LED ZEPPELIN -BABE I’M GONNA LEAVE YOU/STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN
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THE RONETTES -BE MY BABY/BABY I LOVE YOU
The Ronettes recorded “Be My Baby” July 5, 1963 and it raced to the top of the charts ahead of “She Loves You,” the Beatles’s first big single, recorded July 1, 1963. When The Ronettes toured England in early 1964 the Rolling Stones opened for them—and John Lennon met Phil Spector, Ronettes producer, and they became life-long friends. The drumming in “She Loves You” (big and busy) sounds similar to “Be My Baby.” The overall production value is stronger in “Be My Baby” than “She Loves You”—and the excitement of the chorus (which included Cher in her first ever recording gig) is through the roof. “Baby I Love You” followed “Be My Baby” in the fall of 1963 and did not chart as well, but still has a great sound and a thrilling chorus.
The Ronettes is the only act in the Final Four with choral excitement and harmony, a timeless dramatic and musical strategy—which The Ronettes exploited as well as anyone. Real magic here.
Led Zeppelin’s “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You” (1969) has dynamics and drama completely opposed to “Be My Baby.” A powerful solo voice over an acoustic guitar laments and boasts for six minutes—a whole different feel from the orgy of adolescent giddiness conveyed in 3 minutes by “Be My Baby.” Robert Plant, Led Zeppelin’s lead singer, is desperate and autumnal—though “summer” is when he must “go away,” increasing the feeling of sorrow. “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You” does have a ghost of a chorus towards the end as its big drumming flourish lifts up the song’s hopeful agony. “Stairway To Heaven” goes even further in the art of dynamic range—again, there’s no chorus, but flute and acoustic guitars are effective voices and the song continues to build over strange, evocative lyrics (Plato’s bucolic nightmare is expressed in “and the forest will echo with laughter”) becoming self-consciously heavier in its rock sound until dionysus enters full-blown as Page’s electric guitar. The song ends quietly with “And she’s buying a stairway to hea-ven.”
Both well-crafted Led Zeppelin songs end—The Ronettes songs, after reaching their ecstatic heights, fade out.
WINNER: Led Zeppelin
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NINA SIMONE -I’LL LOOK AROUND/JUST SAY I LOVE HIM
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JEFFERSON AIRPLANE -WHITE RABBIT/LATHER
There is no chorus or big guitar solo in Nina Simone’s 1961 slow rock song—“Just Say I Love Him,” a duet between a languid, earnest, muted, electric guitar and Simone’s intimate and melancholy vocals. The whole song is “a guitar solo”—and Simone’s voice—actress, as well as a musical instrument—triumphs over the instrumental backing which is perfectly ideal for her. “I’ll Look Around” (1961, same album) takes a similar approach—Simone’s vocals intimately propound the poetry, and this time a lovely piano solo helps steer the song to its mournful but beautiful conclusion.
“I’ll Look Around” has especially marvelous lyrics.
I know somewhere spring must fill the air
With sweetness just as rare
As the flower that you gave me to wear
And the sweetness of spring is invoked by the piano’s tinkling solo.
And look at this intelligent and subtle passage:
I’ll look around and when I’ve found
Someone who sighs like you
I’ll know this love I’m dreaming of
Won’t be the old love I always knew
The delicacy here of considering a new love with the rueful admission that the new love “won’t be the old love I always knew…” This is unbelievably touching.
“White Rabbit” (recorded in the fall of 1966) by Jefferson Airplane might be the most perfect rock song ever made—the vocals, the instruments, the lyrics, the way it builds, and concludes. Is there anything better?
But this is a Two Song tournament. What about “Lather?” This, too, is an amazing recording, from early 1968:
“And I should have told him, no you’re not old…”
Here are some of the extraordinary lyrics:
His mother sent newspaper clippings to him
About his old friends who’d stopped being boys
There was Harwitz E. Green, just turned thirty-three
His leather chair waits at the bank
And Seargent Dow Jones, twenty-seven years old
Commanding his very own tank
But Lather still finds it a nice thing to do
To lie about nude in the sand
Drawing pictures of mountains that look like bumps
And thrashing the air with his hands
***
Lather was thirty years old today
And Lather came foam from his tongue
He looked at me eyes wide and plainly said
Is it true that I’m no longer young?
And the children call him famous
What the old men call insane
And sometimes he’s so nameless
That he hardly knows which game to play
Which words to say
And I should have told him, no, you’re not old
And I should have let him go on, smiling, baby wide
The effects, the lyrics, the haunting tune, the landscape and the life it creates! The only drawback is that it fades out too quickly.
WINNER Nina Simone
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THE CHAMPIONSHIP
NINA SIMONE
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LED ZEPPELIN
Led Zeppelin songs “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You” and “Stairway To Heaven” have better parts; Nina Simone’s “I’ll Look Around” and “Just Say I Love Him” are better as whole songs with every intricate element intermingling. The Nina Simone songs have sightly better lyrics; “Stairway To Heaven’s” lyrics are brilliant, but suffer a bit from too much mysticism. Robert Plant’s vocals are all you could ask for—Nina Simone’s are all that, and then some, but in a quieter way. If you are alone at midnight, or with someone you love, you will be better able to appreciate Nina Simone in her quiet and sad repose. In a more calculating mood, when the sun is shining, you will likely swear Led Zeppelin is uncanny and stronger in every way. How will this be judged many, many years from now? This contest never really ends.
AND NOW THE CHAMPION…
I’LL LOOK AROUND/JUST SAY I LOVE HIM
CONGRATULATIONS TO NINA SIMONE and those who made her album FORBIDDEN FRUIT.
This ends the 2021 Scarriet March Madness tournament—thanks for watching. Goodbye everyone. –Marla Muse