Venezuela SHOULD be a very rich country

But it isn't.

A couple of months ago I wrote this article on the next steps for the now opposition led National Assembly in Venezuela, recommending what in my opinion are the immediate measures they must take regarding exiting the current crisis the country is in. So far, none have been done.

Most leaders in Venezuela are making a right when faced with this sign 

Today I came across this very interesting article, that captures in one sentence, the constant affirmation what every venezuelan knows (and constantly preaches): "Run the right way, Venezuela should be a very rich country"

Thing is, it isn't a rich country. Which begs to ask the question: Why? Which brings the most simple answer: Because it's run the wrong way.

Most of the Venezuela's middle class -filled by opposition- place the blame on the government and its strict (and crazy) policies, economic controls and laws. This makes some sense, as any business school graduate knows that as the saying goes, "the fish begins to rot from the head". However, the fish also has other body parts apart from the head.

I was having lunch with a friend yesterday at an upscale mall in Caracas when after finishing our meals, we decided to take a walk, eventually ending up at the most visited place any venezuelan attends to in his daily routine: a supermarket. Once inside, we found out a recently arrived flour shipment had made its way to the market and we took the respective two packages (1 kg each) allowed per person, per week, each package costing 2 cents (yes, $0.02). It's so cheap because it's a regulated product. However, whether you're buying regulated or unregulated products, you still have to checkout, right?

Despite many warnings, they keep going past this

Despite the supermarket being relatively empty -which is a rarity-, we ended up spending over an hour in there. You may ask, why? Well, after ten minutes or so (definitely not more than 15), it took us around 45-50 minutes to do checkout and pay. Yes, you read it right: 10 to 15 minutes shopping, 45-50 to checkout. Inevitably, you will probably ask again: Why? I mean, after all, a cashier checkout at a supermarket shouldn't take you more than five minuntes (and that's an insulting time), even if the market is full -which it wasn't. In other words, one could say:

"Run the right way, a Supermarket checkout should take no longer than five minutes"

But in Venezuela, it doesn't.

Going back to your question: Why? The answer is, quite, quite, simple. Because it (the supermarket) is run the wrong way.

Some time ago, I came across this fascinating report on what is called FedEx's Super Bowl: Christmas Rush. Whether you like FedEx or not, if you watch the video or fast forward to the 4:04 mark, where they are filming at FedEx's main hub in Memphis, TN, also known as "The Matrix, you'll listen to the manager say "if you stand here for fifteen minutes, you will see the world's economy pass before your eyes"

This profound statement can be used to explain Venezuela's critical condition, without any comprehension of GDP, CPI, official exchange rate, Black Market, or whatever economic or financial term you wish to use. Instead, just recite this: "if you stand in a supermarket line for fifty minutes, you'll see the explanation of Venezuela's crisis pass before your eyes."

In other words, you will understand why Venezuela should be a very rich country, but it isn't. More importantly, you'll see why Venezuela is run the wrong way:

1. We have a supermarket in an upscale mall, run the wrong way.
2. We have a shipping process in an upscale mall, run the wrong way.
3. We have a distribution process in an upscale mall, run the wrong way.
4. We have a pricing process in an upscale mall, run the wrong way.
5. We have a checkout process in an upscale mall, run the wrong way.
6. We have a payment process in an upscale mall, run the wrong way.

Now keep in mind this is just one supermarket. Add the other 20 stores located all across the city, you now have twenty (or so) supermarkets. Now multiply that by the five most popular supermarket chains, you have a total of 100 supermarkets. Each one of them with is run the wrong way. Finally, multiply that by the six process we listed, all run the wrong way. That's a total of 600 processes, just in the market-retail business industry.

Time passes....

In the end, what other result can it be?

I find it hard to believe that nobody has thought to himself something within the lines of "We have a process that is run the wrong way. Maybe we should fix it, so we can run our business the right way." I simply cannot understand how does a supermarket manager cannot visualize that the less time customers spend checking out (meaning, the fastest they go through the cashiers), the greater revenue the market brings.

This isn't astrophysics, or some sort of complex math problem. It's simply common sense.

