'If it keeps on rainin', levee's goin' to break' Print

If it keeps on rainin', levee's goin' to break If it keeps on rainin', levee's goin' to break When the levee breaks, I'll have no place to stay Mean old levee taught me to weep and moan, Lord Mean old levee taught me to weep and moan It's got what it takes to make a mountain man leave his home Oh well, oh well, oh well Don't it make you feel bad When you're tryin' to find your way home You don't know which way to go? If you're goin' down south They got no work to do If you're going down to Chicago A-ah, a-ah, a-ah Cryin' won't help you, prayin' won't do you no good No, cryin' won't help you, prayin' won't do you no good When the levee breaks, mama, you got to move, ooh All last night sat on the levee and moaned All last night sat on the levee and moaned Thinkin' 'bout my baby and my happy home Ah-oh Ah, ah, ah, ah Ah, ah, ah, ah Goin' I'm goin' to Chicago Goin' to Chicago Sorry, but I can't take you, ahhh Goin' down, goin' down now Goin' down, goin' down now Goin' down, goin' down Goin' down, goin' down Goin' down, goin' down now Goin' down, goin' down now Goin' down, goin' down now Goin' down, goin' down-down-down-down-down “When the Levee Breaks’ by Led Zeppelin Songwriters: Bonham God / Plant R A / Page James Patrick / Baldwin John / Lawlers Minni "When the Levee Breaks" is a country blues song written and first recorded by Kansas Joe McCoy and Memphis Minnie in 1929. The lyrics reflect experiences during the upheaval caused by the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927. "When the Levee Breaks" was re-worked by English rock group Led Zeppelin as the last song on their untitled fourth album. Singer Robert Plant used many of the original lyrics and the songwriting is credited to Memphis Minnie and the individual members of Led Zeppelin. Many other artists have performed and recorded versions of the song. When blues musical duo Kansas Joe McCoy and Memphis Minnie wrote "When the Levee Breaks", the Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 was still fresh in people's memories. The flooding affected 26,000 square miles of the Mississippi Delta – hundreds were killed and hundreds of thousands of residents were forced to evacuate. The event is the subject of several blues songs, the most popular being "Backwater Blues" by Bessie Smith (1927) and "Mississippi Heavy Water Blues" by Barbecue Bob (1928). Ethel Douglas, Minnie's sister-in-law, recalled that Minnie was living with her family near Walls, Mississippi, when the levee broke in 1927. The song's lyrics recount the personal toll on a man who lost his home and family. Despite the tragedy, biographers also see in it a statement of rebirth. The untitled fourth studio album by the English rock band Led Zeppelin, commonly known as Led Zeppelin IV, was released on 8 November 1971 by Atlantic Records. It was produced by guitarist Jimmy Page and recorded between December 1970 and February 1971, mostly in the country house Headley Grange. The album is notable for featuring "Stairway to Heaven", which has been described as the band's signature song. The informal setting at Headley Grange inspired the band, and allowed them to try different arrangements of material and create songs in a variety of styles. After the band's previous album Led Zeppelin III received lukewarm reviews from critics, they decided their fourth album would officially be untitled, and would be represented instead by four symbols chosen by each band member, without featuring the name or any other details on the cover. Unlike the prior two albums, the band was joined by some guest musicians, such as Fairport Conventionvocalist Sandy Denny on "The Battle of Evermore", and Rolling Stones pianist Ian Stewart on "Rock and Roll". As with prior albums, most of the material was written by the band, though there was one cover song, a hard rock re-interpretation of the Memphis Minnie blues song "When the Levee Breaks". The album was a commercial and critical success and is Led Zeppelin's best-selling, shipping over 37 million copies worldwide. It is one of the best-selling albums in the US, while critics have regularly placed it highly on lists of the greatest albums of all time. Led Zeppelin were an English rock band formed in London in 1968. The group consisted of vocalist Robert Plant, guitarist Jimmy Page, bassist/keyboardist John Paul Jones, and drummer John Bonham. With a heavy, guitar-driven sound, they are cited as one of the progenitors of hard rock and heavy metal, although their style drew from a variety of influences, including blues and folk music. Led Zeppelin have been credited as significantly impacting the nature of the music industry, particularly in the development of album-oriented rock (AOR) and stadium rock. Many critics consider Led Zeppelin one of the most innovative and influential rock groups in history. Originally named the New Yardbirds, Led Zeppelin's deal with Atlantic Records gave them considerable artistic freedom. Initially unpopular with critics, they achieved significant commercial success with eight studio albums over ten years. Their 1969 debut, Led Zeppelin, was a top-ten album in several countries and featured such tracks as "Good Times Bad Times", "Dazed and Confused" and "Communication Breakdown". Led Zeppelin II (1969) was their first number-one album, and yielded "Ramble On" and "Whole Lotta Love". In 1970 they released Led Zeppelin III which featured "Immigrant Song". Their untitled fourth album, commonly known as Led Zeppelin IV (1971), is one of the best-selling albums in history with 37 million copies sold. The album includes "Black Dog", "Rock and Roll" and "Stairway to Heaven", with the latter being among the most popular and influential works in rock history. Houses of the Holy (1973) yielded "The Ocean", "Over the Hills and Far Away" and "The Rain Song". Physical Graffiti (1975), a double album, featured "Trampled Under Foot" and "Kashmir". Page wrote most of Led Zeppelin's music, particularly early in their career, while Plant wrote most of the lyrics. Jones's keyboard-based compositions later became central to their music, which featured increasing experimentation. The latter half of their career saw a series of record-breaking tours that earned the group a reputation for excess and debauchery. Although they remained commercially and critically successful, their touring and output, which included Presence (1976) and In Through the Out Door (1979), grew limited, and the group disbanded following Bonham's death in 1980. Since then the surviving former members sporadically collaborated and participated in one-off reunions. The most successful of these was the 2007 Ahmet Ertegun Tribute Concert in London, with Bonham's son Jason Bonham on drums. Led Zeppelin are one of the best-selling music artists of all time; their total record sales are estimated to be between 200 to 300 million units worldwide. They achieved eight consecutive UK number-one albums and six number-one albums on the US Billboard 200, with five of their albums certified Diamond in the US. Rolling Stone magazine described them as "the heaviest band of all time", "the biggest band of the Seventies", and "unquestionably one of the most enduring bands in rock history". They were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1995; the museum's biography of the band states that they were "as influential" during the 1970s as the Beatles were during the 1960s. Source: Wikipedia