"Four Sticks" | ||||||||
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German single picture sleeve
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Single by Led Zeppelin | ||||||||
from the album Led Zeppelin IV | ||||||||
A-side | "Rock and Roll" | |||||||
Released | 21 February 1972 | (US)|||||||
Format | 7-inch 45 rpm | |||||||
Recorded | Island Studios, London, 1971 | |||||||
Genre | ||||||||
Length | 4:42 | |||||||
Label | Atlantic | |||||||
Writer(s) | ||||||||
Producer(s) | Jimmy Page | |||||||
ISWC | T-070.056.818-8 | |||||||
Led Zeppelin singles chronology | ||||||||
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"Four Sticks" is a song by the English rock band Led Zeppelin from their 1971 fourth album and is the sixth track from the LP. The title came from the fact that drummer, John Bonham, played with two sets of two drumsticks, totalling four. His decision to play the song with four sticks was a result of him being very frustrated with not being able to get the track down right during recording sessions at Island Studios. After he grabbed the second pair of sticks and beat the drums as hard as he could, he recorded the perfect take and that was the one they kept. This song was particularly difficult to record, and required more takes than usual.John Paul Jones played a VCS3 synthesizer on the track.
Guitarist Jimmy Page once said of the song: "It was supposed to be abstract." The abstract effect is further achieved by the unusual time signature of the song, featuring riffs in a mixture of 5/8 and 6/8 time signatures. After another failed take during the recording, Jimmy began to play an improvised guitar riff out of frustration. That riff was later on developed into the second track of the album, "Rock and Roll".
The song was re-recorded by Jimmy Page and Robert Plant with the Bombay Symphony Orchestra in 1972, during their trip to India, along with another track, "Friends" from Led Zeppelin III. This version featured tabla drums and sitars. The recordings were finally released officially on the 2015 remastering of Coda. The project is said to have run into problems because the orchestra didn't keep time in the Western style and some of them drank rather a lot.