“Timeless”: the Led Zeppelin song that inspired Ann Wilson to become a musician
When you consider the classic and hard rock movement, you think about some of the most mind-blowing music that continued to push boundaries and change the world. When you think about how against the rules the movement was and how much it persistently expanded upon what music could be, it’s surprising how male-dominant it was. Hard rock, in particular, was very male-heavy. That is, of course, until Ann Wilson and Heart came along.
Wilson and her sister, Nancy, started as a folk duo in the 1960s before turning into Heart. The band was a rock powerhouse that completely dominated the charts in the ‘70s and ‘80s. They were responsible for classic rock hits such as ‘Barracuda’, ‘These Dreams’, and ‘Magic Man’. Wilson’s powerful voice was at the forefront of every song, comparable to the very best, which she proved to the fullest extent during the Kennedy Centre Honours.
A single tear rolls down Robert Plant’s face as Wilson and Heart take to the stage to play ‘Stairway to Heaven’. Wilson’s voice pierces the room as she nails the outro that cemented Robert Plant as one of the greatest rock vocalists of all time. Many singers can only dream of hitting those notes, but Wilson did it with such ease that it moved the original singer to tears.
It’s a song that meant a great deal to Ann Wilson as it resonates as a classic rock song, and it’s one of the tracks that initially got her into music. “One of the main ones, in the beginning, was ‘Stairway To Heaven’ – because of the lyrics and the epic nature of it,” she said, “It starts out acoustic and gets as big as it can be, and it takes you on a real journey. I love that song.”
With this song in particular, while the words resonated because of their ambiguity, they profoundly affected Wilson. It wasn’t just about the literal interpretation of the track but was about how it made her feel. “I think it’s timeless and ageless and beautiful. Do you get the lyrics? Yeah, but I don’t think you get it with your cognition; I think it’s a felt thing.”
Wilson has consistently proven herself to be one of the strongest voices in rock. One of the tracks that set her on the journey to perfect her voice was ‘Stairway To Heaven’. As such, it was a full circle moment that she got to perform the track in front of the band that wrote it and cemented herself as one of the very best in the process.
The song taught her not just about the literal interpretation of lyrics but also how a song is performed can evoke feelings in the listener. She put that at the forefront of her music from then on, leading to her becoming one of the most respected vocalists in rock.
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