Loading summary
Transcript694 lines
- [00:00]
A
Foreign.
- [00:08]
B
Welcome to another edition of Political Beats, a presentation of National Review. Find us over on X at Political Beats. We're also on Facebook as well. Subscribe to the feed for new episodes through Apple Podcasts or where you find your audio. Also right@nationalreview.com Listen, leave reviews where possible and we also invite you to join us at our Patreon site. Patreon.com Politicalbeats support us and help the show stay ad free as it has been our entry level for support and occasional voting privileges and a few posts here and there mid level for early access to our shows and at a higher audio quality and our upper level best friends get the early access to higher audio quality. Monthly exclusive content shows, remastered episodes, playlists and more. Please join us@patreon.com politicalbeats My name is Scott Bertram. You can find me on X. ScottbertRam, my tag team partner standing by as always, Jeff Blair. Jeff, how are you?
- [01:12]
C
Well, I'm trying to deal with a little bit of skullduggery behind the scenes here, Scott. So I know that we're taping this episode right now, but I regret to inform you that I'm also secretly taping another episode of the show with another guy later on because I'm auditioning new co hosts.
- [01:28]
B
Well, there's nothing I can do about that. Just let me know your decision when you come to it.
- [01:32]
C
I suppose you're not getting any writing credits.
- [01:35]
B
My friend Jeff's on x at Esoteric CD and our guest for today's episode is Dr. Ivan Pongrasic Jr. He's the William E. Hibbs Ludwig von Mises professor of Economics at Hillsdale College. He's been here since2020. He writes at occasional places. He's also a well respected and very talented surf guitarist in bands like Space Cossacks and others. And he's here with us in studio today with his guitars, which is going to make this a really special episode. Yvonne, thanks so much for joining us.
- [02:10]
D
It's a true pleasure. Thank you for inviting me.
- [02:13]
B
Scott, I'm going to ask you to tell a little bit about yourself. And I know you, so I know this could go for like two hours. You have an amazing life story, but for a very short, shortened version. Tell us a bit about yourself.
- [02:26]
D
Sure. So I was born and raised in former Yugoslavia country that no longer exists. The current place where I was from is Croatia and but we left. My family left in 1984 and so it's been a long time. In fact, today is exactly 42 years that we came to the United States.
- [02:44]
B
Congratulations.
- [02:45]
C
Congratulations.
- [02:46]
A
Thank you.
- [02:47]
D
Thank you. It's a special date for us. And as it happens, another Winter Olympics was winding down when we left, and it was in Sarajevo, Yugoslavia, and we were on plane with the American hockey team coming to the US So that was pretty, pretty amazing.
- [03:02]
B
Who was happier, you or the hockey team?
- [03:06]
D
I don't think I actually knew anything about hockey at that point. So I'm sure they were very thrilled to have me on the plane, though. Yes, it was an honor for them.
- [03:14]
C
All right, there you go.
- [03:16]
D
Yes. And so I've been, as you pointed out, playing guitar for a very long time. In fact, I started just in the year before we left Yugoslavia. I was 13, and from the very beginning, Richard Blackmore was one of my all time favorite favorites. And when we came to the United States, Deep Purple was really big. And so my fandom grew even more. So Richard Blackmore was always right there. I ended up going into surf music, which is not what usually what people think, usually when they think of Richard Blackmore. But as we're gonna see, actually there are all sorts of connections.
- [03:55]
C
There's more in common than you might suspect.
- [03:57]
D
Right, exactly. And I think people are gonn amazed at the connections between the. The two styles of music. And so, yes, I've been playing in the surf band or multiple surf bands the last 26 years that I've been at Hillsdale College and recorded, in fact, seven studio albums and, gosh, three or four live albums, and toured around Europe and the United States. So it's been a. It's been a good time.
- [04:22]
C
And you're an economics professor and I'm
- [04:24]
D
an economics professor, yes.
- [04:26]
C
Well, see, I have.
- [04:28]
D
Yeah, you were saying, I'm a Gemini. And not that I buy into this stuff very much, but the sign the Geminis are supposed to be. Well, there you go. Exactly. But they are supposed to be associated with split personalities, maybe schizophrenia. And that is definitely the case with me.
- [04:47]
C
And by the way, before we move on to our band this week, I have to say this because I asked Scott before we taped, I was like, by the way, do you know Ivan? Is he born in Eastern Europe? Perhaps? And of course, Scott was like, well, of course he's from Yugoslavia. And I just cracked up because this is like a long standing pattern. I have known now at this point in my life, four people who are just incredible, mega purple heads. They love this music, love Richie Blackmore. And all of them are Slavic. Yeah. One of them is Polish, one of them is Russian, and two of Them are from the former Yugoslavia and now there's you. And there's just something about this band and it's Eastern European fan base that fascinates me. They're like huge there.
- [05:26]
D
It's very true. Absolutely. Yeah. Actually, one quick point about that. The guy that replaced Putin as the president of Russia, briefly. Medvedev. Yeah, Medvedev. He actually was a huge Deep Purple fan. Talked a lot about it.
- [05:41]
C
They played at the Kremlin, in fact. Right.
- [05:43]
A
Yeah.
- [05:44]
B
They're everything.
- [05:45]
D
Okay.
- [05:46]
C
And now, Now, I guess this is the second part, which is, tell us, why do you like this band, Deep Purple?
- [06:04]
A
Oh, it's a killing machine. It's got everything I can drive, the power, be fantasized, everything. I love it and I feel it. I feel it, yeah. Do I wanna feel all right all the time I'm on my way.
- [06:32]
D
You know, it's very interesting you bring up that whole Eastern European. Because there is something different about Deep Purple that I think appeals to all of us with the Slavic blood and self included. Yeah. And, you know, I'm going to actually kind of bring up a lot of those points because what Richie did, and I think John Lord was right alongside with him with this, is use all sorts of exotic scales and exotic way melodies, which the other bands just didn't do.
- [07:08]
A
Sam.
- [07:47]
D
So if you have, you know, if you think of the contemporaries of Deep Purple, like Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath, they just did not almost ever get that exotic. And so there is something special about Deep Purple that taps into the Slavic blood. And for me, I think the level of excitement the Deep Purple creates is just off the charts. I. I never got that feel any of these other bands until I heard Iron Maiden. And I think Iron Maiden, you know, they're one of my favorites. And they are very much successors of Deep Purple, highly influenced by them. And if you look, it's not just actually the Slavic countries. You look at somebody like Lars Ulrich, the drummer of Metallica, and he is a huge fan of Richie Blackmore and Deep Purple and he's from Norway.
- [08:35]
A
Right.
- [08:36]
D
So all these Scandinavian countries, most European countries, they really don't care that much about Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath, but they love Deep Purple and the entire Nuwabam, the new wave of British heavy metal stuff that was happening in the late 70s in Britain, that owes a much heavier debt to Deep Purple than to Led Zeppelin or Black Sabbath or any of the other. Maybe Judas Priest, but, you know, that's it. It is really inspired by Deep Purple. So all of the stuff that I Love about hard rock, heavy metal, the speed, the excitement, the tension. That's what I think Deep Purple brought to that entire sa.
- [09:47]
A
She.
- [10:06]
B
And I'll squeeze in here because Jeff is more familiar with Deep Purple heading into this episode than I was. I mean, quite frankly, I know the songs that are played on classic rock radio. And not much before, not much more. Coming into prep for this show, I do remember as a youngster going through all my parents stuff, my parents 45s and then albums, and there was like superstar hits of the 60s, something. One of those compilations they would sell, and it was Deep Purple and Hush was on that compilation. And I knew One From Tokyo. And I knew Smoke on the Water, Highway Star. And I hear Hush on this compilation. Like, that's not the same band. That's not even the same singer. And of course it's not the same singer, although it is the same band in a very different format. So this is. It's. It's interesting as I piece together some of these bands. You know, we've done 150, 60 episodes at this point. And everyone's got. Everyone's got blind spots. And now we've done, you know, we did. I knew a lot about Zeppelin, but we've done Zeppelin and we've done Sabbath, and we're doing Deep Purple here today. And hearing how the similarities, the differences, and then also the influences of these various bands, it's very, very interesting. And Deep Purple is. I knew a little bit about the personnel changes. I know that's where David Coverdale got his start. I knew Richie. Stories about Richie Blackmore. And then seeing all of it. All sorts of stories, yes. Seeing all of it come together and play out in music. And recognizing the path of that discography and the heights of that discography has been a lot of fun. And I even admit Ivan Nadas. I say Nadas suggested we make sure we extend this at least a little bit into the reunion period of the version 2 lineup in the mid-80s. And even that's worthwhile too. So it's an interesting conversation because there are many different shades of Deep Purple that we'll talk about today.
