Quick Question for the POW guitarist

[rhyd]

In I don't care are you using the riff from Misty Mountain Hop or is it a variation of that? Because to my ear it sounds very similar to that not that it is in any way a bad thing but i'ts just somthing that's been bothering me for a couple of days now.

[me]

yes...its a variation on that riff.much in the same way that zep would use an old blues riff(which in fact misty mountain hop is based on anyway!)and experiment with rhythm,intensity etc to create something ALMOST new!
in fact i dont care is a different rhythm drum pattern..more 4/4 than zeps..zep's actually starts with this riff(played actually differently) on a keyboard and then goes somewhere else completely.
its one of those riffs that i really wouldnt have any idea to who would claim to have used it first!
(did you know that the version of whole lotta love which was an old blues riff CLAIMED as his by willy dixon....was actually played at gigs in the version you know by led zeppelin....but a few years earlier..by the small faces!most people who heard it a box set rarities retrospective recently thought that the SF had covered zeps version instead of the other way round!)
cheers

[rhyd]

thanks for the reply! yeah blues and blues rock player's have been borrowing each other's riffs since it all began and there's nowt wrong with it. i always thought it was howlin wolf who did Whole lotta Love first... oh well guess i was wrong!

i also know that Black Mountain Slide was another one Zep borrowed, the whole borrowing riffs thing is a bit like a pop star who covered a very popular classic rock song and then that version (the rather iffy version IMO) becomes better known meaning i have to explain REPEATEDLY to people that they didn't write it. the frustrating thing is i can't remember the name of either ther pop star OR the song! stupid memory

[Dark Lord of Barnet]

The thing is that there are only so many notes in any musical scale, and they are only so many ways they can be arranged. Some artists deliberately or knowingly 'borrow' riffs or chord sequences - even some very well known ones! But often people are accused of 'ripping off' stuff by artists they have genuinely never even heard - it's inevitable this will happen. Have you heard the theory about what would happen if you let an infinite number of monkeys play with typewriters?

I once spent a whole afternoon working on a new song using an amazing riff I had just written. I was really pleased with how it was sounding. Then that night I went to see a band (Beki & The Bombshells) - I was stunned when they played a song using my riff! It was 'Burn' by Deep Purple. I was gutted! Back to the drawing board for me - my whole afternoon wasted!

'Black Dog' by Deep Purple used a great old blues riff.