New Music - Beth Rowley
I am so looking forward to this lady's debut album release in April, I have posted already a couple of fan filmed live clips but below you can now listen to her official recording of "Nobody's Fault But Mine".
Album Of The Year (2008)
Along with every other editor of a music-related publication, I've been busy compiling my albums of the year recently. Bizarrely, I think I've just discovered a dead cert for next year's list. Little Dreamer by Beth Rowley isn't due out until the end of April 2008 but I got hold of an advance copy at an industry showcase last week.
I really enjoyed her live but only got to hear a handful of songs on that occasion and, because I recognised two of them as covers, I wasn't sure if she wrote her own material. There are lots of nice-looking girls with good voices after all.
The album has banished any doubts I might have had. The covers, which make up about half the record, are blues, gospel, and country standards (plus a reggae version of I Shall Be Released by Bob Dylan) but they're far from obvious choices and are all beautifully arranged and performed.
Even more impressively, the original stuff is every bit as good. So Sublime, for example, is the best song Burt Bacharach never wrote for Dionne Warwick (and she'd be pretty happy with the vocal too), while Oh My Life could be 1960s Diana Ross.
The overall effect is like listening to a compilation of lost American roots classics, despite the fact that Beth is a 26 year-old from Bristol. Yes, it's retro but bloody hell it's good.
Source http://msnukmusic.com
Nobody's Fault but Mine
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"Nobody's Fault but Mine" is a song by English rock band Led Zeppelin, released in 1976 on their album Presence. The track features a compelling, phase-treated, delta blues-based riff in E minor (and later E major) from Jimmy Page which is complemented by unison wails from vocalist Robert Plant. Jimmy Page triple-tracked his guitar intro; playing one guitar an octave higher than the others.
In an example of their tight rhythmic interplay, drummer John Bonham and bassist John Paul Jones maintain the driving rhythm of the song, adding some very complex and syncopated accents during repetitions of the introductory phrase. The song also features a fine harmonica solo by Plant. many of the lyrics in the song were taken from American blues singer Blind Willie Johnson, who recorded it in 1927. Johnson never applied for a copyright for the song and so the band was free to apply their own. In contrast to Led Zeppelin, Johnson was given credit in passing by The 77s when they covered the song by adding the phrase "apologies to Blind Willie Johnson" [1].
When the album Presence was released, the lyrics of "Nobody's Fault but Mine" invited speculation as to what the song was actually about. Some thought it concerned Jimmy Page's blossoming heroin addiction. Others thought it was comparable to Robert Johnson's "Hellhound On My Trail" in that it was Plant lamenting Led Zeppelin's supposed deal with the devil.
From 1977 onwards, "Nobody's Fault but Mine" became a vital component of Led Zeppelin concerts, and was played at virtually every show until the group's final tour of Europe in 1980. One live version, from Led Zeppelin's performance at Knebworth in 1979, is featured on disc 2 of the Led Zeppelin DVD. During live performances, Plant often exclaimed, "Oh Jimmy!" right before Page went into his guitar solo.
Page and Plant would also record a version in 1994, released on their album No Quarter: Jimmy Page and Robert Plant Unledded. This version of the song is performed similarly to acoustic virtuoso John Renbourn's version as heard on his 1967 release "Another Monday". Page and Plant played an acoustic version on their subsequent 1995 No Quarter tour, sometimes swapping it with "When the Levee Breaks".
Jimmy Page performed this song on his tour with The Black Crowes in 1999. A version of "Nobody's Fault but Mine" performed by Page and The Black Crowes can be found on the album Live at the Greek.
"Nobody's Fault but Mine" was performed at Led Zeppelin's reunion show at the O2 Arena, London on December 10, 2007.
Led Zeppelin parody cover band Dread Zeppelin recorded a version of this song on their album 5,000,000.
Sources
- Led Zeppelin: Dazed and Confused: The Stories Behind Every Song, by Chris Welch, ISBN 1-56025-818-7
- The Complete Guide to the Music of Led Zeppelin, by Dave Lewis, ISBN 0-7119-3528-9