- [12:10]
A
Sam. I got certain little girl she's on my mind no doubt about it she looks so fine she's the best girl that I ever had Sometimes she gonna make me feel so.
- [13:09]
C
Very, very clever Scott, I gotta hand it to you, okay, I got in be Purple in college. Now, I'll have to say I. I was not a hard rock loving kid when I was growing up. Like my earliest musical formative phases would have been basically pop and Beatlesque, stuff like that. I didn't really care even about Zeppelin until a late period of high school. Right. I was a bit daintier in my predilections, I guess you put it that way. But I found Deep Purple in college because I. I just randomly. I was in that phase where I was buying box sets. I've talked about this a lot on political beats. I'm just like, I'm gonna take this thing called Shades. It was the 4 CD box set, the Rhino box set. And of course I was. I often joke about how like, those were potluck for me. Like, you know, sometimes you get Shades and then sometimes you get the Doobie Brothers box. You know, you have to just sort of take a chance. But it worked out pretty well. It's not the best box set in retrospect, but it intrigued me and it introduced me to a world, a hard rock that had previously just kind of gone by the wayside for me. And then when I started studying Deep Purple, I realized something fascinating about them. I actually consider this band to be like a skeleton key for rock music, if you want to understand. You mentioned about influences there, Scott. The influences this band has had on everybody who came after them are immense. But to me, of course, as both a musician, a music lover and a comedy lover, I think of the Deep Purple basically as the way to explain Spinal Tap. All right, every. No, of course, Spinal Tap drew from so many sources and places for their jokes, but essentially it's kind of the story of the band Deep Purple, where they were famous. Of course, they know where. It's obviously much lower level thing for Spinal Tap, but they experimented with so many different genres. There's, remember, this is psychedelic phase, there's the jazz odyssey phase for Spinal Tap, which I analogize directly to Concerto for Group and Orchestra. Like the frustrated artist move. There's all sorts of these, these. These interesting 60s and 70s rock and roll stories that come together in the narrative of Deep Purple that make them like, really well worth spending time on. They're a fascinating tale. They're an emblematic tale.
- [15:09]
B
When I see two young lovers
- [15:13]
A
walking that just helps me When I say that you love speed Oh, I put my hand right over where my heart used to be. Cause it's all over don't tell me it's all over it's all over.
- [16:08]
C
And I guess it's interesting to begin with them. Begin with noting that they didn't come together like most normal bands. Right. It wasn't like the Beatles, which just, you know, a bunch of school kids who met, you know, at a churchyard and, like, became essentially a gang. Deep Purple was a bunch of professionals who were looking for people to play with. This is the second wave of the music industry where, like, we've. We've got an industry now. We've got studio players, you got guys looking for bands to join. You got, you know, people putting, you know, it's the way Genesis recruited half their guitarists, you know, half their members. It was from, like, the want ads in the section, the back section of Melody Maker. That's the milieu that Deep Purple came out of. And it's fascinating to see how they. Their career path, path took a very strange route to fame. They actually became very big in the United States before they really even ever broke through in their home country of Great Britain. There's all these interesting stories, and I guess what I want to emphasize the most about this band, what makes them special, what makes this episode so worth doing, is I think of a term, a genre term, like the phrase hard rock. And boy, that's a very kind of a broad term. You can apply that to a lot of different kinds of music. But really, when I think of the term hard rock rock, I think of Deep Purple. They are the quintessential hard rock band in the sense that they're not trying to be too intellectually pretentious. They're not trying to be too far out there musically, although they always do experiment and try new things, and we're going to talk about that here. But they just crunch. There's always a satisfying banging crunch. Even through the 80s, even at their lowest points in the set. In the 70s, Deep Purple was like the pure definition of good time hard rock. I had a friend who say to me once, like, you know, I really like hard rock, but everyone's got to throw Made on Japan on at one point before they're going to a party, so they can bounce around the rooms and then go out and get some courage to dance with a girl later on. It's the. It's sort of like almost a part of my childhood, a part of the historical narrative, the rock scene, but also just like, well, what was this art? What was this kind of music supposed to be? If you want to go look it up in the dictionary, find the definition of hard rock, you might as well just draw an equal sign. Deep Purple.
- [18:20]
A
Maybe it's because I'm only starting. I think it won't take too long. Maybe it's because I can see you laughing I think you got it wrong maybe I could be like Robin Hood like an outlaw dressed all in green with some. Someone said what's he gonna turn out like? Someone else said nevermind Then I was big and bold and more than twice as old as all the cats I'd ever seen I grew my head on photosuit of shiny white it wasn't cream I shook and shivered and danced and quivered and stood on a mountain top Lone cane for miles around I said, man, your music is really hot.
- [19:16]
D
There's one notable difference with Spinal Tap that is that the only guy that appears on every Deep Purple album is the drummer, Ian Pace. So that's pretty different.
- [19:27]
C
It's the last thing you would have expected. Well, I mean, if poor John Lord hadn't passed away.
- [19:32]
D
Because actually, no, he quit before he passed away.
- [19:34]
C
He quit?
- [19:35]
D
Yeah, he was out of the band before that. Yeah, they got. Oh shoot, what's his name now? The Rainbow. And Ozzy keyboard player Don Air. Harry. He replaced him. Yeah.
- [19:47]
C
Oh, he's definitely. Actually he's the one who's in the band right now, in fact.
- [19:49]
D
Right, right.
- [19:50]
C
But I guess that. I guess that means we'll just have to do sort of like the quick backstory. Where did this group come from? I mentioned that they were obviously, it was a very different kind of a thing from the Stones or the Beatles. Like these, these gangs of kids that come up in the early phase of the rock era. These guys were pros, they'd all been in previous bands. And I, I think it starts when John Lord got recruited to some like, you know, half assed musical project that never took off. Richie Blackmore, their guitarist. John Lord is the keyboardist, Richie Blackmore is their guitarist. And then they find a guy who's the vocalist, sings almost like an Elvis like crooner voice. But I kind of love Rod Evans.
- [20:27]
D
Yes.
- [20:29]
C
Feels very out of place in what Deep Purple would come. There's no question he couldn't stay in his band. But for those first three albums, I don't know, it's got a fun style. And Nick Semper, who's just a bassist, there's really nothing much to say about him. And of course, Ian Pace, as you're right, the longest turned, longest tenured member of the band. They come together in like March of 68 and it's very much like a mercenary project is like, we want to get famous, we want to record stuff, we want to get big. And so their record label with something called Tetragrammaton, which is about to go out of business in any event.
- [21:00]
B
By the way, I Love the late 60s record label names. They're so weird and wonderful.
- [21:06]
C
Yeah. You really can't beat a name like Tetric Ramaton. I don't even know what that means, whether it's a made up word or not. Well, it wasn't long for the world in any event. Right. And what they do is basically they're thrown together with a few good ideas, a few riffs that they've worked on their own, but mostly just a bunch of covers and they. They do something that's very popular in the late 60s, which is the psychedelicized cover song. Okay. I think this, I think of Vanilla Fudge, which I think they've cited, is like who they really wanted to be like in those first early days. Yeah, I mean, you're thinking of that kind of an approach, that hard rocking, glittering organ approach. I think early. Yes. Very much resembled this sound as well.
- [21:44]
A
I'm so glad, I'm so glad I'm glad I'm glad I'm glad I'm so gl. I'm so glad I'm glad I'm glad I'm glad.
- [22:26]
C
It's very late 60s. And that leads us to their first album, Shades of Deep Purple. This is the one, of course, that, you know, has Hush on it, the song that Scott mentioned, which is again, you know, a quintessential song where you. Everybody knows it, everybody likes it. Nobody realizes it was written by. Actually it's written by a songwriter named Joe South. But nobody realizes that this is a Deep Purple track. Yeah, he's an American. I think he won like, you know, some like, Grammys. He's like a songwriter. He was like, you know, a hippie, dippy songwriter of that era. But obviously Hush is hard rock. And that's what Shades of Deep Purple is. Their first album. It's probably not the greatest debut in the world, but there are still working within the context of let's do as many glamorous covers as we can. There are still some fine moments on it. Do you guys want to add any thoughts before we talk about, I guess, the rest of early Deep purple? Deep Purple, Mark 1,
- [23:23]
A
Sam.