Many alternatives can be proposed and I am quite sure some of them can be implemented as well. Below I will list a few:

The BEST Solution is: Drop all fixed prices and distribution controls on regulated products: the easiest and most swift solution. Prices of regulated products will go up, but in the end you let the free market flow and economy will find an equilibrium point, with the supply and demand curves. Resellers of regulated products are posting prices that 10x times the fixed price anyway. Economy 101.

An informal street vendor sells regulated products for 10x time its fixed-price

That of course, is a decision that must come from the government and the manufacturing businesses.

BUT... If you can't (or won't) drop fixed prices and distribution controls on regulated products, then we still have many variants of what can be done:

1. Have one (or more) cashier for non-regulated products: if a costumer is buying an $8 pasta sauce and a set of knives, he shouldn't suffer the same fate than those buying regulated products.

2. Have one (or more) cashier for senior citizens: it's inhuman to have a senior standing up for fifty minutes, when all he wants to do is buy food.

3. Have one (or more) cashier with fast dial-up/high speed connectivity with bank lines: paying with credit/debit cards is supposed to be quicker than paying with cash, not slower.

4. Have one (or more) cashier for express or fast checkout/less than five products.

5. Ban cashiers from using their cellphones while at work if they have customers waiting in line (or ban them altogether).

6. Have one (or more) pre-checkout cashier, so a customer can already have its order taken care of and then only has to pay when he arrives at the cashier.

I hardly believe any of the major supermarket chains will lose a substantial amount of money, if they would decide to incorporate one or all of these suggestions.

This is definitely not what I learned from that famous Toyota's Lean manufacturing case I studied in Business School,
and apparently, neither have the supermarket owners and managers

I will wrap up this entry for now, as I have more material to cover for another post, but I will add a few lines before moving on: most real estate in Venezuela has lost its value, probably around 30 or 40%, yet most of the population argue against the fact that similar to the 2008-09 housing bubble, Venezuela is currently sitting on a buyers market, and instead believe this is a selling market.

Once again, another vital and primary core of the economy, that is also run... the wrong way.

Memorable movie scenes

Although I have been taught to never say never in life and that there is always time to do whatever you want, every day that passes by my life, I always wonder what would have happened if I had decided to become a filmmaker, following the steps of Kubrick, Spieldberg, Nolan, Scott and so many others.

As many of my followers know, I am a huge movie fan who also happens to be a great appreciator of the art of filming. I never get tired of watching great films and also never get tired of watching memorable movie scenes. Thanks to the magic of youtube, today I want to share some of my most favorite with you:

Confrontation in the dark: Jodie Foster and Ted Levine. Director: Jonathan Demme. The Silence of the Lambs 

While the clip cuts a few seconds prior from where I would have recorded it, it still manages to capture the essence of what's happening.

Novice FBI agent Clarence Starling is assigned to her first case and boy what a case it is. After tracking down the whereabouts of serial killer Buffalo Bill, she finally lands at his home's basement where he has been keeping his victims. The music is loud, the basement is huge and she nervously keeps searching door by door for Bill -who had ran away from her upstairs-, only to land at a room with a bathtub and a heavily decomposed body. Lights go off and she loses all sight of where she is, while Bill -using night-vision goggles-, has trapped Clarice and has her at his own mercy. Clarice isn't nervous anymore: now she's freaking scared to death.

Jodie Foster's acting here is as good as it gets, portraying the 249 emotions, things and thoughts that must be going through her head, being trapped in a basement with no lights, a serial killer on the lose, no backup to call or anybody available to help. Other than her heavy breathing, the soundless take lasts the longest 60 seconds of her life. After ten more seconds or so, the orchestral violin soundtrack softly fades in, with Bill's left hand trying to reach Clarice's hair, as in to say "I want to have you", while she's still panicking as you can see in her eyes, giving a completely lost sight, and her left arm trying to reach out for something she doesn't even know. Then Bill finally raises his right arm and points his .357 at Clarice, getting ready to put her out of her misery. He makes one fatal mistake. Being an un experienced gun handler, he cocks his revolver, making Clarice aware that he's behind her, who quickly turns around facing him, which makes him scared and misfire a shot that gives away his position. Clarice, in middle of desperation, exasperation and madness, unloads her .38 revolver and puts an end to his life, while also breaking a window glass that allows outside light into the room, letting her see Bill laying on the ground.

Tech Noir: Arnold Schwarzenegger, Lind Hamilton and Michael Beir. Director: James Cameron. The Terminator

Ironically, the reason why is scene is so great, is also the reason why it has aged well, but not as well as other memorable scenes.

