Robert Plant on Led Zeppelin’s “Stairway to Heaven”: As time goes on, you may find another period of your life has got a little bit more substance – VIDEO – INTERVIEW
How does Robert Plant truly feel about Led Zeppelin’s iconic song, “Stairway to Heaven?”
Robert Plant:
It’s not about it being my favorite or not. It has nothing to do with that, really. It belongs to a particular time. If I had been involved in the instrumentation, I would feel that it’s a magnificent piece of music, which has its own character and personality. It even speeds up in a similar way to pieces of more highbrow music.
My contribution was to write lyrics and to sing a song about fate and something very British, almost abstract, but coming out of the mind of a twenty-three-year-old guy. And it landed in the years and the era of twenty-three-year-old guys. I think as time goes on, you may find another period of your life has got a little bit more substance or is more relative later on down the line.
During an interview with Ultimate Classic Rock Nights radio show in 2019, Plant said the following about “Stairway to Heaven”:
Of course, it was a good song. The construction of the song, the actual musical construction is very, very good. It’s one of those moments that really can stand without a vocal – and, in fact, it will stand again without a vocal, I’m sure, because it’s a fine, fine piece of music.
Lyrically, now, I can’t relate to it, because it was so long ago. I would have no intention ever to write along those abstract lines anymore. I look at it and I tip my hat to it, and I think there are parts of it that are incredible. The way that Jimmy [Page] took the music through, and the way that the drums reached almost climaxed and then continued. It’s a very beautiful piece. But lyrically, now, and even vocally, I go, “I’m not sure about that.”
