How rockabilly inspired Jimmy Page to write ‘Whole Lotta Love’
Led Zeppelin had a long and eclectic career where they weren’t afraid to try various styles of music and dabble in different ways to create sound. It means that no two albums are the same, leading to extended debates over the best Led Zeppelin period and when they might have fallen short of the mark. It can be frustrating when you disagree with people, but it is better to have too many choices than not enough.
Thanks to the eclectic styles heard throughout Led Zeppelin’s discography, finding a song that properly represents them is complicated. What would it be if you met someone who had never listened to the band before and you wanted to give them a track that perfectly reflects everything that they stand for?
The answer opens itself up for even more unnecessary debate, but a contender could undoubtedly be ‘Whole Lotta Love’. This song has a dash of everything that made Led Zeppelin so great. It starts with that hard-hitting riff, not too complicated but catchy enough to get anybody’s head banging. You also have Robert Plant’s voice coming through as fierce and gritty as ever, along with John Bonham’s drums trying to tear a hole through the earth’s centre.
As well as that, there is the elongated pre-solo, which sounds like a trip in itself, one representative of the love the song is about, order and disorder, working in harmony to make something that resonates with everyone in the world. It is a fantastic song, no two ways about it.
Something else that made Led Zeppelin great was their ability to draw from other genres and sounds and contort them to create something that aligned better with what they could do. This is also clear in ‘Whole Lotta Love’ as guitarist Jimmy Page confessed that the big intro, which the song is built around, was inspired by rockabilly guitar sounds.
“I suppose my early love for big intros by rockabilly guitarists was an inspiration,” he said, “but as soon as I developed the riff, I knew it was strong enough to drive the entire song, not just open it. When I played the riff for the band in my living room several weeks later during rehearsals for our first album, the excitement was immediate and collective. We felt the riff was addictive, like a forbidden thing.”
The track is undoubtedly one of the band’s most popular, and the power behind that riff, the way it nods to what came before whilst heading directly towards the future of rock, is precisely what made them stand out so much. Jimmy Page represents the ability to remain inspired and take from your influences in a way that is still true to oneself, and ‘Whole Lotta Love’ perfectly illustrates that.
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