- [23:56]
B
I think it's a fine record. It's interesting. You have guys from very different backgrounds, beat bands and pop, rock and jazz and blues. And they kind of forgot someone had to write the songs. Like these are not the most innovative, interesting songwriters. The originals are. Are fine.
- [24:14]
C
It's a sound in turn, in search of a song. Yeah, is what it is. It's a Good band.
- [24:18]
B
The reimagination, a reinterpretation of the tracks. The covers are. Are more interesting than the originals here. Hush's cover that they end up sort of slowing down and bluesing up and that becomes, I think a number three hit in the US and broke them in the US despite as Jeff mentioned, having really no interest from a UK audience yet. And the one cover that I really like an awful lot is the Help cover. The COVID here that is a really, I mean help for what it is in the Beatles hands is a very temple jaunty sort of number. And Deep Purple say, well no, this should be sad.
- [25:09]
A
But every now and then I feel so insecure Now I know I need you Laugh I never done before Help me if you can I'm feeling down, down But I do appreciate your being around me Help me get my feet back on the ground Won't you To me. I need someone.
- [26:12]
D
That's exactly what John Lennon used to say.
- [26:14]
C
I was a about to say John Lennon actually liked this version. He says he liked Deep Purple's cover of his own song.
- [26:20]
D
No, because he said that that song was a cry for help. It really was, literally.
- [26:24]
C
And it was written as a slower tune originally. And they speeded it up when the Beatles recorded it. And so he liked hearing it turn. Turned back into the sort of plaintive cry that it really is.
- [26:33]
A
And it sounds so beautif my. Help me baby, Help me.
- [27:12]
B
Yeah, that's the thing.
- [27:13]
C
Rod Evans may not be like, you know, the guy who could sing, you know, Blood Sucker, but he does really
- [27:17]
B
good with Hell, he does. It's a slow build. It's an interesting take and I think that's the finest moment. I, I like it better than Hush even, which is fine in its own right. But you do hear where, you know, it's, it's. It's. It's Lord's band at this point. I mean Blackmoore's present and playing. But that organ is such an over overwhelming factor. Overwhelming instrument in the mix on the shades of Deep Purple debut that would change and evolve as these albums would move forward. I know Jeff said we're going to talk about these next two. I think of these first three, this is the most complete. I think it's the best of these first three.
- [27:51]
C
Okay, first of all, I would actually disagree. I think what comes next is more interesting. But I'll also point out there are times here where Richie Blackmore sounds downright amateurish. It's the only time that he ever like these first few albums he's making some God awful racket noise on some of the solos and it's, it's not like he doesn't know how to play guitar. He does, but he doesn't know what he wants to do yet and so everything sounds a little bit weird. So Yvonne, do you have any thoughts?
- [28:16]
D
Yes, I have a lot of thoughts actually. So it's interesting you bring up. Yes, first of all, because I was talking to Brad Berser and I know you had him on to talk about.
- [28:26]
C
Of course, yeah.
- [28:27]
D
And after listening to this album, I hadn't listened to it in a while. I get together with Brad every so often and actually quite regularly I told him, listen, you know, I think you might really like this stuff. And he's like, oh really? I'll check it out. And actually I just got an email from him like a couple of days ago. He's like, this is really good.
- [28:43]
C
So yeah, it has that Tony K organ sound like really not Rick Wakeman but Tony K. And the thing is
- [28:49]
D
that I think, you know, Scott is absolutely correct that it, you know, the, the star of the show is John Lord and his playing is probably the best it will ever be on those first couple of albums. He's just driving that band and he's incredible. And Richie actually, when asked in a later interview what his favorite moment by, by John was, he said hush. And you can see why. It's amazing. Yeah, what you say about Richie, Jeff is absolutely dead on and. But here's what I think is happening. Richie actually mentioned that, you know, they recorded the album very quickly. I think they had like two days or something to do the whole thing and they gave him one hour to do all the solos and, and so he, I think he was really, you know, as the expression goes, his reach exceeded his grasp and he was searching for these notes. He's searching for something different. You know, he's trying to establish his style. But yeah, he's hitting all sorts of claims. I mean there are so bad notes there. And you go, why?
- [30:38]
C
On the next album, in my opinion,
- [30:40]
D
both, I think they're actually very similar in that regard.
- [31:01]
A
Sam. Foreign
- [31:29]
D
Richie mention this a couple of times where he would for. Well, when he was asked about, you know, what he thought about Joe Satriani who replaced him in Deep purple temporarily in 93, he said that, you know, that he's brilliant. The problem is that he never hears and make a mistake and if he never makes a mistake, he's never actually going outside of his comfort zone and his capability. And he said that was the thing about Hendrix that he loved, that richly loved, is that he was always reaching for something just beyond his grasp. And he would hit all sorts of bad notes, but then when he finally got to the right note, it would just send chills to your body and that. I think that's what he was trying to do here. But he just did not have his style together. He didn't have maybe quite a chops together yet and certainly didn't have much time. But I think it's actually outside of that, if you're really kind of try to ignore Richie, the rest of the band sounds great. And what I think of it, I mean, both of those albums, both this and Book of Talisman, yeah, they come out in 1968. And if you think about what else is happening in 1968, you have cream, Wheels of Fire, you have Hendrix, that's doing. There's a cover.
- [32:41]
C
I'm so glad on this album it is right.
- [32:43]
D
They were hugely influenced by Cream. Well, they opened for Cream in 68 in an American tour which lasted I think like three shows before, according to Blackmore, that Clapton said, yeah, these guys are not going to be opening for us and kick them off the tour. But I think it was one of the final tours.
- [33:01]
C
They broke up anyways on that tour.
- [33:03]
D
Yeah, exactly. Right.
- [33:03]
C
Was on his last legs, no matter what.
- [33:05]
D
But you know, the originals, I think sound a lot like Cream on Wheels of Fire and a lot like the originals on Electric Ladyland by Hendrix. And so it's very much of its time.
- [33:31]
A
Oh, we got a man drinker roots. It's a thunder in my brain. She thunders just the same.
- [33:46]
D
Evans is a singer of its time. Nick simper is definitely 60s kind of a bass player. And so they were you know, not. Not doing anything to terribly distinctive, but they were actually. They were competing and I think that's who they thought of as their contemporaries at that time. Right. Vanilla Fudge, Cream and Hendrix.
- [34:05]
C
So this album has actually exploded in the United States, which, you know, thinking about it, you're doing better off in the trade. You're not making it in the United Kingdom, but the United States is like a market 10 times the size of the United Kingdom. So they were actually doing well. They were playing, you know, like, you know, expensive gigs in. In the United States and having chart hits.
- [34:23]
D
The Playboy After Hours TV show.
- [34:27]
C
Yeah, them and the Grateful Dead were two famous visitees to that show. We have tapes of both. They're both pretty funny. The Dead actually spiked the water and everybody else started tripping out in the middle of it. Yeah, I know, 1960.
- [34:38]
D
I don't think they needed to spike the water for everybody to be tripping out in that show. But nevermind.
- [34:44]
C
Probably not. But anyways. They were under immense pressure to record a follow up because of the success of this and so. And their career is now essentially basically focused on the United States. So their follow up to this is called the Book of Talisman. And of course nobody really talks about these things, but I love this record.
- [34:59]
A
Record.
- [34:59]
C
This record is actually really great to me. And it's by far the best of those early Deep Purple like era stuff because the covers mostly work. We can work it out. Doesn't work. Kentucky Woman is great fun. I love it. It's one of my favorite Neil diamond songs of all. River Deep, Mountain High is one of those other moments where I think Blackmore doesn't quite know what the heck he's doing on guitar yet. It's just like some very weird, you know, squally kind of notes on it. But the rest of that is a fantastic anthem I think. Again, you know, I never really much liked the I can Tina Turner version of Riverton Deep. Somehow I like it when Rod Evans sings it more. That sounds like it should be blasphemy but like they really get a real head of steam up.
