Led Zeppelin – Trampled Under Foot

A bit different of a song for Led Zeppelin. This was on their great Physical Graffiti album…which was to me their last great album. This song peaked at #38 in the Billboard 100 in 1975. Led Zeppelin really was not a singles band but they did have 10 songs in the top 100 and 1 top ten song.

Led Zeppelin wasn’t a funk band but on this track they had something going. John Paul Jones played clavinet on this song that is just outstanding. Jones was the utility player for the band and probably the most underrated member.

The guitar had a great sound…Jimmy Page: It’s sort of backward echo and wah-wah. I don’t know how responsible I was for new sounds because there were so many good things happening around that point, around the release of the first Zeppelin album, like Hendrix and Clapton.

From Songfacts

The lyrics were based on Robert Johnson’s 1936 “Terraplane Blues.” A Terraplane is a classic car, and the song uses car parts as metaphors for sex: “pump your gas,” “rev all night,” etc.

This evolved out of a jam session. It became a concert favorite and a popular song on rock radio. When Led Zeppelin played it live, they would often jam on it, extending it with guitar and keyboard solos. 

This is one of Robert Plant’s favorite Zeppelin songs. He sang it on his 1988 Now and Zen tour.

Led Zeppelin performed this at Carmen Plant’s 21st birthday party in 1989 with Jason Bonham on drums. Carmen is Robert’s daughter.

The “Talkin ’bout love” part was most likely nicked from the song “Love” by Curtis Knight and Jimi Hendrix. 

Led Zeppelin did not release any singles in the UK until 1997 when “Whole Lotta Love” was released 18 years after it was written. In 1975, Zeppelin’s Swan Song label sent 5000 pressings of “Trampled Underfoot” to UK record stores as incentive to stock the Physical Graffiti album. These were labeled “Special Limited Edition” and became collectors’ items.

At Earls Court in 1975, Robert Plant introduced the song like this: “If you like the motor cars and the parts of the human body, then sometimes… you can get trrrrrampled under foot!” 

“Trampled Underfoot” was probably named after the bassline being a repetitive boom, played with a Moog pedal.

Trampled Under Foot

Greasy slicked-down body, Groovy leather trim
I like the way you hug the road, Mama it ain’t no sin
Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout
Ooh, trouble-free transmission, helps your oil’s flow
Mama, let me pump your gas, mama, let me do it all
Talkin’ ’bout love, huh, Talkin’ ’bout love, ooh, Talkin’ ’bout
Take that heavy metal underneath your hood
Baby, I could work all night, leave a big pile of tubes
Talkin’ ’bout lo-ove, Talkin’ ’bout lo-ove, Talkin’ ’bout
Automobile club-covered, really built in style
Special is tradition, mama, let me feast my eyes
Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout
Factory air-conditioned, wind begins to rise
Guaranteed to run for hours, mama, and brand-new tires
Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout
Groovin’ on the freeway, blazes on the road
From now on my gasoline is even gonna conk your hair
Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout
I can’t stop talkin’ about, I can’t stop talkin’ about
Ooh, yeah-yeah, yes, ah, drive on
Ooh, yeah-yeah-yeah-yeah-yes, I’m comin’ through
Come to me for service every hundred miles
Baby, let me check your valves, fix your overdrive
Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout
Ooh, yes, fully automatic, comes in any size
Makes me wonder what I did, before I got synchronized
Talkin’ ’bout lo-ove, Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout
Ooh, feather-light suspension, coils just couldn’t hold
I’m so glad I took a look inside your showroom doors
Talkin’ ’bout love, Talkin’ ’bout lo-oo-oh-ove, Talkin’ ’bout
Oh yeah, oh yeah, Oh, I can’t stop talkin’ about love
I can’t stop talkin’ about love
Ooh, let me go in down, go in down, go in down, go in down, go in down, yes, I
can’t stop talkin’ about
I can’t stop talkin’ about lo-oh’, baby
I can’t stop talkin’ about love, or my baby
I can’t stop talkin’ about love, my baby, uh, my baby, 
my baby, yeah, Unnh, push, push, push it, push, push
Ounheahhonhouh

Author: Badfinger (Max)

Power Pop fan, Baseball, Beatles, old movies, and tv show fan. Also anything to do with pop culture in the 60s and 70s... I'm also a songwriter, bass and guitar player.

14 thoughts on “Led Zeppelin – Trampled Under Foot”

    1. I like that one also…It’s so powerful…
      My favorite song by them would either be Over the Hills and Far Away or Hey Hey What Can I Do…which was on no album back then.

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      2. I know…I had no clue about what the song was all about. I always enjoyed the feel but it took some thought on those words

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  5. That’s right, badfinger20. It’s long and it’s on In Through The Out Door, one of my favourite Zep albums except for that song.

    Then again, almost all of Led Zeppelin’s albums are my favourites, except I never had that one with a picture of people sitting at a dining table. Presence, that’s it. I used to see it in used-record stores in the 1980s and I would bypass it every time.

    Presence doesn’t move me like their other albums do. “Nobody’s Fault But Mine” is one pretty good track on it, but not enough to buy the whole album. And now we can get individual songs anyway so no need to buy entire albums, though I do still automatically expect to hear the next song from the vinyl to show up when I hear individual tracks, so many times did I play an entire side A and/or side B back in the day. 🙂

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    1. Presence is my least favorite Zeppelin album. They recorded it in a hurry and it shows. It just lacks…I don’t know how to say it…likeability? their other albums had. It did have a few good tracks.

      I do the same with Beatle albums…when I hear one…I want the next one on the album.

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