The movie opens with two naked guys being sent in time to L.A. Not much info on the guys is given, but they do not seek the cops' help nor do they make a big fuzz of their arrival. They are on their own on the loose. Sarah Connor, on the other hand, is a young waitress who on a regular L.A. day, finds out that two other Sarah Connors have been killed. One we see getting killed by one of the guys we saw at the beginning: some mute tall muscle man guy. The other we find out was killed, on a a broadcast while Sarah is in a bar, and this is the essence that makes the scene so great.

Back then, when I first saw the movie I assumed it was THE OTHER GUY who killed that Sarah, and that both of them were on a race to kill the third Sarah (our Sarah), especially when we see the other guy sort of follow Sarah through the dark streets of L.A., till she decides to hide on a club called Tech-Noir and call the cops for help. The cops tell her she'll be fine as long as she stays in the club, because it's a public place, but when she sees the guy that was following her across the bar, she starts to think this may be it for her.

At this time, the first tall muscle man, had made his way into the bar -not paying by the way-, and while at a distance, he makes visual contact with Sarah. What follows next is a cathedratic lesson on suspense: the music of the club, while still loud, fades away to let the movie's soundtrack take over the score. The motion of the characters slows down and now it is at this moment that we know who The Terminator really is, and what he is there to do.

After a violent shooting and a direct confrontation between the unknown other guy and the Terminator, Sarah on the floor hears the words that stuck in our minds for years to come: "Come with me if you want to live"

The Baptism - Al Pacino. The Godfather. Director: Francis Ford Coppola.

I won't take long to describe this one, because we can summarize this whole scene in just one word: Juxtaposition.

Michael Chorleone baptizes his sister's son, becoming godfather to him, while at the same time settles all family business, having his men murder the members of the five families. As Michael's voice in the baptsism utters the words swearing to God he accepts his faith, believes in him, renouncing satan and asks for forgiveness for all his sins, his actions prove exactly the contrary.

Michael's baptism serves for himself being baptized as Godfather to the family.

The Duel - Clint Eastwood, Lee van Cleef, Eli Wallach. The Good, The Bad and The Ugly. Director: Sergio Leone.

Same as above, not much to say about this one. It is an eight minute scene that simply flows around the fact that three almost equally skilled shooters have been racing each other to find a gold fortune burried in a cemetery.

What I like about the scene is the building of a five minute tension between the three of them and what goes on the mind of each:

The Ugly, doesn't know what to do. He knows he's good. Good enough to kill both, The Good and The Bad. But the question is, who should he shoot first?

The Bad KNOWS what to do. He knows he has to shoot The Good first because he knows that he is the better shooter. But he also knows that if he does this, then the Ugly will shoot him.

The Good also KNOWS what to do, and here is where you see the beauty of the scene and overall, the beauty of the entire movie. Throughout the film he keeps being labeled as "The Good", despite the fact that we haven't really seen ANY good deeds coming from him. It is now, only in the end when we do. He knows Tuco's gun is unloaded, so he doesn't have to worry about him, so theoritically, his only preocupation is Angel Eyes. So if this is true, he could have shot him right away and get it over with, but he doesn't. In fact, he doesn't make a move at all, until the very last second, when he sees Angel Eyes grabbed his gun and is going to shoot him. To me, this serves as an act of good.

Blondie gave Angel Eyes a "last chance". The last chance was, what was fair for all three men who arrived by their own means to the cemetery. Angel Eyes didn't want that chance and took a chance to shoot, which resulted in Blondie shooting him dead in self defense.

The end of the scene contains a memorable line: "In this world there are two kinds of people. Those with guns and those who dig. You dig."

Dallas Dies - Nostromo crew (minus two), Xenomorph. Alien. Director: Ridley Scott.

While the chest-bursting scene has become the classic and I do acknowledge its greatness, I could watch Dallas' death scene over and over for days without getting bored of it. As in the Clarice Starling clip, here the uploaded posted the clip also cutting a few seconds from earlier that help up build the tension up.

