| Author |
 Topic Search  Topic Options
|
marktheshark 
Forum Senior Member
Joined: April 24 2005
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 1695
|
 Topic: Just how overrated is Stairway to Heaven?
Posted: March 02 2006 at 23:36 |
|
This is something I've always wanted to get off my chest. Since age 12 I've bought every Zep LP when they've been released 'til Presence (In Through The Outdoor was a joke to me). So I'm not criticizing this song simply 'cause every classic rock station within 3 feet is playing it every 30 seconds. And yes they are!
Put simply, it's repetitious and plane boring! Every time it comes on the radio, I just turn it off! I hate it! Same way I feel about the Who's Won't Get Fooled Again and Skynyrd's Freebird. But unlike those, I didn't like Stairway from the beginning. Of course that was a good ELP song. Heh-heh!
|
 |
ken4musiq
Forum Senior Member
Joined: January 14 2006
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 446
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 00:17 |
All the song's that you mentioned are anthems. Stairway to Heaven has a lot of great lines. "If there 's a bustle in your hedgerow," Ooh, it makes me wonder,""And as we wind on down the road." These lines really speak to a fourteen year old mentality. As does, "I'm as free as a bird now; and this bird you cannot change." It's teen pop poetry. Don't forget, "They're all wasted" more anthemic than "We won't Get Fooled Again," which actually is not that bad but has the great line "Meet the new, boss same as the old boss." When you're fourteen, that's really cool. These guys created the mold for teenage angst rock. I think they really captured something that gen x teens felt and that stayed around for a long time.
I met Lyrnrd Skynrd's original drummer Artimus Pyle the other day and talked to him about the popularity of Freebird and how people yell it out at concerts. He said people always ask him about that. I think the practice is stopping but it took a bit of an effort.
BTW I finally came up with an answer to your other question.
Once to Pink Floyd "Careful with that Axe Eugene."
|
|
marktheshark
Forum Senior Member
Joined: April 24 2005
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 1695
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 00:42 |
 ken4musiq wrote:
All the song's that you mentioned are anthems. Stairway to Heaven has a lot of great lines. "If there 's a bustle in your hedgerow," Ooh, it makes me wonder,""And as we wind on down the road." These lines really speak to a fourteen year old mentality. As does, "I'm as free as a bird now; and this bird you cannot change." It's teen pop poetry. Don't forget, "They're all wasted" more anthemic than "We won't Get Fooled Again," which actually is not that bad but has the great line "Meet the new, boss same as the old boss." When you're fourteen, that's really cool. These guys created the mold for teenage angst rock. I think they really captured something that gen x teens felt and that stayed around for a long time.
I met Lyrnrd Skynrd's original drummer Artimus Pyle the other day and talked to him about the popularity of Freebird and how people yell it out at concerts. He said people always ask him about that. I think the practice is stopping but it took a bit of an effort.
BTW I finally came up with an answer to your other question.
Once to Pink Floyd "Careful with that Axe Eugene." |
I can understand a little of what you're saying EXCEPT that most of these songs were recorded for mostly late baby-boomers and not gen Xers which were about 10 years later. But they were still saying the same things the slightly earlier artists were saying like Beatles, Doors, Hendrix, Jefferson Airplane etc. It wasn't anything that much new. And BTW, Artimus was not Skynyrd's original drummer. It was Bob Burns.
|
|
GoldenSpiral
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: May 27 2005
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 3839
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 01:49 |
|
not very overrated at all.
you are overrated. burn!
|
|
|
|
marktheshark
Forum Senior Member
Joined: April 24 2005
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 1695
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 02:36 |
GoldenSpiral wrote:
not very overrated at all.you are overrated. burn!
|
You're just too stoned as usual Golden. Yes, there is a life beyond weed! Hello!?
|
|
Sean Trane
Special Collaborator
Prog Folk
Joined: April 29 2004
Location: Heart of Europe
Status: Offline
Points: 19626
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 02:50 |
STH is not over-rated
Just over-played
|
|
let's just stay above the moral melee
prefer the sink to the gutter
keep our sand-castle virtues
content to be a doer
as well as a thinker,
prefer lifting our pen
rather than un-sheath our sword
|
|
Guzzman
Forum Senior Member
Joined: August 21 2004
Location: Germany
Status: Offline
Points: 3563
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 03:19 |
Sean Trane wrote:
STH is not over-rated
Just over-played
|
Nothing to add!!
|
|
"We've got to get in to get out"
|
|
Trotsky
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: October 25 2004
Location: Malaysia
Status: Offline
Points: 2771
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 03:52 |
Sean Trane wrote:
STH is not over-rated
Just over-played
|
My thoughts too ... and whether or not you think Plant is a poser/lousy lyricist, I think he got in some excellent imagery on that song ... which (needless to say), I once interpreted as a socialist anthem
The song can still give me chills from time to time ... 
|
|
"Death to Utopia! Death to faith! Death to love! Death to hope?" thunders the 20th century. "Surrender, you pathetic dreamer.”
