The disappearing Beatles/Led Zeppelin mash-up:

ByPaul Merry

UPDATED August 14, 2021.

Good news, the Beatles/Led Zeppelin mash up has started to reappear. Check it out below.

“Always one of the most enjoyable reads about music! Go to paulmerryblues.blogspot.co.uk for the insights and observations of @PaulGMerry. The Project (@MartyrsProject), Indianapolis, USA. July 7, 2014.

This post originally featured the now-famous mash up of the Beatles’ Helter-Skelter with Led Zeppelin’s Whole Lotta Love. Unfortunately, the video proved so popular, the Universal Music Group (UMG) has blocked it all around the world. You won’t find it anywhere now. Some of these big corporations simply don’t understand the benefits of word-of-mouth publicity, do they? So all we’re left with now is a bit of info about each song.

 
“Helter-Skelter”, written and sang by Paul McCartney for the Beatles’ White Album in 1968, is the song that infamously inspired the crazy followers of Charles Manson to go on a killing spree in Los Angeles in 1969. Four people were murdered including the film actress Sharon Tate.
Happy days. The Beatles recording Helter-Skelter in 1968

A helter skelter, for those unfamiliar with them, is an old-fashioned British fairground attraction where a tall spiral slide winds around a tower.

Paul McCartney was inspired to write it after hearing Pete Townsend describing the Who song ‘I Can See For Miles’ as the loudest, rawest, dirtiest song the Who had ever recorded. Said Macca:
“I said to the guys (the other Beatles), I think we should do a song like that; something really wild. And I wrote Helter Skelter. You can hear the voices cracking, and we played it so long, and so often, that by the end of it, you can hear Ringo saying, ‘I’ve got blisters on my fingers’. We just tried to get it louder. ‘Can’t we make the drums sound louder?’ I said. That was really all I wanted to do – to make a very loud, raunchy rock & roll record with The Beatles. And I think it’s a pretty good one.”

“Whole Lotta Love” was written and recorded by Led Zeppelin for Led Zeppelin 11 (Two) in November, 1969.

Led Zeppelin recording Whole Lotta Love in 1969

Willie Dixon was later added to the list of composers after it transpired
Robert Plant had taken lyrics Dixon had written for “You Need Love” for Muddy Waters and used them on the Whole Lotta Love” recording.
Plant has been quoted as saying:

“That was it, a nick, now happily paid for. At the time, there was a lot of conversation about what to do. It was decided that it was so far away in time and influence that … well, you only get caught when you’re successful. That’s the game.”

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