After seeing his fellow crew member get attacked by an alien egg on an unkwown planet they landed, then see this creature attached to his fellow crew member magically remove itself, then seeing a tiny alien creature burst out of the crew member -killing him- and finally, seeing another crew member being abducted by the creature, Captain Dallas of the Nostromo asks himself whether or not he screwed up by braking quarantine protocol and bringing up a living creature that is as deadly as it gets to a cargo ship in space, where - as the tagline says- no one can hear you scream.

After coming up with a plan to chase the creature out of the ship through the ventilation shafts, Dallas walks into the "mother computer" and asks "what are his chances?" against the deadly alien creature. From that moment when he is already doubting his own plan, he knows and we know, he's done for, and he will be next to die.

Cut now to where the clip starts and the faces, reaction, dialogues of the other crew members say the rest:

A panicking Lambert feels Dallas' fate as soon as he walks through the shaft
A nervous Parker feels Dallas is hopeless against an unknown enemy
A cold-blooded (later to be found cyborg) Ash is emotionless realizing the Alien's superiority
A passionate Ripley, feels for Dallas, nothing but sadness.

and finally Dallas himself. This scene, similar to Clarice's deals with the sense of isolation. Being alone against an unknown killer, who you know -not hint, know- has the upper hand, and will likely end up killing you.

The ending. Samuel L. Jackson, Tim Roth, Amanda Plummer, John Travolta. Pulp Fiction. Director: Quentin Tarantino

I remember when I first saw Pulp Fiction at my local cinema, throughout the movie as each minute passed by, I knew I was witnessing a classic, but still had a few doubts on how big a classic it was. The ending scene however, cleared and erased all doubts. This movie was THE classic.

There isn't much to be said about the scene, as there aren't enough words to describe how perfect it is, so I'll just say it is perfectly acted, perfectly written and perfectly directed. Even the freaking soundtrack to finish the movie is so casual, as casual is the walk Jules and Vincent walk, leaving the cafeteria with their guns in their dork shorts.

Unfortunately, there is no youtube clip of it as I would have like to appreciate it, but there are two clips that sort of do it justice.

The ending (cuts the final seconds)

The ending (true ending)

Gene Kelly. Singing in the rain. Singing in the rain. Directors: Stanley Donen and Gene Kelly

This scene talks for itself

Assault scene. Malcolm McDowell. A Clockwork Orange. Director: Stanley Kubrick

What makes the previous selection even best, is Malcolm McDowell's version of it in Kubrick's A Clockwork Orange

Cheers,

H

ESPN's NBA's top 10 of all time: LeBron is 3rd!

ESPN has done it again. Create controversy in a theme that is supposed to be their every day bread and butter: Ranking all time greats.

Do you agree with LeBron at #3 in the all time NBA Greats?

After weeks of suspense and thrills, the sports network finally released their top 10 NBA players of all time, and just a few hours were needed to bring even their own analysts Stephen A. Smith, Skip Bayless, to contradict it. What follows is my breakdown of their top 10 list.

#10: Hakeem Olajuwon.

Hakeem The Dream

With Shaquille O'Neal himself, one of the biggest centers of all time himself, and also, one of the biggest EGOS of all time in the NBA, even bowing down to Hakeem's greatness and how he wasn't able to figure him out, I don't think anyone disagrees that Hakeem deserves to be mentioned in a top 15 list, with a lot of chance to be included on a top 10 list. Hakeem "The Dream" won two NBA championships, two NBA MVPs, two NBA Finals MVP,12-time all star games. Hakeem is the only player to average 20 points, 10 rebounds and two blocks per game, in his first 12 seasons. Plus, he was the leader of his team the Houston Rockets. Enough said, let's move on.

#9: Shaquille O'Neal.

Simply unstoppable

This is where I believe, ESPN analysts begin taking some sort of mind "performance-anti-enhancing" brain-pills. Apart from Kareem and Wilt, there hasn't been such a dominant force in the center position as Shaq in all of NBA's history, and Shaq's career was more prolific than Wilt's, championship-wise speaking. Therefore, a case can be made of him being second after Kareem. I'll quote ESPN's website:

"Most dominant ever? Not quite"

Excuse me, but if Shaq was not dominant, I think one of the two of us has problems with the definition of the word 'dominant'.

Shaq won four rings, is seventh in the all-time scoring list, and is the only player in NBA history to score 30 points on every finals game, on multiple finals.

Shaq is way, way up on my list, up to #5.

#8: Tim Duncan.

