Why Hotel California?

singemonkey

So, I'm puzzled. Why do cover bands always do Hotel California - a pale, corporate-rock immitation of Stairway to Heaven, and they never do Stairway? Stairway is approximately forty million times more awesome than HC. Confused.

Tokai-SA

Good question.

I think Stairway is one of the greatest rock songs of all time, a masterpiece.
Yet, it's always the song used to describe a kid playing in a music store and getting on everyone’s nerves. ???
Not for me, if a kids playing the intro to Stairway in a music store I dig it as long as he's doing a good job.
If a band played it at a gig I'd be a happy man, but they never do.
Perhaps most bands don't actually know how to play it and do it justice...the guitarist claims he learnt it 20 years, boring, well, if you learnt it 20 years ago then play it tonight. ?

Hotel California, man I love that song...perhaps just out of the Stairway league, but still a masterpiece.
One of the great solos of all time...can't get enough of it.
Most cover bands will f**k the song up in any event, although Peter Hanmer and Clint & Co nail it spot on.

Wizard

singemonkey wrote: Stairway is approximately forty million times more awesome than HC.

:roflmao:

AlanRatcliffe

Stairway needs a good vocalist that can pull off soft and sweet as well as hard and loud. Surprisingly hard to find. I've always preferred Stairway because the focus is on the composition and production rather than the solo.

Keira-WitherKay

It may just be most vocalists can't cope with what robert plant did vocally on stairway ? and hotel calif is considerably easier to make sound good is you have harmony backup , but roberts vocal acrobatics is reserved for A grade vocalists ,

Keira-WitherKay

? alan must have posted seconds before i did , so same thought on vocalists ability to crack led zep , ?

singemonkey

Right. I was wondering if it wasn't that. The "And as we wind on down the road..." bit is particularly challenging.

AlanRatcliffe

singemonkey wrote: Right. I was wondering if it wasn't that. The "And as we wind on down the road..." bit is particularly challenging.

That's the bit... ? The artists that can pull that off really well can rarely do justice to the rest of the song. The bands that tend to pull it off well live often use two different singers...

vic

singemonkey wrote: So, I'm puzzled. Why do cover bands always do Hotel California - a pale, corporate-rock immitation of Stairway to Heaven, and they never do Stairway? Stairway is approximately forty million times more awesome than HC. Confused.

I never hear Bohemian Rhapsody either ! ?

Seventhson

Personally I love hotel but personally I want to cover gary moores Parisian walkaways. ?

vic

Daniel Stuart wrote: Personally I love hotel but personally I want to cover gary moores Parisian walkaways. ?

That's a great song too.

singemonkey

Vic wrote:
singemonkey wrote: So, I'm puzzled. Why do cover bands always do Hotel California - a pale, corporate-rock immitation of Stairway to Heaven, and they never do Stairway? Stairway is approximately forty million times more awesome than HC. Confused.
I never hear Bohemian Rhapsody either ! ?

Haha. Excellent point. Not many doing Good Vibrations either. ?

Reinhard

I guess another factor is not everybody worships at the temple of Zeppelin.

I for one would not mind seeing a version like this performed live.

=

singemonkey

Reinhard wrote: I guess another factor is not everybody worships at the temple of Zeppelin.

Yes. There was one like that in my village. But we burnt him and salted over his fields. ?

I for one would not mind seeing a version like this performed live.

I remember this one from when it came out. I like that they completely rearranged it. A bold move, even if it was in the style of the time.

AlanRatcliffe

singemonkey wrote:
Reinhard wrote: I guess another factor is not everybody worships at the temple of Zeppelin.
Yes. There was one like that in my village. But we burnt him and salted over his fields. ?

Squonk

I never quite got the Joe Walsh era Eagles... although I think he is most probably the best part of the band, if that makes sense!

I have always loved "Stairway" and the version on "Song Remains The Same" has one of the most memorable Jimmy Page Solo's. The goosebump kind!

I still play it and don't feel ashamed...although after Wayne's World, I dont really give it a bash in music shops

Seventhson

Squonk wrote:
I still play it and don't feel ashamed...although after Wayne's World, I dont really give it a bash in music shops

hahhahaha. That made my day. ?

Warren

Stairway is a long, complex bit of music to get right in a band situation.

Our current band (the Band With No Name (tm)) has taken a few stabs at it, and at one point it wasn't sounding too bad. We're still working on it in between adding other bits to the repertoire.

I agree that the vocals are the toughest bit: I have a very average voice and it's not much built for rock, much less Robert Plant at the height of his ability. That "...wind on down the road" never really sounds the way I want it to: it's tough to get the right combination of pitch and aggression together.

That said, it's also difficult to get the right dynamics throughout the song, constantly building towards a climactic finish. It's not rocket science, but it takes a lot of work and practice (about 400 times more than, say, Cocaine (*shudder*) and I think lots of bands just chicken out after the first couple of awful sounding attempts.

Sean

ShreddySmurf wrote: ...and I think lots of bands just chicken out after the first couple of awful sounding attempts.

Or just being sensible ?

Warren

Sean wrote:
Or just being sensible ?

True ?

The keyboardist I played with used to say, "There are a million great songs to choose from, so why spend months on one song that you can only ever make 'OK', when you could use that time to put together 5 or 6 other great-sounding songs?"

Still, you want to balance that sort of thinking with the right level of challenge: it's also not fun to stay away from the difficult stuff just because it takes more commitment to get right.