That's The Way

Jimmy Page & Robert Plant
Album: Led Zeppelin III
Album Artwork: Zacron

I re-recorded this song as an exercise to learn my way around Logic 8 and purposely used the same arrangement and tried to get the same sounds. All things considered, it came out ok, although the tempo is a wee bit slower (as they did it live) and I did have to substitute my Les Paul for the pedal steel used on the original. Of course it's heavily a digital thing whereas the original was analog all the way.

Audio Files:
That's The Way - MP3 (12 MB)

That's The Way - AIFF (117 MB)

Recorded using this gear: Macintosh G5 1.8GHz dual Processor - Logic 8 - Universal Audio UAD-1 card - MOTU Ultralite Firewire - Ovation Legend - Gibson Les Paul Standard - Line 6 Flextone III XL - Kentucky KM350S Mandolin - Fender Jazz Bass - AKG 414B-ULS - Tambourine

Vocals, acoustic guitar, mandolin and tambourine were recorded with the AKG 414. The Les Paul was recorded using the Line 6 XLR direct into the MOTU Ultralite.

A picture of me with the gear.

Jimmy uses an "Open G" tuning on his Martin D-28 (low to high: D-G-D-G-B-D). Interestingly, on the studio version they tuned down a half-step to G flat. In keeping with trying to replicate this great recording, I did the same thing.

"That's The Way" was written at a cottage in Wales called Bron-Yr-Aur (Welsh for "golden hillside") where Page, Plant and their families retreated following the 5th American tour (21 March - 18 April 1970).

This song appeared on the third Led Zeppelin album, released October 5, 1970 by Atlantic Records. Songs from the album were recorded at several locations between January and July 1970. There is a little discrepancy between the notes on the Album and other information but regarding "That's The Way", it appears it was recorded at Island Studios London with Andy Johns engineering and then mixed at Ardent Studios, Memphis in August 1970 during Led Zeppelin's sixth American concert tour with Terry Manning assisting Jimmy Page.

If you are interested in seeing Led Zeppelin perform this live, I HIGHLY recommend the footage from the 1975 Earl's Court performance found on the Led Zeppelin DVD from 2003. If you are interested in Led Zeppelin in general and are looking for a book about them that is NOT a sensationalistic piece of crap, then I HIGHLY recommend Led Zeppelin: 1968-1980 by Keith Shadwick.

For more info on this Led Zeppelin song, check out these links:
That's The Way - Wikipedia
That's The Way - Songfacts