"No" replies the unhumbled optimist "You are only the present."
|
|
Easy Livin
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator / Retired Admin
Joined: February 21 2004
Location: Scotland
Status: Offline
Points: 15585
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 03:57 |
Spot on Hugues. If you're anything like me though, you still turn the volume up when it comes on. 
|
|
Snow Dog
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: March 23 2005
Location: Caerdydd
Status: Offline
Points: 32995
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 04:24 |
|
Not overrated.
|
|
|
|
marktheshark
Forum Senior Member
Joined: April 24 2005
Location: United States
Status: Offline
Points: 1695
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 04:26 |
|
Maybe I'm just getting too old, but I would give the Beatles' Strawberry Fields Forever or A Day In the Life or even the last 3 cuts of Dark Side Of The Moon over STH as rock masterpeices. Oh well!
|
|
Moogtron III
Prog Reviewer
Joined: April 26 2005
Location: Belgium
Status: Offline
Points: 10616
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 05:24 |
Guzzman wrote:
Sean Trane wrote:
STH is not over-rated
Just over-played
|
Nothing to add!!
|
Me neither, this guy speaks the truth
|
|
erlenst
Forum Senior Member
Joined: May 17 2005
Location: Denmark
Status: Offline
Points: 387
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 05:38 |
|
Not overrated at all, actually. It is one of the most amazing pieces of music I know. Hauntingly beautiful !
|
|
oliverstoned
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: March 26 2004
Location: France
Status: Offline
Points: 6308
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 05:39 |
Agree! Maybe Mark has listened it too often, but it's excellent, the lyrical guitar solo is amazing. Some live covers are even better, like the one on the live DVD. And Robert sings and doesn't shout on this one. Some find it too gentle, but not me.
|
|
Sean Trane
Special Collaborator
Prog Folk
Joined: April 29 2004
Location: Heart of Europe
Status: Offline
Points: 19626
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 05:55 |
Easy Livin wrote:
Spot on Hugues. If you're anything like me though, you still turn the volume up when it comes on. |
To ear-spiltting level when the mood fits me!!!
|
|
let's just stay above the moral melee
prefer the sink to the gutter
keep our sand-castle virtues
content to be a doer
as well as a thinker,
prefer lifting our pen
rather than un-sheath our sword
|
|
Sean Trane
Special Collaborator
Prog Folk
Joined: April 29 2004
Location: Heart of Europe
Status: Offline
Points: 19626
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 05:58 |
marktheshark wrote:
Maybe I'm just getting too old, but I would give the Beatles' Strawberry Fields Forever or A Day In the Life or even the last 3 cuts of Dark Side Of The Moon over STH as rock masterpeices. Oh well! |
HoweverI feel that Zep is overall over-rated 
Page was a major copyist.
Until Zoso which is tremendous, but I am sick/tired of hearing it, simply because so much over-played
This is probably the way you feel about Stairway
|
|
let's just stay above the moral melee
prefer the sink to the gutter
keep our sand-castle virtues
content to be a doer
as well as a thinker,
prefer lifting our pen
rather than un-sheath our sword
|
|
krusty
Forum Senior Member
Joined: September 27 2005
Location: United Kingdom
Status: Offline
Points: 1777
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 06:30 |
I agree with you Sean, overplayed
Not overrated. I know what I prefer on side three of " The Song Ramains The Same" and that's No Quarter!!
|
|
|
|
chopper
Special Collaborator
Honorary Collaborator
Joined: July 13 2005
Location: Essex, UK
Status: Offline
Points: 19944
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 08:05 |
Three brilliant but overplayed songs. All 3 deserve their status as rock classics.
I do wonder how Lynyrd Skynyrd felt sometimes, having to play Freebird at the end of every gig. I've heard them play it live (with the original band) and it is an awesome song. Artimus Pyle is a great drummer (and what a great name as well!).
|
|
Sean Trane
Special Collaborator
Prog Folk
Joined: April 29 2004
Location: Heart of Europe
Status: Offline
Points: 19626
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 08:35 |
chopper wrote:
Three brilliant but overplayed songs. All 3 deserve their status as rock classics.
I do wonder how Lynyrd Skynyrd felt sometimes, having to play Freebird at the end of every gig. I've heard them play it live (with the original band) and it is an awesome song. Artimus Pyle is a great drummer (and what a great name as well!).
|
I always thought the paralells from Stairway to Freebird quite overdone: sure they both go crescendo and ends in wild guitar solo , but the drums and full group get going quite quickly in Freebird.
Not much else common
|
|
let's just stay above the moral melee
prefer the sink to the gutter
keep our sand-castle virtues
content to be a doer
as well as a thinker,
prefer lifting our pen
rather than un-sheath our sword
|
|
Pafnutij
Forum Senior Member
Joined: October 02 2005
Location: Russian Federation
Status: Offline
Points: 415
|
Posted: March 03 2006 at 08:41 |
|
I think it's great classic rock. The acoustic intro riff is kinda cliche'd, but I like it nevertheless, and the rest of the song's pretty good too.
|
|
Donate monthly and keep PA fast-loading and ad-free forever.
/PAlogo_v2.gif "Progarchives.com Homepage")
Just how overrated is Stairway to Heaven?
