LED ZEPPELIN’s History of Movie Soundtracks

By Prog Sphere on April 22, 2017

Led Zeppelin remains one of the most wanted bands when it comes reunions, but after years of talks and a $1 Billion offer, it seems unlikely that the remaining members of the band will ever perform again. General opinion is that it’s singer Robert Plant who is not interested in revisiting the past, but the man gave his reasons about why he wouldn’t do that.

Anyway, after the most recent reissues that were overseen by Jimmy Page, it looks like the band still receives a lot of money just from licensing their music in the Hollywood blockbusters. The recent trailers of Thor: Ragnarok and King Arthur: Legend of the Sword both include music from Led Zeppelin; the former featured “Immigrant Song,” which upon the trailer’s release last week entered the Hot Rock Songs chart for the first time. The tune originally appears on Led Zeppelin III which was released in 1970, and is definitely a great fit for the trailer itself.

King Arthur: Legend of the Sword, on the other side, features “Babe I’m Gonna Leave You,” which was released on Zeppelin‘s debut album in 1969. Over the years, Led Zeppelin has become one of Rock’s most-featured bands in films or trailers. The popular opinion about trailers especially is to include a Led Zep song in it, and you immediately go from a perfectly effective to a holy-shit-did-you-see-that trailer.

For most of the last few decades, the band’s surviving members have been notoriously picky about which film soundtracks get to feature their music: Jack Black, who is said to have personally lobbied the band by video to get “Immigrant Song” into School of Rock after director Richard Linklater failed. David O. Russell described his efforts to license “What Is and What Should Never Be” for Silver Linings Playbook as ”like a man determined to marry somebody.“

David Fincher‘s The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo includes a cover version of “Immigrant Song” which was recreated by Trent Reznor for the movie. X-Men: Days of Future Past included the orchestral version of “Kashmir.” Ben Affleck‘s 2012 Argo features a scene where his character is putting the record arm down on the right part of the record with “When the Levee Breaks” kicking in. The official trailer for 2013′s American Hustle featured the intro groove of “Good Times Bad Times.” A scene from 2013′s Oblivion has Tom Cruise grabbing a vinyl and putting it on a turntable, after what “Ramble On” from Led Zeppelin II plays.

Beside films, Led Zeppelin‘s music has been featured in TV shows and video games as well. “In the Evening” was used by True Blood, while “Immigrant Song” (again) was used in a trailer for Activision‘s video game Destiny, and then “Black Dog” was used for the game’s expansion pack.

According to an article from The Los Angeles Times from 2012, the band’s asking price for their song to be licensed usually sees a seven-figure fee.

If all these soundtracks tell something, it is that Led Zeppelin‘s music is very appreciated by the seventh art, and you can’t argue about that.