- [36:47]
A
No, I'll never never let you down Cuz it get closer. So higher. My.
- [37:22]
D
It's almost like Elvis doing it, right? I mean he's got a very Elvis Elvis kind kind of voice to. To him.
- [37:29]
C
But the real point is that this is still Lord's band and on those original songs for the first time actually stand out. There's two of them, Shield and Anthem, which both have these very kind of neoclassical influences in them that I'm really impressed by. I actually really great original. The first great original tunes that this band ever wrote. So yeah, you know, there's a little. There's. There's some of the stupidest lyrics of all time on Listen, Learn, Read on, which is a fun little rock track. But some terrible lyrics on that.
- [37:57]
B
And it has spoken word versus.
- [38:00]
A
Yes, that's what I'm thinking of.
- [38:02]
C
That's really goofy, right?
- [38:04]
A
I know.
- [38:04]
C
But again I got a lot of time for this album. Even though like people just pass over it usual.
- [38:08]
D
Now hear you the words of Taliesin
- [38:11]
B
on the foaming beach of the ocean
- [38:13]
A
in the day of trouble I should be of more service to thee.
- [38:32]
D
Two things that I would just like to mention about does have Bring that Neck, the instrumental which does showcase Richie pretty effectively. And that's.
- [38:42]
B
That's the first time his guitar starts to push forward.
- [38:45]
D
Yeah, exactly where I think you could say, you could see people saying, oh, you know, there is something special about this guy. And it's kind of this jazz hybrid, you know that it is like a jazz odyssey showstopper.
- [38:58]
C
When they played it live too.
- [38:59]
D
Absolutely.
- [39:00]
C
They play like half hour long versions that I really actually just enjoy listening to immensely. They play film for me.
- [39:05]
D
Right, yeah. And the other thing that I think of, and that's there in the first album too, but there are these kind of classical, classically inspired preludes, you know, the little introductions, expositions that you can see where John Lord was still very much thinking about, about all of that stuff. And it led up to the concert of a group and orchestra ultimately. But you know, that, that is. That was pretty different, you know, who was doing that kind of a thing back then? It was Distinc.
- [39:36]
A
Sam.
- [40:23]
C
I don't know. Scott, if you have any thoughts or do we want to move on to the final one of this?
- [40:27]
B
We can move on. This is probably my least favorite of the three. And it's your favorite, so we'll just leave that contrast.
- [40:34]
C
Deep Purple is the third album of the Deep Purple band's career and it's a self titled album. Came on pretty early in their whole run. This is a fascinating album. I will not claim that it is a great album, but it's fascinating to see the group just splintering apart. They're going in two opposite directions and one of them is Lord's and one of them is Blackmore's. Richie Blackmore is now chasing after hard rock. All right. He's coming up with songs like why Didn't Rose Mary? Which is by far the best song on this record, I think. I love that. Even if it's about Rosemary's baby and sleep. Why didn't Rosemary ever take pill?
- [41:29]
A
There's a black hill we have to climb Everything I need but nothing was mine See this world How Black hill why didn't Rosemary ever take the pill? Live there waiting Waiting for the kill A man won't do it but the devil will
- [41:54]
C
but also Bird Is Flown is a great track. I prefer the B side version more. And again, the. The one, I guess the last cover they did in their career is something by Donovan of all people, called Lalania. But it's a beautiful song and Blackmore's guitar soloing on it is actually surprisingly sensitive and thoughtful and he really has that nailed down. It's like an aspect of Deep Purple that really didn't. Didn't really get returned to in later years, but boy, they sound great on that.
- [42:47]
A
Somebody d.
- [42:58]
C
But on the other hand, you got John Lord and you got that. That tracks like April, which I just don't think works. It's just like a giant, like, neo giant classical, you know, excursion in the middle of that track. It just lets it down. I. I don't understand why they were investing all of the time into that track. It never paid off. But again, you know, other people really consider this to be one of the Purple's hidden great records. I've never felt that way myself.
- [43:23]
B
I don't love it, actually. The tracks I do like appear to be the ones that Jeff doesn't like. I think April's pretty. Pretty good.
- [43:30]
A
Yeah.
- [43:31]
B
I like the Painter, where you hear that guitar organ interplay work very well between Lord and Blackmore. Really cool organ sound late by Lord in the Painter. Chasing Shadows, which I think is the first track on the record. They're beginning to play a little bit more with some of the rhythmic patterns and Pace is not.
- [43:52]
C
That's Ian Pace's track to me.
- [43:54]
B
Yeah, like, Pace is not showing it quite yet. It'll be more apparent soon. He's just a hell of a drummer. Like a hell of a drummer. And you hear that first starting to emerge. If we heard a little bit more Blackmore on the last album, I think we hear a little bit more Pace.
- [44:07]
D
Right.
- [44:07]
B
Play with rhythms on a song like Chasing Shadows, which I like an awful lot.
- [44:34]
A
I don't.
- [44:58]
D
Yeah, actually, I, I. This is my least favorite of those first three albums is it just kind of lacks a sense of fun that the first two have, which I don't think most people think of fun when they think of Deep Purple, but I think those two.
- [45:11]
B
But early on. Yeah, yeah, sure.
- [45:13]
C
Absolutely. I really do think it's fun.
- [45:15]
D
Oh, do you?
- [45:16]
A
Okay.
- [45:16]
D
Good, good fun.
- [45:18]
C
These first few albums.
- [45:19]
A
Yeah.
- [45:19]
D
I think of this album as being just kind of dark and dull and maybe that's colored, no, no pun intended, by the COVID which is the borsch part of the borsch painting, which is really dark. And seems like, again, that the whole band at this point, the. Their reach exceeded their grasp, so they're trying to do something that, you know, they cannot yet. And there are some good moments. And I like Chasing Shadows, I like the Painter, but in general, I just find the album kind of boring. It really does not grab me at all. I could easily just never listen to it again and be fine with It
- [46:01]
A
Conquer up my life. Oh, painter Conquer my life. Take away the misery Take away the sight.
- [46:42]
C
So if you want to talk about our reach exceeding our grasp, well, I guess this brings us to the next phase of Deep Purple. So even as this album is being toured and it released, they decided, first of all, Led Zeppelin Happen is what is really what happened. Led Zeppelin bursts onto the scene. Richie Blackmore hears that and says, wait a second, they're onto something. This is what our band should be doing. And he begins to assert himself. And so part of that means that we have to get rid of our lead singer, who sounds like Elvis, to find someone else. There's a lot of hugger mugger that goes on about how they find these guys and how they replace them in the band. But we'll just say that what happens is that Ian Gillan and Roger Glover join as a pair from another group called Episode six. And they come as a package deal, by the way, because Gillen and Glover are friends and they're co songwriters together. They're collaborators. Richie Blackmore insists constantly. We didn't really even want to take Glover. He. He was foisted on us. I have no idea what kind of bad blood must exist between all these people. It's kind of funny to think about it, but they come in together and now deep purple mark 2 is born. The band that basically everybody knows and loves, the band that made it big, the famous one. And now they're going to be a hard rock band. Except they're not, not at first, because what they have to do first is Concerto for Group and Orchestra. This is John Lord's baby. This is the absolute apex of his influence on this band, which is, you know, Deep Purple playing with an orchestra. And I'm. I've listened to this thing about five, six, seven times in my life, including when we were preparing for this show. I really have nothing that to say about it. It's an experiment that doesn't work. It reminds me. The joke to me has always been the. The analogy has been to Jazz Odyssey, which is Derek Smalls. Derek Smalls, by the way, was a dead ringer in Spinal Tap. He's intentionally. He looks just like John Lord. Same hairstyle, same look, right?
- [48:35]
B
Harry Sheer.
- [48:35]
D
And then the mustache, the hand.
- [48:38]
C
The mustache and the hair. I mean, it's perfect, right? But also. Also his, like, already. His already sensibilities, like, you know, Lords keep insisting, like, we're gonna do our thing. I'm gonna do my classical thing, right?
- [48:49]
D
That's like jazz Odysse, that But the gentlemanly manner to both of them, Right? So they. They have, like, the pipe and the. John Laurie, ultimate gentleman. Yes.
- [49:37]
B
I have to disappoint Jeff because, I mean, Yvonne brought his guitar, but I brought my pipe organ in today. I was gonna play a few things from Concerto, but you don't. You don't want me to.
