Listen To Beth Hart’s Cover Of Led Zeppelin’s ‘Black Dog’
Beth Hart has released her version of Led Zeppelin’s 1971 classic Black Dog. It’s taken from her upcoming album A Tribute To Led Zeppelin, which is released on February 25, and follows the release of her cover of Good Times, Bad Times in November.
Like Good Times, Bad Times, Hart’s version of Black Dog doesn’t stray too far from the source material – the instrumentation bears an uncanny resemblance to the original – although the introduction of a string section does enhance the performance with some well-oiled oomph. You can listen to it below.
Led Zeppelin’s Whole Lotta Love has been an occasional feature of Hart’s setlist since 2004, and after she sang an impromptu version of the song in the studio during the recording of 2019’s War In My Mind album, producer Rob Cavallo suggested that Hart do a whole album of Zeppelin covers.
Hart wasn’t initially keen. “I’m not doing this whole album,” she said. “To do Zeppelin, you’ve got to be pissed off to hit that right. I can’t go there; I’ve worked years to put my rage away.
“Then the pandemic and all the things around it hit. So now I’m pissed off. I called my manager and said, have Rob and Doug [McKean, engineer] send me all the music because I am ready to do this.”
“They had this huge unlimited vocabulary,” Hart enthuses. “When I started to delve deeper into Zeppelin, I realised what a magnificent composer Page is, and I had no idea how educated Plant is. Let’s not forget they were kids at the time, and Page is such a badass that he was coming up with new ways of producing and getting sounds outside the box. It’s phenomenal. They are modern-day Beethovens. They’re insane; that’s insane music.”
Musicians contributing to the album include guitarist Tim Pierce (Bruce Springsteen, Tina Turner), bassist Chris Chaney (Rob Zombie, Slash), keyboard player Jamie Muhoberac (Bob Dylan, Rolling Stones), drummers Dorian Crozier (Celine Dion, Miley Cyrus, Joe Cocker), and Matt Laug (Alanis Morissette, Alice Cooper). The orchestral parts were arranged by David Campbell, who has worked with Muse and Beyonce.
Pre-order A Tribute To Led Zeppelin here.