The song so good that Led Zeppelin erupted in spontaneous dancing
Led Zeppelin’s musical origins started relatively close to home. They were inspired by blues music, and they ended up making a heavy and slightly more twisted version of it. It was incredibly appealing to audiences, but having one sound dragged out for multiple albums doesn’t result in one of the best bands ever made. Upon getting their recognition, Led Zeppelin sought inspiration from various places.
A common thread throughout the band is a love of travel. By travelling worldwide, the band was able to take inspiration from different cultures and find the foundation for potential tracks in unlikely places.
During his Desert Island Discs appearance, Robert Plant spoke about how, in the early 2000s, he went to Timbuktu and covered The Drifters in a desert with Ali Farka Touré. “In the middle of it all, I saw some and heard some of the most remarkable music,” he said.
“There was a little fire lit in a scoop in the night sky,” he added. “I mean, you’ve never seen a night sky like it. Ali Farka is just singing so quietly, playing the guitar and just singing these soft melodies, and Ali Farka smiles at me and nods to me, and I think to myself, ‘hmm, this is interesting.’”
Plant performing in the desert is hardly anything new; the band always wanted to immerse themselves in different cultures and establish new sounds. On a trip to Bombay, Jimmy Page and Robert Plant heard an Indian song that they thought was beautiful. It was filled with light and embedded with happiness, so much so that when they got home, they decided to write about it.
The end product was exactly what they were looking for, as it invoked that same feeling they had when hearing the original song for the first time. It had such a monumental impact on the band that they all ran onto the lawn at Stargroves Studio and danced to it. That spontaneity gave them the idea for the title and lyrical content; with that, ‘Dancing Days’ was born.
The track appeared on the band’s 1973 album Houses Of The Holy. As a light, vibrant summer song, it was a bit of a left turn for Led Zeppelin, something many fans weren’t quick to embrace, but it also highlights the ingenuity that kept them in the spotlight for so long. The song has impacted several artists as Stone Temple Pilots covered it in 1995, while Bobby Brown sampled the riff in his ’92 single ‘Humpin’ Around.’
Led Zeppelin was an excellent musician, which was enough to propel them to fame. However, they are considered some of the best not just because of what they wrote initially but because they continued to find inspiration from places other musicians in their genre never looked. The variety of their sound contributes to its timelessness, as rock music still looks up to them.
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