- [49:46]
C
Don't want me to. No. All right, all. So it's a silly kind of an album. It's never much worked for me. Does anybody disagree? You're gonna make a big defense of Concerto for me?
- [49:56]
D
I'll just mention two things. Okay. So it was. I guess there was somebody outside of the band that said. That offered it to John to do this concerto. And it was done at the Royal Albert hall, which is a massive venue. And we have to remember.
- [50:13]
C
Very prestigious, right?
- [50:14]
D
Very prestigious. And we have to remember, remember that Deep Purple was not successful in Britain at this point at all. They were mostly unknown. And this really put them on the map. This was a huge success, both the live performance and then the. The. The. The following album. And so that is really the thing that broke them. And. And what's interesting about it is that we think of Blackmore as loving classical music, but he was not into this at all. And he would really kind of seem to be resentful about the fact that he had to. I remember the story. I mean, it was a very uneasy combination of musicians. The orchestra guys back then did not like rock music. And so Blackmore talked about how, you know, he had this VOX amp which is, you know, certainly a lot less loud than his marshals that he ultimately ended up using, but that's what he was using. And all these orchestra musicians, when they weren't playing, they would immediately plug up their ears because of his. The racket he would. He was making. And he said, you know, it's. I'm supposed to get inspired with this, you know, and apparently they had such a bad attitude that the Malcolm. What was the Malcolm. The. The conductor that was behind it, it was very enthusiastic about the project. He got so fed up during the rehearsal with his musicians, he said that, gentlemen, we are going to be making history here. We may as well actually make some music. So start actually playing. They had such a bad attitude about it. And then the final thing I'll mention is that, you know, they were actually supposed to be reading music, and so it was all written out in notation. And rock musicians are notorious, notoriously bad readers. So Blackmore actually did have training in classical guitar, so he had the ability to Read music, but not that great. So apparently he got lost. He had to do a solo and. And he got lost and he just. Just kept playing. And the conductor again, who I can't think of.
- [52:22]
C
Matthew Arnold, I think is his name.
- [52:23]
D
Matthew.
- [52:24]
C
Matthew Arnold.
- [52:24]
D
Malcolm.
- [52:25]
C
It's Malcolm Arnold.
- [52:26]
D
Arnold. Yeah, that's it. But he. You can see him kind of looking at. At sheet music and he's looking very puzzled. He's like, what's happening here? And it's funny because I saw other people, you know, I think somebody in the band said that this was Richie asserting his independence, right? He's. He said, I'm not going to be structured, right? And then you ask Richie and it's like, no, I was just lost. So I kept playing.
- [52:51]
C
I wasn't trying to do anything funn.
- [52:53]
D
So anyway, that was. That's the story, but that's the. I think that's what put him on the map in Britain. And it was a very important album for them. And also because it set up the next stage which was then, you know, that was Deep Purple in concert and then the next album was Deep Purple in Rock. And I love the. I'll let Jeff take over here, but I just love the quote that. That Blackmore had many times, you know, he said, all right, let's try this hard rock thing and if it doesn't work, then I'll play with orchestras for the rest my life. Because he was. He definitely didn't want to do that. He was pretty bitter about the experience. And so unfortunately for him, it worked really well.
- [53:35]
C
Scott, any thoughts you can offer stirring defense of Concerto?
- [53:38]
B
I'm not going to offer Defensive Concerto,
- [53:40]
C
but I hope you will offer a stirring defense for the next album, which I consider to be not only functionally a perfect album, maybe one of the. What better cover for Deep Purple and rock than to have it Mount Rushmore. Yeah, this is a Mount Rushmore, Rushmore level hard rock album. And in fact, he said, what is hard rock? I will hand you Deep Purple and rock before I will give you any Led Zeppelin album. I will give you any Black Sabbath album. I love all of these bands. Deep Purple and Rock is almost miraculous. It's like it's not a complete rebirth because we knew this band was capable of making some heavy, hard, ripping music. But there's just something about the addition of Ian Gillen and then the focus, the focus on every. Everything that's just lose gut bucket. Heavy metallic crunch. Deep Purple and Rock is an icon of music. I can't think of a single song I would critique on this record a single song I criticize. I wouldn't remove a second. I wouldn't even remove the opening of Speed King, which is impossible as it is to believe. Was released in the United States originally without that great nuclear explosion.
- [54:47]
D
Yeah,
- [54:49]
A
it.
- [55:41]
C
This is an album that basically needs no defense. All it needs is praise, in my opinion. And it's like one of those things where if I can meet a person who says they like, you know, like Led Zeppelin 4 or even they like Smoke on the Water. And I'm like, well, you've heard Deep Purple and rock, haven't you? Sometimes they say no. And then that's when I know what I have to do. It's like, do not pass. Go put this record on. What do you guys think about this one? The real turning, the real beginning of what we know is famous rock and Deep Purple.
- [56:41]
B
Just Wright, of course. Great. You know, if Zeppelin were proud. Zeppelin were maybe a little more based in the blues. If Sabbath maybe were a little bit darker, this record in rock is faster. It's more technically explosive. Blackmore's guitar tone is something that you don't hear in. In those bands. And then, of course, Gillen's just shriek.
- [57:08]
C
You've never heard that shriek before. To me, it's more. That's more imp. Me than Robert Plant's voice.
- [57:12]
B
I was thinking about.
- [57:13]
C
It feels like it's lightning bolt hot.
- [57:16]
B
I was thinking a lot about that comparison between Gillen and Plant. And especially as we go farther into these records, further into these records, there's a passion and enthusiasm that Gillen always seems to bring, that Plant brings. Sometimes it's not that it's not there, but Gillen is so over the top. But not in a way that makes you say, oh, that's too much. It's not too much.
- [57:42]
C
I see why he was cast as Jesus Christ, by the way. Because he's theatrical, right? It's not hysterical, it's theatrical. But he has a real acute sense of, like, when to just go crazy with his vocals. And he can do so many impressive things.
- [57:54]
B
Well, like Bloodsucker, the. The second track on the record. It starts with almost a Zeppelin type whole lot of love kind of riff. By the end, it's something totally different. It's harder, it's louder. And Gill by the end is just speaking in tongues like his. His vocals are coming so fast, so furious, so intense. That's a real difference that Deep Purple brings to this record. Into the Fire is a is track I like here. And that's where you start to hear Lord and. And Blackmore sort of doubling up on those rifts, which makes it so much heavier.
- [58:54]
C
That's what gives him the power. Yeah, we'll get into that in the next few albums.
- [58:57]
B
It's amazing, but that, you know, into the Fire is one of the first times that I. That I hear that where.
- [59:01]
A
That.
- [59:01]
B
That the doubling of the riffs just becomes so heavy. And into the Fire is one where Yvonne talked about Hendrix. That's where you hear a little bit that Purple Haze intro, and that. That. That's repeated on into the Fire. Flight of the Rat, I hear Brian May is probably.
- [59:19]
C
That's my favorite song by far my favorite track on this record. And of course, it's not even a song to me. It's mostly an instrumental. So Ian Gillon sings some verses. I still don't know what they're about or what they mean. Doesn't matter, man.
- [59:31]
B
I don. I wrote down more than four lines of lyrics in my entire notes for every Purple album.
- [59:37]
C
Because, I mean, listen, they're lucky that they didn't get sued by Little Richard for speech.
- [59:40]
B
Right? That's right. Yeah.
- [59:41]
C
Just like every Little Richard song.
- [59:44]
D
There's quite a bit of Elvis in there, too.
- [59:46]
C
Yeah, there is too. Right. But to get back to Flight of the Rat, okay, When it tears off into that organ solo, like in the middle of the song with John Lord, that, to me, is. That's. That's the definition of Deep Purple. If you want to, like one second, one segment of one song that describes what. What would this band bring to the table? It's that. So that's what. Why that song, to me, is the standout on a record that basically has no weak tracks.
- [60:27]
A
Sam,
- [61:02]
C
What about you? What do you want to say?
- [61:03]
D
Oh, my gosh, I have so much to say.
- [61:05]
C
Everything isn't there.
- [61:06]
A
Yeah, I know.