Respect 

If you had doubts, whether the ESPN analysts had been taking some "performance-anti-enchancing" pills, seeing Tim Duncan placed at #8 erase any doubts. I like how their website refers to their "Expert panel". I wonder what are these guys expert on? Because, they are certainly no experts in NBA.

First of all, Tim Duncan is a leader. He has been the driving force behind the Spurs, for almost twenty years. He's the Jordan of the Spurs, he's the Magic Johnson of the Spurs, he's the Diego Maradona of the Spurs (to put it in other context).

Second -and perhaps the greatest blasphemy from ESPN-, Tim Duncan is 5-1 in NBA finals, and... he could have been 6-0, had he beaten LeBron the second time they met in 2013. Tim Duncan beat in order:

The 99 Knicks of Pat Ewing and Larry Johnson

The 03 Spurs of Jason Kidd and Richard Jefferson

The 05 Pistons of the Wallace brothers, who were also, defending champions

He swept the 07 Cavs of LeBron. Repeat after me: SWEPT

The 14 Heat of LeBron and Wade.

That's it, he defeated LeBron TWICE. So how is Tim Duncan placed in a lower spot than LeBron? I'm telling you: performance-anti-enhancing pills, is the only answer.

Third. You want to discuss stats? We can, but you don't need to with Tim. Because he is a force. He is a clutch player, a defensive player, an offensive player, a franchise player, a leader. He is everything, he's the whole package. 

Tim Duncan, you are #4 on my list.

#7: Bill Russell.

I'm ok with Bill Russell at #7. Let's move on.

"I just want to see which of you
guys is gonna come in second place,
'cause I'm winning this"
 - Gotta love this guy!

#6: Larry Bird.

I'm ok with Larry Bird at #6. But read below, I'll move him up a spot.

#5: Wilt Chamberlain.

This is where things start to get tricky. What I'm going to do, is spread-out the rest of the list to make it easier to explain

#4. Magic Johnson

#3. LeBron James

#2. Kareem Abdul-Jabbar

#1. Michael Jordan

I rate Shaq over Wilt, because I will.... well... I'll quote Skip Bayless: "Wilt Chamberlain is the best one-man act of all time." That however, doesn't make him the best player ever. After all, we are talking about a team sport. I'll also rate him below Larry Bird, because well, it's Larry Bird. So that's why Wilt goes down two spots. Larry Bird was a better shooter period, and arguably the best clutch player ever.

Nice!

If you disagree with MJ at the top spot, you definitely are using the same pills the ESPN so called "Expert Panel" use, or probably something stronger. 

I know Mike, you can't help being the greatest!

The two greats together

Next Kareem at second. Some people rate Kareem second and Magic third, other people place Magic second after Jordan, but on top of Kareem. I really don't mind switching them, as long as they occupy spots #2 to #3. I can even relax if you want to play spots #2 to #5, as long as it's Kareem, Magic, Tim and Shaq we're talking about. But definitely not LeBron James.

LeBron at #3... is a big NO-NO. I like LeBron, I really do. I admire and respect how much of a complete player he is, and how fortunate we are to watch him play in this era. He has impressive, godlike stats. But... --and here it comes-... he fails in the key moments, and no one can argue with that reasoning.

Great players, legends, godlike sportsmen, are judged, ranked, rated and their legacy is built upon delivering the goods when it takes. LeBron is 2-4 in NBA finals, and as I said a few lines ago, should be 1-5. LeBron HAD to move to Miami and team up with an already NBA champion Dwayne Wade, to win his first championship. Nobody, I repeat, NOBODY in the top 10 list did such a lame move, and we can take a look:

Hakeem: leader of the rockets. Point made.

Shaq: signed with the up and coming new Lakers franchise. Point made.

Tim: really? Point made.

Bill, Larry, Wilt, Magic, Kareem, MJ: Point made.

To leave the Cavs and sign up with an already powerful team, who already had been champion was such a coward move, I lost all respect for LeBron as the leader he should have been. Plus, even after singing with the Heat he still lost in his first NBA appearance with them (second overall). How pathetic is that? He finally bounced back and won back-to-back titles, only to lose again back-to-back with the Heat against Duncan's Spurs and the following year against Golden State.

Come on man...

