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Led Zeppelin wore their influences on their sleeve, and whether this was conscious or happened subconsciously, they channelled their heroes. Therefore, when others have tried to emulate their sound, they’ve had to suck it up and take it as a compliment.

Most famously is ‘Whole Lotta Love’, while it is an entirely original piece, the lyrics, on the other hand, were a “nick”, according to Robert Plant. On this occasion, it was Willie Dixon who they’d stolen from and his 1962 track ‘You Need Love’, which Dixon wrote for Muddy Waters. The song had been previously covered by The Small Faces, which likely brought it to Plant’s attention, and the band eventually paid out in 1985 after a claim was forwarded.

Plant later told Musician Magazine: “Page’s riff was Page’s riff. It was there before anything else. I just thought, ‘well, what am I going to sing?’ That was it, a nick. Now happily paid for. At the time, there was a lot of conversation about what to do. It was decided that it was so far away in time and influence that… well, you only get caught when you’re successful. That’s the game”.

Admittedly, Zeppelin haven’t been ripped off as boldly as they did to Dixon, these examples below show they could have brought legal cases against other groups, but after being on the other side of the coin, that’s not an avenue they’ve chosen to pursue.

Several times, Jack White has acknowledged Led Zeppelin’s influence on his career. In Jimmy Page’s biography Light and Shade, he noted: “What was interesting about Led Zeppelin was how well they were able to update and capture the essence of the scary part of the blues”.

“A great Zeppelin track is every bit as intense and spontaneous as a Blind Willie Johnson recording”. White added, “They are an immovable force in music. I don’t trust anyone who doesn’t like them”.

Many songs released by him bear a striking resemblance to Zeppelin, such as ‘Blunderbuss’, which is in the mould of their more tender sound. However, none more so than the heavy-hitting ‘High Bell Stepper’, which is straight out of the Page playbook.

Although The Black Keys are only a two-piece, on ‘Little Black Submarines’, they managed to emulate the grandiose sound of Led Zeppelin, which could pass as the younger brother of ‘Stairway to Heaven’.

In 2014, The Black Keys drummer Patrick Carney revealed Zeppelin had influenced their then-new album, True Blue. Although ‘Little Black Submarines’ featured on El Camino, it does confirm how they’ve influenced the duo.

He told the Daily Star: “I’ve always been fascinated by making a record that you want to live inside of. Led Zeppelin II is a record like that, that I can really get lost in, because they’re almost not songs, they’re just riffs and beats and space and vocal parts. The way they utilised the form of a song always fascinated me”.

The late Soundgarden leader Chris Cornell once furiously tried to shrug off the Led Zepellin association with his band, but ‘Pretty Noose’ explains why they were regularly compared. Although Cornell was cut from a different cloth lyrically, his voice undoubtedly resembles Plant, and the effort is one that Zeppelin would be proud of creating.

In 1989, Cornell said: “When we first got stuck with that Led Zep tag three years ago, I thought it was OK Back then, everyone in Seattle was into the Smiths and the Cure and Led Zeppelin was very ’70s, very uncool. We were outcasts from the goofy art rock scene, which was fine by me. I just figured it could be worse, they could’ve compared me to Jim Morrison.

“Lately, though,” the frontman continued, “All the Led Zep comparisons have become a thorn in the band’s side. I mean, Led Zeppelin was never a favourite band of anyone in the group and, to tell the truth, I don’t really hear much Led Zeppelin in us, except that I sometimes sing in a loud falsetto”.

Whitesnake’s David Coverdale can protest all he likes about not being influenced by Led Zeppelin, but it just doesn’t ring true, and ‘Still of the Night’ is undeniable evidence. After all, there’s a reason why Robert Plant refers to him as “David Cover-version” and why Jimmy Page teamed up with the singer after failing to get a Zeppelin reunion off the ground.

“If I had sold 100 million records emulating anybody, then there’s something wrong in the universe,” Coverdale once defensively said regarding the comparisons to Zeppelin. However, ‘Still of the Night’ is essentially Led Zeppelin by numbers. Considering the originators of the sound were no longer around as competition, it’s no surprise Whitesnake were such a huge commercial success.

Greta Van Fleet are another example of a group who are the sonic children of Led Zeppelin, and this has won them an army of fans, including Robert Plant. They are a throwback to a bygone era of heavy rock, and according to Plant, “They are Led Zeppelin I“.

Furthermore, he described Josh Kiszka as “a beautiful little singer,” although Plant did then playfully add, “I hate him”. Plant was then asked what he thought about Kiszka’s “huge voice”, to which he replied: “Yeah, and he borrowed it from somebody I know very well! “But what are you going to do? That’s OK”.

‘Highway Tune’ is the most obvious comparison to Led Zeppelin, and rather than get worked up about being likened to the British legends, Greta Van Fleet take it as a compliment. “It’s being said over and over, and I think it’s one of the greatest compliments that could ever be given to a young band like ourselves,” they said in a 2018 interview with FaceCulture. “They’re arguably one of the greatest rock bands of all time, so that is humbling and inspiring and honourable, in that sense”.

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