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"Swan Song"


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Does anyone have any idea as to how developed the track "Swan Song" ever ended up becoming? I'm really interested to know if there were ever any lyrics (of course there's The Firm's version, but I wasn't sure if there were ever any lyrics in the original LZ version). It's a shame that it wasn't really pursued because it's such a beautiful song; it makes me think of other Led Zeppelin songs that never made it out there :(

Thanks for any input! :) 

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1 hour ago, Piper_Led_Head said:

Does anyone have any idea as to how developed the track "Swan Song" ever ended up becoming? I'm really interested to know if there were ever any lyrics (of course there's The Firm's version, but I wasn't sure if there were ever any lyrics in the original LZ version). It's a shame that it wasn't really pursued because it's such a beautiful song; it makes me think of other Led Zeppelin songs that never made it out there :(

Thanks for any input! :) 

Jimmy played snippets of the song during the 77; tour during his WS / BMS interlude as well as Over Europe 80'. There is also a YouTube video of what is believed to be the full amount of the song Page wrote and recoded during the PG sessions (see below). The two songs I really wish they would have stuck with and developed are Fire & Shake My Tree as both were worked on during the ITTOD sessions. I have no clue why SMT especially was not fleshed out at the time as it was a big hit for Coverdale Page, and Plant performed it during the 95' PP tour. Zen mysteries indeed.

 

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17 hours ago, kayley10 said:

Has it ever been confirmed that Shake My Tree was an ITTOD outtake? I certainly never heard any tape of that!

No tape exists in fan circles. However has been widely known it to be the case SMT was from 78. From Jimmy himself and I believe I've heard Jonesy agree on that in an seperate instance before.

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SMT did not go beyond Bonham and Page. Jones and Plant didn't know what to do with it so no track was developed to record. It was the basic riff then "dynamic movements" that were charted out.  Think Bring it On Home with a Heartbreaker solo with 3 gutters, 2 channels and no chorus. Not much to play along with if you are thinking pads, strings and trumpet sounds on a keyboard and they already had one epic in the can.

It would have been on the riff based next LZ album (not CODA)  The riff is "borrowed."  Page tried it again at The Mill with Paul Rogers and nope.  Next.  Opted for You've Lost that Loving Feeling.

Coverdale was ok with it and it turned out to be significant, especially live as Page brought out some nice showmanship and included his Theremin.

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6 hours ago, Dallas Knebs said:

SMT did not go beyond Bonham and Page. Jones and Plant didn't know what to do with it so no track was developed to record.

Exactly, so.  Jimmy said it in one of the interviews in Brad Tolinski's book: 'the acoustic lick that opens Shake My Tree was something I'd originally presented to Led Zeppelin during the In Through The Out Door sessions. At that time there wasn't any sort of mass enthusiasm for it. No one except for Bonzo really seemed to understand what to do with it, so I filed it away.' 

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  • 3 weeks later...

Getting back to the track "Swan Song," I know parts of it were put into The Firm track "Midnight Moonlight," but people act sometimes as if "Swan Song" IS "Midnight Moonlight," when it's clearly not. If you listen to the songs back to back, there is a whole bunch of music on "Swan Song" that didn't get transferred over to "Midnight Moonlight." Once again, not including "Swan Song" on the PG companion disc is a travesty. There was more than enough room for it. I know Jimmy tried to stay away from things that have already been bootlegged. I can understand that, but when there is room on the CD, and you can finally get the song released with decent sound.....

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Well with "Swan" pretty sure Robert heard it and was not really inspired. I think the Page-recorded 70's version/s are

interesting but just like the Firm version, it's kind of beautiful but to me anyway lacks momentum at times. But if others

think it would have ended up a Zep classic, that's cool. I actually saw Page and Paul Rodgers do it before it was recorded

at two of the NYC ARMS shows in 83'. MM was intriguing and original, but again to me some parts weren't  laser sharp as

with something going on a Zep album.

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37 minutes ago, BledZabbath said:

Why the term Swan Song for other bands, as in "that's their Swan Song"?

 

Not sure, but Zep always had a sense of humor. After all, their band name means failure. So I'd guess they named their label Swan Song for a similar tongue-in-cheek reason. (The winged-man logo comes from a German artist's drawing, but it also looks quite a lot like Icarus in his final moments of flight before his wings melted - another fatalistic/ironic failure image...)  As for the song/musical suite itself, perhaps Page thought there was an elegiac or funereal quality to it.

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23 minutes ago, tmtomh said:

 

Not sure, but Zep always had a sense of humor. After all, their band name means failure. So I'd guess they named their label Swan Song for a similar tongue-in-cheek reason. (The winged-man logo comes from a German artist's drawing, but it also looks quite a lot like Icarus in his final moments of flight before his wings melted - another fatalistic/ironic failure image...)  As for the song/musical suite itself, perhaps Page thought there was an elegiac or funereal quality to it.

I meant why do people use the term, like an example with Sabbath's Spiral Architect, "that's their Swan Song"

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On 6/6/2017 at 7:04 AM, Brigante said:

Spiral Architect clearly wasn't Sabbath's swan song - if someone says it was, they've just misunderstood the term, that's all.

 

I was just using it as an example, at the spur of the moment.

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