Rock and Roll by Led Zeppelin vs Rock and Roll by Velvet Underground

there probably is a VU song I like more than any given Zep song but right now I can't think of one

VU

The Velvets song has heart. But Football In The Groin has John Bonham.

Zep

If there was a jukebox in the world that had only the entire VU catalog plus "Boogie With Stu," I would play "Boogie With Stu" over and over and over. Therefore, Led Zeppelin.

VU

I'm not sure which one is better but I know which one rocks harder/sounds like an actual rock n roll song. in the original version of the VU song, the guitar is practically playing a bossa nova figure

Also, never forget Charles "Keep A Knockin'" Connor. http://www.legendarydrummer.tv/

In that one sound like an actual, specific, rock n roll song.

playing VU's track and it's not their fault at all and they came first but my first reaction is that it sounds like Belle & Sebastian

Oh, it's definitely their fault, Dan.

haha well I was trying to give them the benefit of the doubt

This is going to turn into one of those thousand post take-no-prisoners threads, isn't it. Waiting for a voice of reason who can see both sides like Sund4r to arrive.

Phil D my man

zep

I can def see both sides. as would be expected Lou does something a good deal more interesting lyrically than Plant's sub-Mike Love schtick, positioning r-n-r as an anti-suburban, anti-consumerist, anti-herenormative cultural oasis

"When The Levee Breaks" vs. "Ocean"

VU song doesn't really start to "rock" until the drums shift into that Motown stomp rhythm and the distorted guitars take over

I'm not even much of a Zep fan, and this is Zep by far for me.

"When The Levee Breaks" vs. "Ocean"

You could actually do "Ocean" versus "The Ocean."

yep it's zep

woo it's the VU

don't be bitter, it's not gary glitter

it was all right

yep it's zep

^ title of failed Monkees-esque Led Zeppelin sitcom.

One's about looking forward. One's about looking backwards.

I'd vote VU over Zep but Zep wins this

VU over Zep in an artists poll, i mean

Both absolutely brilliant, little tired of LZ's at this particular point in my life. Prefer the VU's "Rock and Roll" as originally released, rather than the alternate version that came out years later (which may in fact be the true original); even more so when it comes to "Sweet Jane."

I think of Cadillac cars when I hear Zep's, so I'm going with the Velvets.

velvet goldmine

Sadly I can only picture Cadillacs when I listen to Zep's. Because I was like 12 when that ad came out. Although the version on "How the West..." is friggin tremendous. Alas, going with VU here

oh, ha, didn't see Alex's post. honestly think that ad was what made 12 year old me get sick of classic rock at last though

Don't know if those last posts have a double meaning, but it's VU who actually mention Cadillacs in their song.

like a rock, i was strong as i could be

I'd say the VU's "Rock and Roll" a better song but Led Zep's is a more of a classic recording with Bonzo' really laying out a bad ass drum lick to open the tune.

Other options -

ZZ Top vs. Rolling Stones "Brown Sugar"
Grand Funk Railroad vs. Black Sabbath "Paranoid"

Been a long time since/her life was changed by rock and roll

Don't know if those last posts have a double meaning, but it's VU who actually mention Cadillacs in their song.

― clemenza, Monday, September 16, 2013 5:27 PM (38 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gpD7f8gWgDg

lol @ cadillac talk

No, I got the reference to the Led Zeppelin Cadillac commercial--just was pointing out that the other "Rock and Roll" actually mentions Cadillacs.

VU...the Loaded version is quite possibly Lou's greatest vocal

otm. Good thing he didn't let Doug sing it.

feel like people who'd pick the velvets are lying to themselves

Although the version on "How the West..." is friggin tremendous.

If this was between live Velvets and live Zep, I'd give it to the Velvets hands-down, even though I voted for Zep in this poll. Except for Jones and Bonham (mostly), live Zeppelin was a winded, unfocused, fumbling mess.

Tend to be underwhelmed by tunes with "Rock 'n Roll" in the title, feel like they end up succumbing to the truism of trying too hard to live up to their name and failing, making me want to listen to some actual 50s stuff from the official Rock and Roll Era like, um, Little Richard. Lou Reed finesses this by being deliberately underwhelming in the first part, since he is just telling the story of how her life was saved by rock and roll but she hasn't actually been saved until the latter part of the song. /its_quine_time

Forgot to mention Lou's rule that anyone who played a blues lick would be fined and him saying "Everyone's going crazy over all the old blues people but they're forgetting about all those groups, like The Spaniels, people like that. Records like "Smoke From Your Cigarette," and "I Need A Sunday Kind of Love," "The Wind" by The Jesters, "Later For You, Baby" by The Solitaires. All those really ferocious records that no one seems to listen to anymore are underneath everything we're playing. No one really knows that."

"Despite all the amputations / You know you could just go out / And dance to a rock 'n' roll station"

The Velvets espouse Rock's ability to bestow dancing prowess upon the limbless.

FACT

(Thought "The Wind" was by The Diablos, one of Jonathan Richman's favorite groups besides The Velvets, but I guess this is the cover version. Source had it as *The Chesters*)

I've always wanted to know what exactly a five-year-old expected to be happenin' anyway. Like was she reading "Ondine's Big Book of Fun for Kindergarteners" and dreaming of the big city?

ositioning r-n-r as an ... anti-herenormative cultural oasis

How does the VU song do this?

This is one of the most basic songs Zep ever did but the performance and recording/production really make it work for me.

also they should probably be remixed with a kendrick lamar verse, just to be safe.

Having [VU] place where it did essentially destroys all credibility of this message board.

Giving place to gross, cheesy, formulaic shit is detrimental to the legitimacy of the entire list.

This particular placement makes me want to call shenanigans. Maybe some people voted for it higher than they truly rate it in order to make a point.

