DID YOU KNOW...

When The Levee Breaks is based on a 1928 song by Memphis Minnie and was originally recorded by Minnie with Kansas Joe McCoy in 1929. The mix of When The Levee Breaks is the only remnant officially released from the aborted Sunset Sound Studios mixing session. The Headley Grange mix surfaced on the companion disc of the 2014 reissue. John Bonham’s legendary drum beat on When The Levee Breaks has been much sampled: it can be heard on the Beastie Boys Rhymin’ & Stealin’, Cold Cut’s Beats + Pieces, Dr Dre’s Lyrical Gangbang, MC Lute’s Survival Of The Fittest, Eminem’s Kim, Ice T’s Midnight, Massive Attack’s Man Next Door and Beyonce’s Don’t Hurt Yourself. It wasn’t just the Headley stairwell and hallway that gave that massive, famous echoey drum sound, it was also thanks to two Beyerdynamic M160 microphones with limiters and a Binson Echorec echo device that Jimmy Page had bought. An early version of When The Levee Breaks titled If It Keeps On Raining was cut at Island Studios in November 1970. It can be found on the extended version of Coda released in 2015. If you have an original UK pressing of the album that misspells Memphis Minnie’s credit on When The Levee Breaks as ‘Mempnis Minnie’ it could be worth up to £500. At Led Zeppelin’s induction into The Hall Of Fame on January 12, 1995, Page, Plant and Jones reunited to perform a short set that included When The Levee Breaks with Neil Young guesting on guitar.