2010, 06:47:08 PM
the little Spirit interlude was nice.

Zep has yet to give a LOT of credit where credit is due. i still like them and probably always will but their big blues breakout was rooted a lot deeper than the yardbirds. IMHO.

taking it back to Leadbelly's "Squeeze My Lemon" for starters is as far back as i can go just out of memory and lets not forget Willie Dixon's "You need Love" into "Whole Lotta Love". i believe it is in the spirit of creativity that an artist can take influences from earlier works and turn them into their own...not ness copying but rearranging and presenting has always been in the forefront of performing.

there is a small write up about some of it here: http://en.allexperts.com/q/Led-Zeppelin-501/influences.htm
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: jmcgliss on January 22, 2010, 07:16:31 AM
Zappa for President !
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: rockinrayduke on January 22, 2010, 08:40:31 AM
Quote
Nothing new for Jimmy Page though

Yes, don't even get me started on "Dazed and Confused"...
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: uwe on January 22, 2010, 09:11:14 AM
I like it better than Zeps. version  :thumbsup:

Me too. They've turned it into a song. Zep's original is a pretentious stranded whale to me that grates as it goes on and on and on. That's right, and I don't "remember laughter" either!
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: PhilT on January 22, 2010, 10:52:14 AM
I have quite an ambivalent feeling about Led Zep. I can live with the mining of blues heritage, that's always gone on, just LZ made more money from it than most. The songs can be overlong and pretentious, and they'd take a reasonably catchy riff like Kashmir and then bludgeon it to death. It often sounds to me like Plant is making the lyrics up as he goes along, and the Lord of the Rings stuff is awful. In the end, though, the performance overcomes all that.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Barklessdog on January 22, 2010, 10:57:28 AM
Thats how Barney makes a living- changing the words to familiar songs.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsKO_r76kfQ&feature=related
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: uwe on January 22, 2010, 11:41:26 AM
+1 on Plant's lyrics! They have always left me utterly cold. I don't find them sexy no matter how much lemon juice runs down his legs, I think they're po-faced and humorless, never witty and not relevant social commentaries either. Just words he sings with that admittedly remarkable and unique voice. He could be singing Chinese throughout and it wouldn't sound more non-connective to me. Even the sword and scorcery stuff is below par, Dio at least creates worlds with his lyrics even though it's the same world "on and on and on, it's heaven and hell". Frankly, Plant to me is as poor/rotten a lyricist as he is excellent a singer.

But then I've never even heard from the most devout of Zep fans that his lyrics are in any way relevant to them. Let's wait for what Ter will have to contribute to this ...  8) 8)  :) I'm sure he'll admit that (bar singing) chest hair and girlie kimonos are Herr Plant's most redeeming traits!  ;D
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Rhythm N. Bliss on January 22, 2010, 12:28:28 PM
The Beatnix are cute & even mildly badass but Dread Zeppelin's Stairway is 10 times funnier!!! ha haaa haaaaa

C'mon~ Zep's lyrics have always grabbed you, if you can only remember back to Zep I my dear ol' curmudgeons: From the first song--Good Times, Bad Times--you know I've had MY share! to the last song about Rosie stealing away...then on to Zep II for a Whole Lotta Love...Love is what it's all about, right? All You Neeed & all that.
I'll defend Plant to the end, I've always LOVED his lyrics, like many, many other Americans who set attendance records for the largest crowds to go see ONE band (An Evening With Led Zeppelin) & according to radio reports they were & probly still are The Band Most Rockers Are Blasting While Having Sex!!!
Zep is all about SEX--- from Your Time Is Conna CUM to Every Inch of My Love to All of My Love to....Bonzo's Montreux heh
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Muzikman7 on January 22, 2010, 06:43:26 PM
The only thing I liked about Led Zeppelin was John Paul Jones.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: gweimer on January 22, 2010, 06:55:08 PM
The only thing I liked about Led Zeppelin was John Paul Jones.

Not even Bonzo?  And regardless of what you think of their material, I've always thought Page was an outstanding producer.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Muzikman7 on January 22, 2010, 07:50:11 PM
Not even Bonzo?  And regardless of what you think of their material, I've always thought Page was an outstanding producer.
Ok I'll give you those two things, but as a band I think they're overrated.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Dave W on January 22, 2010, 10:41:23 PM
I listened to Led Zeppelin I and II, never a big fan. Couldn't stand III and IV, never listened again except when I can't get away from it.

 
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: sniper on January 23, 2010, 04:15:13 AM
i was a big fan up through lV. after that it seemed they were making good rock in search of a beat and i felt they lost me when they got away from what i realized was, as it has been named earlier "blues mining".

their earlier blues influences are a particular hobbit of mine but not too fruitful lately. i did a little collaboration work with Tommie B. but didn't like where she went with my lyrics or the melody it was written for (the original 4/4 beat was abandoned) so we parted for good. maybe i should have left the song in its released format but as i am on the copyright, i made her pull it for good. so all in all i can relate to being "mined" myself. yeah i am prolly a prick when it comes to situations like trying to co-write over the net and abuse of power but she did not have the authority to call it finished and put my name on the copyright without my consent. the fact of Zep's "mining" has left a bad taste so i am not a fan of their later work to even more extent now as i am reverting to a "blues root" and some 60's to 70's rock themes and a little classical jazz.

maybe i am a curmudgeon ... so what ... i don't bite! deep anyways, at least i don't sever arteries. in my old age i decided i would "rather write for no audience with myself rather than write for an audience without myself". thats a paraphrase of something i read somewhere but i can't remember where.

Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: uwe on January 23, 2010, 05:09:47 AM
Not even Bonzo?  And regardless of what you think of their material, I've always thought Page was an outstanding producer.

I think Page is one of the most brilliant rhythm guitarists, alternative tuners and chord inventors in the genre of rock, but I always hated the way Bonzo dragged behind the beat though everybody and his brother loved him for it. And Led Zep albums always sounded weird to me (for instance I never found you could hear well what Jones played), I think Page's much lauded production abilities are an acquired taste (he never did much production outside of Led Zep for other people). Zep production always lacked directness and separation to me plus sounded strangely middish and muddled in the presence frequencies. I either like orchestral producers like George Martin, Tony Visconti (Bowie and Bolan) or Bob Ezrin (Alice Cooper, Pink Floyd, Hanoi Rocks) or the more sound engineer types that give you a direct sound such as Martin Birch (Deep Purple, early Rainbow, MSG, B.Ö.C, Iron Maiden) or Tom Allom (Judas Priest). Or someone who deconstructs an artist to then build something fresh from his most profound characteristics like Rick Rubin, but he's in a league of his own.

My pet theory is that I prefer a European sound which the above producers (most of them Europeans) represent whereas Page - though a European himself - found something that you yanks seem to immediately latch onto though it leaves me scatching my head. Perhaps Zep sounds especially good through FM radio.

Uwe
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Denis on January 23, 2010, 05:11:59 AM
...and the Lord of the Rings stuff is awful...

...their earlier blues influences are a particular hobbit of mine but not too fruitful lately...

I want to go read "Bored of the Rings" now.  ;D

I always liked Led Zep but always thought Page was overrated as a guitarist.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: uwe on January 23, 2010, 05:26:55 AM
Well, let's put it that way, he was no doubt the worst lead guitarist of the Yardbirds, but that is a burden most of us would have to live with!!!  :mrgreen:

He's a very sloppy bastard when playing lead and his sound is so-so. Not Clapton's tastefulness, not Beck's uncanny phrasing, not Hendrix' drama and innovation, not Gallagher's grittiness and attack, not Gilmour's depth of tone and not Blackmore's moody precision and elegance. A lot of Zep solos on studio tracks sound like afterthoughts to me - the dramatic effect Whole Lotta Love ejaculation after the breaks (when the bee swarm has left the speakers) is an exception. That didn't keep him from conquering the US of A (and not really very many other parts of the world, Zep hardly toured anywhere else) with Led Zep though.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: uwe on January 23, 2010, 05:32:19 AM
While we're writing this so unabashedly a thought flickers across my mind: Does Ter keep guns at home?  ???

There you have it again: German angst.  :-\
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Denis on January 23, 2010, 05:40:42 AM
Why the angst? French to the left of you, Russians to the right...
I agree with you when comparing Page to the other guitarists you mention. With a few exceptions, I don't think his style brings up all that much emotion or feeling.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Rhythm N. Bliss on January 24, 2010, 01:11:12 AM
While we're writing this so unabashedly a thought flickers across my mind: Does Ter keep guns at home?  ???

There you have it again: German angst.  :-\

Yeah Guns N' Roses. heh
...swords n' a baseball bat.

JPJ is my fav bassplayer & he & Bonzo are the Most Powerful Rhythm Section Ever!!
Page is a genius & Plant is a phenomonen!! Utterly AMAZING MAGIC BAND!!!!

I don't care what anyone says, they LOVEd to play & it showed!!!!
I haven't seen anyone else play a 3&ahalf hour show.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Aussie Mark on January 24, 2010, 02:49:36 AM
Well, let's put it that way, he was no doubt the worst lead guitarist of the Yardbirds

Fortunately for him though, that meant zip for the studios that wanted him to play on their singles and albums.  I forget the exact stat, but I remember reading somewhere that Page played on 25% of charting pop/rock releases recorded in England in the 1960s.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Dave W on January 24, 2010, 11:59:45 AM
Or at least he claims to have played on that many. Some of his claims have been disputed, e.g. by Ray and Dave Davies.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: ilan on January 24, 2010, 01:36:53 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3iM63kqnwY
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: PhilT on January 24, 2010, 01:59:18 PM
Bonham grew up 10 miles north of where I live, before my time though. Any Woman of A Certain Age you meet in a bar round here slept with him and all the men played in a band with his brother. According to local legend he started in a band called Terry Webb and the Spyders. They did a reunion gig last year, without Bonzo obviously. Jim Capaldi grew up 10 miles in the other direction, but doesn't seem to have put himself about as much.
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Rhythm N. Bliss on January 24, 2010, 03:21:52 PM
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B3iM63kqnwY

Not bad!  ;D
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: sniper on January 24, 2010, 04:11:35 PM
and to think i was actually worried about damaging my chromosomes!!! ;) ;)
Title: Re: Stairway to Heaven
Post by: Rhythm N. Bliss on January 25, 2010, 05:35:15 PM
and to think i was actually worried about damaging my chromosomes!!! ;) ;)

Oh yeah~ I wasn't worried...that's probly why my twin daughters are little MONSTERS!! heh
They have all their digits in the right places & so on tho, thank the Lord!!

I'd never heard Spirit ~ Taurus before. Evidently Page did build off that. RC RIP
Saw Randy California & Ed Cassidy with Spirit in the mid 90s in my hometown- Glendale, California. A stage was set up right in the middle of a main intersection in the center of town.
Got Ed to sign a tambourine.
Randy talked about how he & Jimi were kindred spirits & played together in Jimmy James & the Blue Flames.
Funny thing is Mitch Mitchell was in a band by the SAME NAME! before joining The Experience!!
Kindred SPIRITs indeed.