- [61:06]
D
This is. This is really where everything comes together for the band. And it is astonishing. And from the COVID which I think is possibly the most iconic rock cover of all time, and it's incredible, you know, what a perfect representation of the music and the. In the. On the album, and. And you have. You know, Blackmore says that he heard Led Zeppelin, he heard Robert Plant, and he immediately knew that things were changing, that there is something else that's coming. And he knew. He knew they needed to change along with that. And you can see him taking the opportunity to shift to the music where he now becomes the leader. He becomes the most prominent part of the band. And, you know, the guy has had a. Has a Massive ego. And so he finally had the ability to, you know, impose himself more, which he didn't really have an opportunity to do before. And he wasn't really worthy of it anyway. But it's also interesting that Blackmore always. It makes it sound as though John Lord was not quite as into it that he wanted to do the classical stuff. And Laura said many times is like, that is absolutely wrong. I love that stuff. And Lord is truly.
- [62:19]
C
He leans into it on all these arrangements. So he's clearly convinced he's invested in this.
- [62:23]
D
I think think he is the most hard rock keyboard player that ever existed. You know, he takes his les, he takes his Hammond organ and plugs it into the Marshall staff, which has never been done before, you know. Yeah. And almost nobody has done it sound.
- [62:39]
A
Yeah.
- [62:39]
D
And, you know, so he finds him
- [62:40]
C
in this era,
- [63:08]
A
See if you can make it like the other two feel a burden.
- [63:28]
D
He matches Blackmore's sound and Blackmore actually becomes much more aggressive in the sound because he switches from a Gibson ES335 to a Stratocaster, which we are so closely associate him with. And the Strat gives him that kind of wide, wild sound. The untamed, unbridled, uninhibited sound that he thrives on. That actually such a great representation of his personality. And he starts using those massive Marshall stacks, 200 watt heads. Usually two or three of those stacks together. Obviously heavily influenced by Hendrix. And so many of the riffs on the album are Hendrix derived, you know, you can see that. And also because Roger Glover turns out to be a very prolific writer and Glover is ripping off Hendrik's riffs and bring them. But you know, they take these riffs and they do something totally different with them, but they're all riff based. And that's what they saw with Zeppelin and Black Sabbath, which came out. The debut came out, I think four months before in rock. And so they see that there is something happening and they're going to be on top of that. And it's this heavy riff based sound. And let me say this, just a couple about the songs, a couple of things about the songs. It. So as Jeff pointed out, there is the whole opening of side one, which is side A, which is absolutely incredible. And. And it's got, you know, the organ, but it's really Richie show. And Richie just goes nuts. And actually you can hear it on this track on Speed King, on the opening, the actual main track and the closing track. Hard Love and Men, man.
- [65:06]
C
Yes, those two feel like amphetamine Like. Like songs. Like, yeah, there's something obscene, obsessive, and, like, really aggro. I'm speaking.
- [65:14]
D
That's Rich's personality. He is aggro. He is fundamentally.
- [65:18]
C
And then Hard Loving man is Lord's version of it, where he has that, like, obsessive drone on the organ.
- [65:24]
D
Wait, wait, wait, hang on. You step on my line here. So.
- [65:28]
C
Okay, go for it.
- [65:29]
D
So the thing. What I'm. What I want to say is that there is this absolute lack of inhibition. And you can hear that. I don't know if you guys can tell, but there are multiple parts in both Speed King, the opening and the song. And then Hard and Man, where Richie takes his Strat and is rubbing it against the post in the middle of the studio. And you hear this, like a. Like a. Like, it's almost like a sound that's slowing down, and that's what he's doing. He's just going absolutely crazy. And he said that the engineer is staring at him like, you're not. So what are you. What the hell are you doing? You know, have you lost your mind? And. And I just want to point out about the intro to Speed King, that I think that's the model for Van Halen's Eruption. And you can hear that. You know, you can. The first. It starts off with the whole band just making the. On, you know, ghastly racket, and the guitar player just going absolutely nuts. Right. And we know. I know Eddie, you know, he let his guard down. He often talked about how much he loved Blackmore and what a huge influence he was on him. But you can hear that in the opening of Speed King. But you know, just the level of virtuosity in that. On that entire album, the interplay between John Lord and Richie Blackmore. Blackmore really steps up his game and is now matching Lorde. And Lord is stepping up his game in terms of the aggression, in terms of not just the musical musicality, but the power of his playing.
- [67:11]
A
Sam.
- [67:55]
D
So you have. And then you got Ian Pace, who is just, you know, going nuts. I mean, the stuff that he's playing, I think, you know, everybody talks about John Bonham. John Bonham, the greatest drummer ever. I honestly think that Ian Pace was a greater drummer than John Bonham. He had a swing. He had a. A groove to his playing that John Bonham couldn't even imagine playing with. And, you know, he had more pep in his play. He absolutely had more pep. Yeah. No question.
- [68:22]
C
I think of John Bonham as a little sludgier.
- [68:24]
A
Yes.
- [68:25]
B
Exactly.
- [68:26]
C
Beast.
- [68:26]
D
Right, right, right, right. And. And with Ian Pace, he's got that bounce, you know, there. Everything has a bounce to it, right. That. That. That swing. Not even groove, actually. And so you have all these. These elements. And then, you know. So Blackmore said he saw Led Zeppelin, he saw Robert Plan, and Gillan becomes the first of a long line of singers that are not into hard rock, are picked by Blackmore and then become iconic, become absolutely legendary, even though that's not their kind of music. But they become associated with that music because Blackmore pick them. And they are kind of resentful about it, actually, though. But most of these guys come from some kind of pop, R and B background. Like, that's what Gilland was. And. And Blackmore says here, do this, and, you know, he becomes a legend, but he.
- [69:16]
C
He becomes a theater legend, too. So. Like Child in Time is, believe it or not, the song we haven't mentioned yet.
- [69:21]
D
I know. That's amazing.
- [69:22]
C
It's Deep Purple's biggest epic, really. Right. It's actually one of the very few Deep Purple songs I remember hearing on the radio before I got into Deep Purple. When I finally came on. On the box set, I'm like, oh, I know that one. That's the ah song.
- [69:34]
A
Right.
- [69:34]
C
But the reason I knew it as the Ah. Ah song is because it is defined by. By Ian Gillan's shrieking vocals. These keening whales. He sounds like a banshee. This is about, like a guy in the Vietnam War, basically, is dying breaths.
- [69:46]
B
Right.
- [69:46]
C
Something. One of those horror songs. And so when he. When Gillen goes like, ah, I'm not even going to try to sing what he does, My Lord.
- [69:54]
D
Well, nobody could do that. I mean, honestly, there's no single other person that was alive at that time that could do that. Gillen really was absolutely unique.
- [70:04]
A
Sam.
- [70:37]
C
That was his. That was what he brought to the band.
- [70:39]
A
Yeah.
- [70:39]
C
Scott, any other thoughts before we move on? Do you want to talk about the. About the. The most intelligent single ever written.
- [70:47]
D
We have to talk about that.
- [70:48]
A
Yes.
- [70:48]
C
Which is Black Knight. It was like, I think the biggest hit in the United Kingdom.
- [70:51]
D
Yeah.
- [70:52]
C
And it was, like, knocked off practically on a dare. They walked in. It's like, we're gonna do a riff. I think somebody's like, I'm gonna play with the riff from this, like, Ricky Nelson song. I was listening to up with Black Knight. Gillen's like, I have to write the stupidest lyrics possible because that's what the people want to buy. We want to get into the top 10 let's write something Dumb. And of course it worked. And it's, like, kind of legendary, in fact, among British bands is like a rockheadedly stupid song that everybody likes anyway, because it is. It's pretty irresistible, that riff.
- [71:20]
D
You know, the funny thing about it is that, you know, and Blackmore's talked about this many times is that they recorded the album and the management came around our label. I can't.
- [71:30]
A
I remember.
- [71:30]
D
And they said, we don't have a single. You need a single. It's like, oh, really? You know, and we never thought of that.
- [71:37]
C
Always, like, in the. Into the Great White Open. Always. Same line.
- [71:41]
D
Exactly. Yeah. And. And so they said, okay, go back in the studio, take one day and write a single. Like, write a hit single, right? And it's like, oh, sure, no problem. Right.
- [71:51]
A
And.
