TONE WORLD "NEWZ"
09/30/08
“Hopping Around With My Friends On A Misty Mountain.”
The Led Zeppelin Project.
Part Two: “Happenings Ten Months Time Ago.”
2A: The Preamble.
Whenever The Slashtones and I approach doing a cover or tribute song we either try to pay tribute to more than one artist that has done the song before, (“Just A Gigolo” combined elements of both the Louie Prima and David Lee Roth versions, “You Really Got Me” combined elements of both The Kinks and Van Halen versions), or try and find an odd approach that hasn't been done before, (What would “Detroit Rock City” by KISS sound like if it was performed by Deep Purple with a horn section in a Las Vegas lounge in 1960?”) all while keeping the sound distinctively “Slashtonian”.
My original idea for “Misty Mountain Hop” from Led Zeppelin’s fourth album was going to be along the lines of “Led Zeppelin meets the Motown sound of the Four Tops”. Basically a Led Zeppelin tune with a huge funky horn section and four lead singers. We played with that idea for awhile but then decided to take a better approach, keep the multi singer concept but make the backing tracks sound like "Led Zeppelin meets The Yardbirds".
2B: The Ramble On.
I have to start off by saying that while this whole project was plagued with scheduling conflicts, “Misty Mountain Hop” was one of the most fun and least problematic songs I’ve recorded. The original song itself is not very complex and that’s the beauty of it
I was able to assemble most of this song’s cast together one rainy night in October 2007. (A rare thing on this project) Beside myself and co-producer Tarik Solongi i managed to get Steve Budgie, Tony Moore, Mark Hitt and Marianne DeAngelis all in the same room. We played around with various arrangements and tempos but the original song’s simplicity is it’s beauty and dictated we stick to the original’s arrangement. We got a very cool “late 60s / early 70s” live sound going and Steve Budgie’s drums, Tony Moore’s bass and Mark Hitt’s rhythm guitar were all recorded together in one take. Mark then added a second rhythm & lead guitar track and the guitar solo. (Yes, it was a Fender Custom Telecaster through a Marshall amp., what else?”)
The approach to vocals was still slated to be a multi person harmony on the verses with everyone taking turns doing the solo answer tracks. Tony and I recorded our parts for the verses, then decided to save the rest for another night and we all went home.
Recording on “Misty Mountain Hop” didn’t happen again until about 10 months after that first session. During that time I did wok on various other projects with Tony Moore, (and Arno Hecht, Felix Hanemann, Joe Lynn Turner, Mac Gollehon, ...), but never got around to recording Tony’s solo answer vocal tracks. He and his wife had just moved from NY to California and I was not about to ask him to run to a studio out there while he’s still unpacking boxes and getting settled in. We had just worked with vocalist Charlie Sabin on a Guns N’ Roses tribute and it seemed natural to bring him in on a Led Zeppelin song. I would keep Tony’s tracks on the verses and add Charlie on them and doing solo answer tracks.
At the second session I (Harry Slash) played an acoustic rhythm guitar track and Arno Hecht recorded all of his saxophone tracks. Use of the saxophones was always in question because neither Led Zeppelin or The Yardbirds ever really used horns as far as I know but let’s face it, everything sounds better with horns on it. We figured out the best way to use horns without straying from the "Led Zeppelin meets The Yardbirds" concept.
A few days later at the third session Mark Hitt added another guitar solo track to emulate the dual lead guitar sound from The Yardbirds’ Jimmy Page and Jeff Beck era. (Mark used his Ed Roman Custom Quicksilver through a Marshall.) Marianne DeAngelis played harmonica on the track the way Keith Relf might have done.
I had a week before the next session and I listened to my entire Yardbirds collection and the idea of four lead singers was no longer working for me. Had The Yardbirds actually recorded this song back in the 60s I’d imagine Keith Relf would have sang a lead vocal track with Chris Dreja, Paul Samwell-Smith and Jim McCarty singing backing vocal harmonies against Keith’s lead during certain parts and key phrases. The vocals we had recorded at that point were not going in that direction, they were more of a gang chant thing, so I scrapped them and decided to follow the original version’s lead of one singer multi-tracked. (Something I rarely do.)
Of all the singers I work with, the one with the most experience singing Led Zeppelin songs (other than maybe Randy Jackson of Zebra) is Charlie Sabin. I asked Charlie to try and stay away form the way the Robert Plant originally sang this song and let his own voice shine through. Oddly enough while Charlie is not as avid a fan of The Yardbirds as others on this project are, some of his vocal parts are slightly reminiscent of the late Keith Relf. It’s kind of like a cross between a little bit of Keith Relf and some Robert Plant but all Charlie Sabin in the end.
(While originally slated to play on “Friends”, Steve Budgie’s son Keith Werner was added to “Misty Mountain Hop” on shakers and vibraslap for reasons that will be explained in ‘Part Three’.) Felix Hanemann’s keyboard parts were the last tracks recorded in early September. Felix based his playing on the original but added his own unique approach to the song.
And that was it, five days worth of tracking sessions followed by two days of mixing and mastering and “Misty Mountain Hop” was done. Granted that was over an almost 11 month period of time, but at the end of the day I feel we achieved the "Led Zeppelin meets The Yardbirds" sound we wanted.
Unfortunately the final mix was slightly different than the track credits I had already submitted to Versailles Records. The correct track listing is Harry Slash: Acoustic Rhythm Guitar, Arno Hecht: All Saxophones, Tony Moore: Bass, Steve “Budgie” Werner: Drums, Felix Hanemann: Keyboards, Mark Hitt: Electric Lead & Rhythm Guitars, with Marianne DeAngelis: Harmonica, Charlie Sabin: Vocals, and Keith Werner: Percussion.
“Hopping Around With My Friends On A Misty Mountain.”
The Led Zeppelin Project Report.
PART I: “An Epic Tale. Two Years In The Making!”
PART II: “Happenings Ten Months Time Ago.”
PART III: “Friends, Romans and Countrymen.”
PART IV: “Coda.” (forthcoming)
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