Stephen A. Smith said it best: Give me LeBron for the first 40 minutes of the game. Give me Larry Bird for the last 20 seconds.

As it is then, my list (as you should know I don't believe in "Top 10 lists" and just do "lists") ends up as follows:

1. MJ

2. Magic

3. Kareem

4. Tim Duncan

5. Larry Bird
6. Shaq

7. Wilt

8. Bill Russell

9. Hakeem Olajuwon

10. Kobe Bryant

11. LeBron James

The summarized explanation:

1. MJ (6-0 in NBA Finals. 6 NBA Finals MVP. 5 NBA MVP. Best player ever period)
2. Magic (5 NBA Rings. 3 NBA Finals MVP. 3 MVP Orchestrated showtime. Epitome of a PG)
3. Kareem (6 NBA Rings. Skyhook move. All time scoring leader. Best Center ever)
4. Tim Duncan (5-1 in NBA Finals -should be 6-0. 3 NBA Finals MVP. 2 MVP. Best PF ever)
5. Larry Bird (3 NBA Rings. 3 NBA Finals MVP, 3 MVP. Best clutch player and Best SF ever)
6. Shaq (4 NBA Rings. 3 NBA Finals MVP, 1 MVP. Unstoppable at Center)
7. Wilt (2 NBA Rings. Avg 30 pts 20 rbnds. Arguably, best solo act player in NBA history)
8. Bill Russell (11 NBA Rings)
9. Hakeem Olajuwon (2 NBA Rings. 2 NBA Finals MVP. 1 MVP. Redefined the Center post)
10. Kobe Bryant (5 NBA Rings. 2 NBA Finals MVP)
11. LeBron James (2 NBA Rings with 4 losses in NBA finals. 2 NBA Finals MVP. 4 MVP)

Other blasphemies in ESPN's list include Isiah Thomas at 26th: apparently the Expert Panel also suffers from brain damage. Maybe it's the pills?

Ok, I know Zeke is not top 10 material, but come on, he's definitely top 15.
And, over Pippen, Stockton, Malone, Barkley, Durant, Curry and Nowitzki

I don't have a problem with a great player ranked 26th, like for instance, in Baseball, they ranked Johnny Bench 26th, but had Steve Carlton at 25, Tris Speaker at 24th, Frank Robinson at 20th and Mike Schmidt at 16th, meaning, the closer the ranking gets to the top spot, the better the player is. 

But come on man, Thomas at 26th and John Stockton at 16th ! It doesn't end there. Steph Curry, Dirk Nowitzki, Charles Barkley, Kevin Durant, Karl Malone and... SCOTTIE PIPPEN are also ranked higher than Thomas. To quote John McEnroe, "you gotta be kidding!"

If you have any doubts or are unaware of Isiah's talents, I recommend you to watch this vid:

Nice try ESPN, better start advertising that you are hiring new Expert Panel.

H

Stairway to heaven Lawsuit

Today's post will be concise, as it tackles an issue I already talked about over a year ago: plagiarism in music.

Led Zepellin surving members, Jimmy Page, Robert Plant and John Paul Jones were deposed last week regarding the suit filed by lawyer Francis Malofiy, who represents 'Spirit', an American rock band from the late 60s who wrote a song called 'Taurus'. Taurus is an instrumental piece to which Stairway to Heaven bares a remarkable similarity, hence Malofiy claims Zepellin stole the main theme of Taurus and used it in Stairway without giving proper writting credits to Spirit. Malofiy is seeking at least 50% of all of Stairway's royalties, which amounts to half a billion Dollars (ouch!)

Before getting into the specifics of the case, let's take a look of the core problem.

This is Spirit's 'Taurus' which was written in 1968, and while listening to the first minute or so may be enough for you to judge whether it sounds similar or not, I recommend to listen to all of it:

...and well, if somehow you have been living in a cave in Afghanistan since 1962, or in an asteroid, and haven't listened to Stairway to heaven in your life, well, this is, Stairway to heaven.

Next, let's address this "giving proper credit" issue.

As I wrote in my post last year, theoritical music is both easy and incredible hard at the same time. There is only a finite amount of notes and the odds of two pieces sharing a few notes in their structure, is quite fair, meaning, it can happen every now and then.

