New office decoration: the Notorious RBG
Can you appeal a denial of summary judgment?

The Song Remains the Same—Or Doesn’t

Did Led Zeppelin plagiarize another song in writing “Stairway to Heaven”? A while back, a federal jury in California jury found that they didn’t. Last Friday, the Ninth Circuit reversed and remanded for a new trial. Skidmore v. Led Zeppelin, No. 16-56057 (9th Cir. Sept. 28, 2018). The dispute arose because of similarities between “Stairway to Heaven” and the song “Taurus,” written by Randy Wolfe and performed by Spirit. I haven’t read the decision yet and probably won’t comment on it here, but I thought I’d share it here for any music lovers and guitar players who may be interested.

Here’s a video of “Taurus.” If I did this right, it should start at 0:45, where it has a chromatically descending bass line similar to that in the intro to “Stairway.”

Comments

Feed You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

Verify your Comment

Previewing your Comment

This is only a preview. Your comment has not yet been posted.

Working...
Your comment could not be posted. Error type:
Your comment has been saved. Comments are moderated and will not appear until approved by the author. Post another comment

The letters and numbers you entered did not match the image. Please try again.

As a final step before posting your comment, enter the letters and numbers you see in the image below. This prevents automated programs from posting comments.

Having trouble reading this image? View an alternate.

Working...

Post a comment

Comments are moderated, and will not appear until the author has approved them.

Your Information

(Name and email address are required. Email address will not be displayed with the comment.)