Court Rules Plant, Page Must Face "Stairway to Heaven" Jury Trial/ Decision*

While I think he had a good chance of winning the suit, I think settling on those terms was an excellent legal resolution for John. It would have cost him a lot of money to defend the suit. It cost him nothing to include some songs he loved on an upcoming album.

 

Technically, only Plant "openly admitted" to stealing.

The Page quotes in your link are not an admission of theft.

 

Really? You missed the point. Loving and caring for your child is the RULE, not the EXCEPTION. There was nothing to take offense to in that statement...

 

Both songs suck? Laughable indeed.

 

No, but the choice of words he made was really poor.

He could have said that they sometimes started jamming using some blues/rock as basis, and sometimes the jamming evolved into a new song -- a relatively common method of composition for rock and pop musicians.

Instead he said "I always tried to bring something fresh to anything that I used. I always made sure to come up with some variation. In fact, I think in most cases, you would never know what the original source could be."

Those comments portray him as openly copying some composition and later doing something to "erase the fingerprints."

 

To me, that's maybe being concerned that Morris Levy's goons were going to do him over if he didn't cough up something.

 

Yeah, and although it doesn't make it anymore right, Steve Marriott took credit first for the ripoff for his You Need Loving, with The Small Faces, which had even more similar lyrics than Whole Lotta Love.
The article is about one song, but even on the other tracks where they were accused (many which are assumptions by people who think every cover they reworked only had proper credits added later lawsuits, which is not the case,or were open domain songs) Page is still making the point that music to blues and folk are so similar that as long as you tweak it a bit and rearrange it some, it sort of does become yours, because the original idea they built upon, has been traditional for years.
Meaning, as he said, if you change the lyrics you only don't need to do too much to the music, especially if you add a lot to it.
I always reference the Leiber and Stoller song Trouble written for Elvis.
They get full credit as the songwriters because of the lyrics even though the music had been done a million times with the blues.
Rockbabilly and Reggae are even worse than anything Zep ever did.
My God, every other song uses the same music with different lyrics.

 

Saying what, exactly? What Page describes is the use of another song as the basis for the creation of a new song, not "stealing" music.

 

I agree completely with the result but question for the lawyers. In the preliminary judgment which sent it to trial, i.e. didn't find enough evidence to reject the claim without a hearing, the judge referred to tone and feel, that was a connection in this regard between the two songs. But, if it ended by being judged just on the sheet music, and you couldn't hear Taurus played in court, how could tone and feel matter? In other words, does the fact that the sheet music had to be the basis of the suit mean it should never have gone to the jury?

On another point, to me Summer Rain and the catch a shad song, amongst others, dispose of any uniqueness to Taurus. Both have that spacey "atmosphere", it's not just the similar descending notes. And the tempo in the shad song seems quite close to that of Taurus. There is just too long a history of similar-sounding material...

Anyway good call by the jury, justice was done in my view.

 

I really liked Randy California. I had the privilege to meet and talk with him a few times. Once was a lengthy conversation at a guitar show in Los Angeles in the mid 1990's where he had a booth and was promoting his music and signing autographs. We discussed a number of topics regarding the state of music at the time and Spirit's past and future. Randy seemed to be in a good space and did not appear bitter whatsoever.

Although I was not a close personal friend, it's hard for me to believe that he really thought of Stairway as a ripoff. He was a professional and knew the components of songwriting. Unfortunately, he is not here to state his version of events. Perhaps the outcome would have been much different, but I think if he felt he really had a case, he would have pursued it much earlier.

 

The judge rejected "tone" and "feel" before the trial, for two reasons: one, because those things can't be copyrighted; and two, because the sound recording of "Taurus" would not be entered into evidence (and you can't really analyze the "tone" of sheet music).

Malofiy was trying to use those elements as proof that Page must have copied from "Taurus" (i.e., "Both songs used an acoustic guitar and a string section, which proves that Jimmy was copying!")

The judge allowed it to go to a jury because there was still a similarity between the sheet music of "Taurus" and the sheet music of "Stairway". But the jury concluded that such similarity was not "substantial" (as required by the court).

 

Led Zeppelin's 10 Boldest Rip-Offs »

 

Okay thanks, I thought the judge had suggested in that judgement (the one that sent it to trial) that the 2 songs did have a similar tone and feel, but I guess not.

 

That's right. I got my scumbags confused. Sorry.

 

Are you freakin' kidding me?! For God and your childrens' sake, I hope you are childless.

 

People! Don't you understand a joke? Seriously?

 

"Farewell to Cash Grab!"

 

Led Zeppelin Shouldn’t Have Won the Taurus/Stairway to Heaven Court Case | The American Spectator »

 

There were only 4 songs mentioned in that link, and one of them ("Babe I'm Gonna Leave You") could hardly be described as a "bold rip off".

 

Nothing to joke about.

 

I'm completely open to a well-reasoned argument in favor of "Spirit", but it's hard for me to take that argument seriously when it starts with "the two bands toured together".

 

I think we have to be careful to not get caught up in "our favorite band" mindset and really look at the facts. This accusation has been around for many years and I for one am glad it's over. I have listened to both those songs very carefully and personally never thought there was much of a case.

My fear was that if Spirit had been successful, it would have set a president that would have opened up a floodgate for these kinds of frivolous lawsuits. If Zeppelin had lost, they are in a financial position to handle it. However, had the situation been reversed, could Randy California or surviving band members financially withstood the damage from such a decision? I don't think so. I thought the decision was fair and we can all move on from it. Let this be a lesson to those thinking about the same to have your facts straight before taking on such an endeavor.

 

Why on earth would that turn you off. It shows Zeppelin had ample opportunity to hear it. Jake Holmes toured with the Yardbirds when he heard Dazed and Confused and decided to change it a bit and put his name on it. And please don't come back with the justification that it's ok because they improved on it.

 

But they did and they did so after it was presented in detail in the courts twice. The first time wasn't a loss and the second time was a win. Spirit is 0-1-1, while Zeppelin is 1-0-1

 

Clever but I think you need to listen to the song again.

Spoiler

The lady was wrong.