"The Battle of Evermore" is afolk duet sung byRobert Plant andSandy Denny, included onLed Zeppelin's untitled 1971 album, commonly known asLed Zeppelin IV. The song's instrumentation featuresacoustic guitar andmandolin playing, while the lyrics allude toJ. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy novelThe Lord of the Rings.

The song was written byJimmy Page andRobert Plant atHeadley Grange while Page was experimenting onJohn Paul Jones's mandolin.^[10][11] Page explained in 1977 that"'Battle of Evermore' was made up on the spot by Robert [Plant] and myself. I just picked up John Paul Jones's mandolin, never having played a mandolin before, and just wrote up the chords and the whole thing in one sitting."^[12]

The song, like Led Zeppelin's "Ramble On" (Led Zeppelin II) and "Misty Mountain Hop" (alsoLed Zeppelin IV), makes references toJ. R. R. Tolkien's fantasy novelThe Lord of the Rings,^[13][14] with "TheDark Lord rides in force tonight and time will tell us all" in line 4, "The drums will shake the castle wall, theRingwraiths ride in black" in line 18, and mentions of war andswords (line 13), shooting with a bow (line 19), magicrunes (line 20) and "thedragon of darkness" in line 24.^[15]The J. R. R. Tolkien Encyclopedia states that the three songs make "direct references toGollum,Mordor, the Ringwraiths, and events described inThe Silmarillion andLord of the Rings".^[16]

The Oxford Handbook of Music and Medievalism treats the song as "fantasy medievalism", seeing allusions to multiple features of Tolkien'sMiddle-earth.^[14] It notes that the song "specifically alludes" to the Dark Lord and the Ringwraiths, while the "Queen of Light" mentioned is "possibly" the elf-queenGaladriel.^[14] It states that the battle in the song "has often been identified by fans" as theBattle of the Pelennor Fields.^[14] Describing the effect of the song, it writes that Plant makes use of the feeling ofnostalgia with the "strain and desperation" in his "vocal cries" combined with the "haunting, pastoral soundscape" that together set up "the destructive world of war in opposition to an idealized and Arcadian peaceful home".^[14]

Plant felt he needed another voice to tell the story, and for the recording of the song, singerSandy Denny was invited to duet with Plant. Denny was a former member of the British folk rock groupFairport Convention, with whom Led Zeppelin had shared a bill in 1970 at theBath Festival of Blues and Progressive Music. Plant played the role of the narrator and Denny represented thetown crier. Page elaborated that "[The song] sounded like an old English instrumental first off. Then it became a vocal and Robert did his bit. Finally we figured we'd bring Sandy by and do a question-and-answer-type thing."^[12]

To thank her for her involvement, Denny was given the symbol on the album sleeve of three pyramids (the four members of Led Zeppelin each chose theirown symbols for the album). This is the only song Led Zeppelin ever recorded with a guest vocalist. In an interview he gave in 1995 toUncut magazine, Plant stated that "[F]or me to sing with Sandy Denny was great. We were always good friends with that period of Fairport Convention.Richard Thompson is a superlative guitarist. Sandy and I were friends, and it was the most obvious thing to ask her to sing on 'The Battle of Evermore'. If it suffered from naivete and tweeness—I was only 23—it makes up for it in the cohesion of the voices and the playing."^[17]

According to Jean-Michel Guesdon and Philippe Margotin:^[1]

• Robert Plant – vocals
• Jimmy Page – mandolin, acoustic guitar
• John Paul Jones – mandolin (?), acoustic guitar (?)
• Sandy Denny – vocals

"The Battle of Evermore" was played live atLed Zeppelin concerts during the band's1977 North American Tour. For these live performances, Jones sang Denny's vocals and played acoustic guitar whilst Page played mandolin. SometimesJohn Bonham sang Denny's vocals along with Jones.^[18] The British rock bandFairport Convention performed "The Battle of Evermore" with guest vocalists Plant and Kristina Donahue atFairport's Cropredy Convention on 9 August 2008.^[19]Plant andAlison Krauss regularly performed "The Battle of Evermore" on their tour of US and Europe in spring and summer 2008 in promotion of their 2007 collaboration albumRaising Sand.^[20]

An instrumental version of the song is featured on the companion audio CD on the remastered deluxe 2CD version ofLed Zeppelin IV, titledThe Battle of Evermore (Mandolin/Guitar Mix From Headley Grange), recorded on 29 January 1971, at the Rolling Stones Mobile at Headley Grange with engineerAndy Johns. It is much shorter than the original, with a running time of 4:13 rather than 5:51.^[21]

Page and Plant recorded a live version of the song in 1994, released on their albumNo Quarter: Jimmy Page and Robert Plant Unledded.Najma Akhtar [de] sang Denny's vocal part.^[22]

(*) designates unordered lists.

• List of cover versions of Led Zeppelin songs § The Battle of Evermore

• Guesdon, Jean-Michel; Margotin, Philippe (2018).Led Zeppelin All the Songs: The Story Behind Every Track.Running Press.ISBN 978-0-316-448-67-3.

• The Battle of Evermore (Remaster) onYouTube

• 1971 songs
• English folk songs
• Led Zeppelin songs
• Male–female vocal duets
• Music based on The Lord of the Rings
• Sandy Denny songs
• Song recordings produced by Jimmy Page
• Songs written by Jimmy Page
• Songs written by Robert Plant

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