Friday, April 01, 2005

"Misty Mountain Hop"

After seeing "Almost Famous" and hearing this song playing as the band arrive in New York to the memorable line: "Welcome to New York. It's OK to be nervous", I can't help but think of the dark underbelly of late 60s and early 70s so-called "innocence" whenever I hear this. Before, I had always enjoyed the back-beat, the hardcore opening riff and Robert Plant letting it all go: "Baby, baby, baby do you like it?". But I've read enough rock star biogs to know that there was just as much unpleasantness as there were God-like moments in front of a stadium crowd. There's something about the heavy-as-fuck beat -- perhaps it was the sheer size of Bonham's drumsticks -- that reminds me of ELO's "Don't Bring Me Down" (or should that be the other way around?) and makes me wish I had been around to hear this when it first came out, rather than filtered through history and a hundred and one pastiches.

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