Robert Plant has mostly kept his Led Zeppelin past to himself since the group officially broke up in 1980. But there are a few songs from the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame band's catalog that he's revisited and revised over the years. current summer Can't Let Go tour with Alison Krauss;
On Friday (June 7), the duo released their rousing live version of the country blues classic “When the Levee Breaks,” which was famously cranked up to arena-bombing levels. Led Zeppelin IV. In the pair's rendition of Memphis Minnie and Kansas Joe McCoy's 1929 song, the track morphs into a mix of Celtic chant and mournful country ballad with a combination of drums and fiddle complimenting their interlocking vocals.
The version that they have been playing live together since 2007 has echoes of the Middle Eastern influences heard on Page and Plant's 1994 album No quarter live album and represents their first new music release since their 2021 Grammy-nominated album Raise the roof. “Mean old levee taught me to cry and moan/ Mean old levee taught me to cry and moan/ It's all it takes to make a mountaineer leave his house,” croons Plant as Krauss doubles the his vocals, giving the already ominous arrangement a more haunting feel.
String player Stuart Duncan takes a dramatic violin solo midway through as he goes toe-to-toe with a furious drum pattern before ending the four-minute tour de force with Plant's signature “coming down, coming down now.” The song also features the duo's crack live band, which also includes Duncan, guitarist JD McPherson, drummer Jay Bellerose, bassist Dennis Crouch and Krauss' brother, multi-instrumentalist Viktor Krauss.
The pair perform “Levee” – along with some other Zeppelin covers such as “Gallows Pole” and “The Battle of Evermore” – as part of the tour, which also showcases their takes on a number of other rock classics, country and bluegrass standards from Raise the roof and its Grammy-winning predecessor in 2007 Sand lifting. The Can't Let Go tour kicked off earlier this week and will hit the Mystic Lake Amphitheater in Prior Lake, MN on Friday night.
Listen to “When the Levee Breaks” below.
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