Single:
Immigrant Song entered the Australian singles chart* on 18 January 1971 and peaked at #23.
Album:
The song is on Led Zeppelin III which entered the Australian albums chart* on 21 December 1970. It reached #1 on 25 January 1971 and remained there for 4 weeks.
Songwriters:
Jimmy Page, Robert Plant
Producer:
Jimmy Page
Record label of Australian release:
Atlantic
*Kent Music Report / Australian Chart Book. See About.
BELOW: Led Zeppelin perform Immigrant Song live in Sydney
The film footage in this clip of Immigrant Song was taken from the band’s performance at the Sydney Showgrounds in February 1972, while the music is from a show at Long Beach Arena, Los Angeles in mid 1972.
Wikipedia:
Immigrant Song was written during Led Zeppelin’s tour of Iceland, Bath and Germany in the summer of 1970. The opening date of this tour took place in Reykjavík, Iceland, which inspired Plant to write the lyrics. He explained in an interview:
We weren’t being pompous … We did come from the land of the ice and snow. We were guests of the Icelandic Government on a cultural mission. We were invited to play a concert in Reykjavik and the day before we arrived all the civil servants went on strike and the gig was going to be cancelled. The university prepared a concert hall for us and it was phenomenal. The response from the kids was remarkable and we had a great time.
Read More: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immigrant_Song
Songfacts:
Robert Plant’s love of history played into the lyric, as he was thinking about explorers like Marco Polo and how they must have felt in their travels. Just as he felt pressure to top the previous album, he wondered if these explorers felt pressure to find even better lands after a big discovery.
Read more: www.songfacts.com/facts/led-zeppelin/immigrant-song
Lyrics:
We come from the land of the ice and snow
From the midnight sun, where the hot springs flow
The hammer of the gods will drive our ships to new land
To fight the horde and sing, and cry
Valhalla, I am coming
Click for full lyrics
This song is also on our Spotify playlists Bang a Gong – the 70s and Bang a Gong – rockin’ the 60s & 70s
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