- [71:52]
D
And they struggled for, like, hours and came up with absolutely nothing. And they go. Go down to the pub, get slashed and. And then come back in the studio and, yeah, Richie starts playing that Ricky. Ricky Nelson riff. Right. Which is so stupid, but it's so catchy, right? And it's from a Sing Songy.
- [72:16]
C
Right?
- [72:17]
D
Yeah. And it's from this 1958, you know, album track by Ricky Nelson. I don't have. Not sure if it. If it was even a single. And this. This kind of begins the ripping off of riffs by Blackmore. And he.
- [72:32]
A
To.
- [72:32]
D
To his credit, he's extremely open about every time he does that. Right. And most notable on. In Rock, besides all the Hendricks riffs that they, you know, morphed into something else was Trial in Time, which was lifted almost verbatim from a song by a band called It's a Beautiful Day, which I think they're mostly forgotten at this point. But the song is called. Called Bombay Calling. And they take that and turn it into this massive epic, but it's a total ripoff. And then, you know, they do the same thing with the ripoff here. And, you know, it's quite amazing, actually, that they were able to. They, you know, they're. I think they're mostly drunk. They go in the studio and they come up with a song, and it's in like, half an hour, and they record the whole thing in half an hour and becomes, I think, the first number one hit. And I think for. For Gillen, the lyrics that he came up with with was not intentionally, like, let's dumb down the lyrics. That's really the best he could do at that time because he was badly drunk, you know, so I think Glover, you know, threw in Some of the lyrics too. But you know, actually just before we move on, I. I wanted to mention that for as far as the In Rock album, the Hard Loving man song, I think is truly iconic and it's not one that people talk about. Everybody, I love it, you know, correctly talks about Trial and Time, which is remarkable. But you listen to Hard Love and Man and there is like the entire new wave of British heavy metal there, there is like Iron Maiden, there is the blueprint for that, right? You get the galloping, absolute galloping rhythm. You get the harmony guitars, right? And what I wanted to mention is, is that Blackmore just goes berserk on guitar and he starts playing this wild stuff, but he. With these harmony lines and he's got this incredible ability to, to play harmony lines that are very unusual, that are constantly shifting. And you listen to something like that. He, he doesn't do it very often because he's such a spontaneous player. In order to write the harmony lines, you actually have to compose the pieces first, right? And he doesn't like doing that. But the few times that he does it, they're mind blowingly amazing. He's got this just absolutely natural ability to comp Come up with incredibly creative harmony lines that predates kind of Brian May, you know, they Queen is not around at that point yet. And you can see also one other aspect of Blackmore's playing. Well, actually the whammy bar abuse which he got from. From Hendrix. But he starts really going heavily into that with this album. But the final thing in terms of his playing, he had this remarkable ability to build up tension. And so he builds tension, builds tension build and it just develops this. And then when it goes into the resolution, a chord or a particular line, you feel such a sense of relief, such sense of satisfaction, right. I think that's actually something that Deep Purple starts doing on all of the In Rock album. Every one of them has that ability. Ian Pace is such a dynamic drummer and he has the ability to ramp up the tension, bring it down, right, and then be just absolutely explosive at the right moment to, you know, have the climax it. And, and that's, you know, John Lord, Ian Pace and in Blackmore and I guess Gillen and I think that they do that better than anybody else. That tension and release thing in their music is just. I don't see it anywhere else. And that was such a huge part of their jams that they started doing, of course, is they played live, you know, is that they would go on for 10, 15, 20 minutes and they had this ability to, you know, ramp up the tension, resolve it, bring it back up. And it just kept, you know, making. They kept making it interesting. It was not something that was just a drone. It kept getting more and more exciting. And of course, as we'll talk about Made in Japan, that's kind of the. The ultimate of that. But since I have the guitar and I haven't played very much here, let me just do this very quickly. Here's what I love about Blackmore. So, you know, you listen to like Paige and Tony Iommi and they are very blues based, you know, so they're playing like. That kind of stuff, right? So it's. It's blues based soloing and they do not really stray out of that. And they play like vertically across the neck. They stay in the same position on the neck. Blackmore had so much training, he actually there was, you know, so Scott knows I love this British band, the Shadows. And sure, the Shadows played a very important role for Blackmore in the following way. So one of the early rockers in British history was this guy by name, Marty Wilde. Marty Wild is, by the way, the father of Kim Wilde, of kids in America fame. But Marty Wilde had this backing band called the Wildcats. And the Wildcats saw the success of the Shadows starting 1960, 61, and decided to also become an instrumental band. And just like the Shadows, they were, you know, Cliff Richards back in band and they started doing instrumentals and. And. And they changed in name to the Crew Cats. I have no idea why, but the Crew Cats had three, four singles. Their lead guitar player was Big Jim Sullivan, and Big Jim Sullivan turned out to be Richard Blackmore's neighbor. And the guy was an amazing guitar player. And Blackmore somehow found out about it. You know, the guy was a successful professional guitarist that soon after that became a legendary studio session guitarist and in fact was often teamed up with Jimmy Page. So you had little Jimmy, Jimmy and Big Jim, all right, and the two of them were, you know, a pair. So Blackmore, when he started playing guitar when he was a teenager, he would just show up at Big Jim's house and would beg for lessons. And Big Jim really knew his stuff. He knew his jazz, he knew his classical music, right? And that was why Blackmore became who he became the rhythm section of the Wildcats. And the Ku Cats were these guys, Brian Bennett and Licorice locking, who by 1962 actually became the Shadows rhythm sect. So those two guys ended up, you know, the original bass player and drummer left the Shadows, and then these two guys became the shadows. And so, you know, you have all these connections right there between Blackmore and In the Shadows and Big Jim Sullivan and. And Little Jimmy Page. And you know, you have Jeff Beck that was around all of that time. But this is why I think the Big Jim Sullivan's influence is what allowed Blackmore to have a much more interesting guitar style. So whereas, you know, he would blues soloing. He do, he would do that, but he started playing like minor scales, Right? So you would get something like that and. And he would actually start moving up and down the neck. It was a more horizontal kind of play, Right? So you get that. And then he starts incorporating all these more exotic scales like the harmonic minor, which is. And that harmonic minor scale became the foundation of all of the neoclassical kind of shred guitar in the 1980s. Without that, Engvid, Monster would not exist. Right. But he starts incorporating that scale and then he starts going much more exotic and starts going into like the Hungarian minor, you know, you know, that kind of stuff. Nobody was doing that. He's the only one that's doing that. Right. You know, the Middle Eastern kind of skills. You know, all of that is part of Blackmore's playing that you start seeing little bits and pieces of on Inrock. So I just wanted to mention that I think on Hard Love and man, that's one place where you really start seeing what this guy's capable of. And there was nobody that could touch him at that point.
- [81:56]
C
All right, now you want a blast of irony. We've spent about what, a half an hour praising Deep Purple in rock. And I'm about to tell you that the. The follow up album, the one that is kind of falls between two very small, very tall stools, that's the greatest Deep Purple album of all time.
- [82:12]
D
It's called.
- [82:13]
C
It's called Fireball.
- [82:29]
A
Where you're from. Magic, in your opinion, which is all you gaz upon Stand up on your head around you I wonder where you're from oh, yeah they wonder where I found you all my love is a long way. Time to understand you and the band
- [82:55]
C
doesn't even like it that much. Does.
- [82:58]
D
Okay, well, he's.
- [83:00]
C
He's right. All right. Fireball to me is so underrated. It's like that. It was that moment that really cemented my love for Deep Purple because, like, as I mentioned earlier, I went and got the box set, then you start getting the famous album. So you get in rock, you get Machine Head, you get Live in Japan, made in Japan. And then only then do you go back and you get some of the other stuff. And then I found. That was when I found Fireball, which is sort of like I knew from one song, Strange Kind of Woman, which I think wasn't actually even on the album originally.
- [83:30]
D
Right.
- [83:30]
C
And I discovered this, like, wow, this band has depth. This band is deep. They are trying multiple things on this album. They say, like, they did a song like Anyone's Daughter because they had no other ideas. They were frustrated. I think they even regret its inclusion on the album. I love Anyone's Daughter. It is a quiet kind of ghostly, country piano based rant. It's so left field for Deep Purple, but it feels completely. It reminds me of the, like the great stuff on Van Halen's Women and Children first that wasn't hard rock. It's of course, much later band that was, I think, pretty much deeply influenced by this album.