The issue Spirit's lawyer is bringing here is not that Stairway to heaven sounds similar to Taurus. It's the fact that Taurus may have served as inspiration to write Stairway, and there was no acknowledgement of this by Zepellin. Let's take the following example:

Seven years ago, Madonna asked ABBA for permission to use the main theme of one of their songs. The song was 'Gimme, gimme, gimme'

... and the song Madonna wrote and eventually launched as a single, became Hung up

They both sound alike right? Well, of course they do! The main theme for both songs is the same!

Thing is, Madonna gave credits to ABBA as writers, as you can see here. So nothing's wrong in that case, because ABBA receives royalties and cultural acknowledgement that they were co-writers of Hung up.

Now, the case with Spirit and Zepellin is that well, a point can be made by Plant, Page and Jones, who declared earlier this past week that "their memories on the 60s and 70s were vague" (which kind of makes sense considering the amount of heroin and alcohol they did back then), and therefore, a case can be made by the fact that Stairway and Taurus sound the same simply because it is coincidence.

In the late 90s, American rock band Nerf Heder were also accused of stealing the main riff of a German pop song called 'Codo' written by German band D.O.F. Nerf Heder not only pleaded ignorance, but claimed that the fact that their song sounded like Codo, was simply, merely and entirely coincidental, and also, they had no idea the German band D.O.F. even existed! You probably haven't heard of Nerf Heder, but just click on the video and you'll get the picture. Check it out:

...and this is D.O.F.'s Codo, written sometime in the early 80s

Perhaps the most famous case of plagiarism in music is the one that involved The Rolling Stones suing The Verve, for "taking just four bars" of an early unknown hit-song written by the Stones called 'Last time'.

... which The Verve stole in the mid 90s and turn it into, well... if you do not know what song I'm talking about, you may have to reconsider your life. In that case, The Verve pleaded ignorance and got punished badly by it. Court sentenced and granted 50% sharing writing credits to the Stones and 100% royalties to the Stones. Keith Richards summed it all up better than anyone: "If the Verve can write a better song, they can keep the money." 15 years later, they haven't been able to write anything better than Bittersweet symphony.

So where does all of this take us regarding the Zepellin-Spirit issue?

In my opinion, there is no question that Stairway's intro sounds VERY similar to Taurus. It doesn't sound 100% exactly the same, but I would say there is about an 80% similarity between them. Being completely technical, both songs begin with an A minor bassline picking, that progresses descending a semitone for each beat all the way to D. Thing is, the baseline in both, acts as the main theme for the song.

Now, does this mean Zepellin actually stole Spirit's Taurus to write Stairway?

Well here's the thing: Zepellin members can plead ignorance and swear it is just a plain coincidence, like Nerf Heder did with D.O.F. An undeniable truth that every respectable musician (including myself) knows, is that an A minor descending bassline as a main theme for a song, is a very common musical structure in rock and even in pop. But that's not the only aspect where Stairway and Taurus are similar.

The phrasing -meaning, the way the guitar strings are played throught the descending progression- is 95% similar. Make no mistake on that.

The beating -meaning, the tempo in which the phrasing is played- is... 100% similar. Make no mistake on that.

And then, there's the KO punch.

Nerf Heder can claim ignorance on D.O.F. and can kind of get away with it. I mean, what are the chances of a teen pop punk band from Santa Barbara, California, knowing about a German pop band from the the 80s? I'm not going to say really low, but they're definitely not very high either. It's a 50-50 shot in my opinion.

But, can Zepellin claim they had no idea of the existence of Spirit? I mean, after all, why would a British rock band care about an American rock band, especially at the peak of British Invasion phenomena!?

Well, thing is... Led Zepellin not only KNEW about the existence of Spirit, they actually TOURED with them in their early unknown years, in which Spirit were more famous than Zepellin !!! And yes, Spirit played Taurus several times during these tours with Zepellin. So there goes your chance of pleading ignorance. Also, let's not forget Zepellin has already been found guilty of plagiarizing 'Dazed and confused' from Jake Holmes...

...and turn it into Dazed and Confused

In my opinion, Zepellin is guilty of at least, subconsciously plagiarizing Spirit.

But, considering Zepellin has already a previous case on plagiarizing, and the fact that they toured with Spirit in their early years, they are guilty of plagiarizing Taurus and turning it into Stairway to heaven.

Cheers!

H

(Here's my previous blog on the same matter)