The Led Zeppelin song is very sad. I think it is about the end of a marriage. They don't have sex anymore.

Yeah, Zep's song is emphatically not about rock n' roll music, but about fucking. Or the lack thereof.

i remember the first time i heard vu rockn'roll, i was in hs and had only heard the first album which i knew was cool but didn't fully get, heard this and just tripped so hard for like a week. led zep i have no memory of hearing for the first time, just rocked my ass since forever basically

limp, non-threatening, far more interested in talking than fucking

board description blah blah blah

lol mook

btw, is The Boys song "I don't care" actually about Led Zep's "Rock And Roll" ?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4RyuZT_Oj-k

Singing about rock n roll > actually rocking the fuck out, I guess

Lonesome Cowboy Bill rocks more than the VU's "Rock n Roll".

what the shit is this

do over

^ did not vote

Deserved win for the New Yorkers here

I voted early for Zep, but man, some of the literal-ass VU interpretations made me wish I had voted for the Velvets, purely out of spite.

wau @ no. of voters and margin of victory

just ridiculous

Lot of amputations, apparently.

sorry, guys, I was drunk....my Yardbirds album won't speak to me today.....mea maxima culpa....

but I do still buy a version of my own point--maybe if I'd made it, uh, differently?

Zeppelin was a ruthless unsentimental non-nostalgic machine of a band: they don't give a fuck. Lou did/does.
in many contexts this juxtaposition means a win for Led Z--but with these two particular songs, I called it the other way around.

hmmmm--live 1969 version of "Ocean" vs "When the Levee Breaks"?

Can't see reading anything into these results when I bet that at least three-quarters of the people who voted love both songs. Not either/or, just degrees of brilliance. (Also imagine LZ get hurt by the fact that their "Rock and Roll" is simply far more ubiquitous.)

http://www.electricroulette.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/socks.jpg

The Led Zeppelin song is very sad. I think it is about the end of a marriage.

This seems really obvious now. My 'celebration' comment upthread seems kind of dumb, except that I think it's doing that at the same time.

5 years old, that's when I was a Viking!

lol

They were wild like the USA
A mystery band in a New York way
Rock and roll, but not like the rest
And to me, America at it's best
How in the world were they making that sound?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTT-wj69ObE

This thread got me thinking about Loaded and how Rock and Roll is the only truly successful piece of music on it. Sweet Jane, also a great song, is much inferior to the Live 1969 version. I used to like New Age, but long since concluded that its Sunset Boulevard tale is something Bowie could have done far more justice to. Much of it is just embarrassing. Lonesome Cowboy Bill?
Even without Cale, its about as far away from the cold medieval sound of the debut as you could possibly get. Rock and Roll is probably Lou’s finest vocal. The cynical urban drawl for once shows some emotion; perhaps this is the only topic it can get excited about. “She didn’t believe what she heard at all.” When the music stops and it just comes back with I IV I IV, it’s a glorious moment. But as to the fine fine music that Jeannie was dancing to, well it probably sounded more like Rock and Roll by Led Zep.

i like the warm and open sound of 'loaded' -- most days i'd rather hear it than the 'cold medieval sound of the debut' tbh.

Was thinking about polling Loaded vs. the MC5's High Time: two swan songs, same label, same producer, almost the same year.

(xxpost) Even though I'd agree that Loaded is not as consistently great as the first three--for me, not even close--I do think it has a third masterpiece to go along with the two obvious ones: "Oh! Sweet Nuthin'."

Yeah, that one's good. Don't know if it's a masterpiece, but I also quite like "Head Held High".

i love loaded. "head held high," "train coming round the bend," "cool it down" - it's still great bubblegum!

i mean, shit reed just made three groundbreaking albums, the kind where individual songs would become the blueprint for whole subgenres. Let him make an album of sugar sugars for Clive Davis!

Got excited when the Velvets' "Rock & Roll" played twice within 15 minutes in the coffee shop I'm sitting in.

Me: "Who's the Velvet Underground fan?"

(blank look from behind the counter) "It's a playlist."

Classic

Gotten used to this by now. Often it is actually the owner’s taste that is responsible for that playlist but they might be at another location on any given day so difficult to ask them.

Lou Reed: "Can you imagine working for a fucking year, and you end up on some coffee-shop playlist?"

lol @ 5yo literalists itt

I know, right?

Rolling (Thunder) Bob Dylan's 115th Dream laugh at Lou Reed joke.

One of the owner's of place I go to is a big Replacements fan. The day Dead Man's Pop came out I walked into the place and on cue "Talent Show" came on. The co-owner has never made it clear to me whether he did that on purpose or it was an accident. Probably an accident but hey, print the legend.

Leaving aside the low blow from DJP about VU's "Rock and Roll" sounding like Belle & Sebastian, what actually does sound like it?

"Shakin' Street" from MC5 is in a similar ballpark, I suppose.

Could hear "Subterranean Homesick Blues" in the background where I ate dinner tonight, but resisted the urge to ask "Who's the Bringing It All Back Home fan?" (least of all when played in tandem with "Dancing with Myself").

Lol

I knew who would win this before I opened the thread, but the actual margin of victory is astonishing.

Results are wrong

Well, yeah.

*stands up at the bar*
“Who’s the LCD soundsystem 45’ 33” fan?”

Pours one out for the "4AD" coffee bar in OC long ago. The place had a perfectly anonymous suburban hipster coffee bar name, but it was a lot easier to call it 4AD because that's what was playing there, all the time. I heard that Heidi Berry s-t album there about a zillion times.

Got excited when the Velvets' "Rock & Roll" played twice within 15 minutes in the coffee shop I'm sitting in.

Me: "Who's the Velvet Underground fan?"

(blank look from behind the counter) "It's a playlist."

Hahaha