- [84:05]
A
Well, I stood under your bedroom window throwing up a brick.
- [84:10]
D
No one came.
- [84:11]
A
I threw one more that really did the trick. Your daddy came and banged my head. He said what kind of man is this that's hanging round my girl Threw me in the can. You're a farmer's daughter, you're a farmer's daughter.
- [84:28]
C
Why do I always get the kind
- [84:31]
A
of girl I didn't oughta get? I won't get no more eggs and water. Now I played the farmer's Daughter.
- [84:55]
C
But like, it's that kind of left turn that I really came to love about Deep Purple. And it's all on this record. And again, there are seven songs. This record, eight if you include Strange Kind of Woman. Not a one deserves to go. Every one of these is a great song. And in fact, I think, in my opinion, at least, it includes the greatest Deep Purple hard rock song of all time, which is no one Came. And this is a song that no one talks about. I don't even think the band ever played it live. They just didn't seem to think it was one of their big, like, you know, stage hits. If it is, I have never heard a live version. But no one came. Just from the opening seconds of the Thumb. Dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb, dumb. Beginning of that. When it. And then Ian just starts screaming about like, it's because I'm like, maybe as I'm starting off new. It's a song about making it as a rock star. He's like, we're going out there, we're playing all the pubs. But no one came for miles or around and said that your stuff is good. No one. No one is interested in our stuff. But we're going to keep hacking away at it. I know the band doesn't have a lot of great things to say about Fireball. The band is wrong.
- [85:59]
A
Well, I believe that I must tell the truth and say things as they really are but if I told the truth for nothing but the truth Should I ever be a star Nobody knows who's real and who's faking Everyone shouting out loud it's only the glitter and shine that gets through where's my Robin Hood outfit? I'm coming I'm gone before you winking Ey. No one even cared enough to say goodbye the money's good and the times you have fun and games galore but you spend your money and you lie in bed forgotten I wonder what you did it for no one came from miles around and said, man, who's he?
- [86:57]
C
All the hard rock stuff on this is incredible. All the left turns work. I love the Mule. I love everything about Fireball. And I guess my only question is why. People don't really give it the same kind of credit that they do the other albums from this era, I think.
- [87:13]
B
I think it's only because it comes. It's in the middle between them. It's between them. It's between In Rock, which is a breakthrough and something.
- [87:19]
C
And it doesn't have any of those big singles and it doesn't have the
- [87:21]
B
singles that Machine Head has. And Machine Head's great too, like Jeff. I really like Fireball and I listen and the variety appeals to me. Every song has its own identity, which sometimes gets lost, lost when you're putting together an album. But I think every song stands on its own. Fools has this kind of psychedelic doom feel to it. It's a really good one. I love that drawn out middle section. And Gillan really sells it, really goes for it vocally. And Fools no One Came, which Jeff talked about, has that kind of Prague complexity to it, which is why I think Jeff likes it. I like Anyone's Daughter, which feels very Dylany to me in the presentation and. And the way they pull that off. It's a very funny track too. I mean, lyrically, a very funny track about betting the farmer's daughter, the judge's daughter, and then he ends up marrying a rich man's daughter. And what do you think of that? Is how this.
- [88:14]
C
It's motorcycle nightmare, if you know that. Maybe that's the reason you're thinking. It has Dylan esque overtones. It kind of has the same theme as a pretty well known song off of another side of Bob Dylan called Motorcycle Nightmare, but I think my favorite.
- [88:26]
B
And I really like this album. I'm not totally sure I'd say it's better than in rock, but it's very close. This just feels like they're so close to. I don't want to say figuring things out because they're already there, but they're so close to having that breakthrough, you know, commercially, which they would have at the very next record. And I think you hear that throughout. I really like. No, no, no. This song that is. That is very unique in the catalog, at least early on. But it's funky and elastic. They play more with R B and a little funk in.
- [88:54]
C
It has such a good turnaround, too. Right where John Lord comes in with that organ chord. He holds it and like, the Blackmore, like, you know, riffs away with a good bluesy riff. And it's just like, well, this is a big band in command.
- [89:05]
B
Yep.
- [89:06]
C
It's gotta know what they're doing.
- [89:07]
B
It's really sweet, clean Blackmore solo on it. And the playful. You know, it is a heavy, heavy band. Could be playful. This is a playful interaction between organ and guitar, between Lord and Blackmore on. No, no, no. I think that's my favorite track on the record. But as Jeff said, you don't toss any of these off the ship. They're all really good. So
- [89:30]
A
us. No,
- [90:08]
D
I appreciate everything you guys have to say about it. I mostly agree with it, but I just can't get myself into that album. I just don't. I don't love it. And I'm very much with Blackmore here, and I think Blackmore was very critical of it because I don't think he was the driving force behind this album. And, like, he was within rock, you know, and. And was. It was more of a band effort. And that is what Gillen appreciate. Gillen has often said that that was his favorite Deep Purple album, and he thought he actually used the word that probably made Blackmore hate it even more. He said that it was. It was more funky. It was, you know, going into funk. And it's like, we're gonna get into those. Yeah, we are. And it's like that. That's like the death knell, right? But you can see. Yeah, I totally get everything you guys are saying here, and I think you are right. But it just lacks that excitement. It does have a sense of fun. There is a more groove. There is a bit more groove to it, but it lacks the excitement. And that. That feeling of being on the edge. And there is not that level of at any moment, like in Child and Time or Hard, Hard Love Loving man, where things could just fall apart at any point. Right there. The danger to this, there's no.
- [91:25]
A
No.
- [91:25]
C
Huge, big climactic moment.
- [91:27]
D
Exactly. Yeah.
- [91:33]
A
And I can see it's in my brain. You don't know the pain I feel As I must live again Rocks and stones can bruise my soul but tears will leave us. They smile to themselves and they lay down my head oh, sun pierce, I'll sleep A tear from behind
- [92:19]
D
and all of this, you know, what Blackmore said about this album is that he felt it was contrived. And I think it felt like for him, it was craftsmanship rather than inspiration behind it. You know, they kind of forced their way through it and it was the first time that they retreated to this awful house that was extremely cold up in North Devon. Devonshire. And, you know, so Blackmore got pretty bored and started playing pranks on everybody. And this is where he actually. They started doing seances and he needed a cross and so he want. Went to Roger Waters, to Roger Waters, Roger Glover's room, and said, roger, can we borrow your crucifix? And he's like, no, go away, I'm sleeping. And so Blackmore would not take no for an answer. Took an axe and broke down the door. Poked his head through the door. Can I have the crucifix now? And apparently Glover was so angry that he grabbed the ax and started chasing Blackmoor all around the house, ready to, to kill him, actually. So, you know, it sounded like it was a little bit of a miserable experience at that house. But, you know, I, I, I actually love the first track, you know, the, the title track, which is the one bit of true excitement. And it doesn't have a Blackmore solo, which is bizarre. Right. I mean, it's this really hard, rocking track which, by the way, begins with the sound of an AC unit being started, which.
- [93:40]
C
Like a vacuum cleaner. Right.
- [93:41]
D
I guess it's not, you know, it's an AC unit. Yeah. Which is just phenomenal. But, you know, you get, you have this driving track and even if the, Even if there is no Blackmore solo, you get this incredible Glover solo. Yes, right. Yeah, the BAS solo, which is so perfect in that track. And it's like, wow, this guy had a lot more to offer than we probably often give him credit for, you know, so I wish we had more of that sort of a thing.
- [94:31]
A
So.
- [94:31]
D
Yeah. But actually, I love the single. You know, the Strange Kind of Woman is, Is such a great track. It is so Catchy. And I think it was on the, on the US version of the album. I think it was an album track. And then I actually love the B side of Strange Kind of Woman, which is a track called I'm Alone, which is kind of like Hush. But it's an original. It's very Hendrix and it's a ripoff of Hendrix, but it's a driving track and it's got great organ, great, great guitar playing. And those are probably. I, I love both of those even better than the album as a whole. And I should point out, by the way, let me just say this. Yeah. You get the, the first, first kind of inkling of where Gillen's head is with the Strange Kind of Woman lyrics, right? He's got this obsession with prostitutes and women of the night and, and kind of, you know, women that have been around the block a little bit too much. Let's say you get the living wreck on the first in rock. Right? And he just loves writing about these kinds of women. It's like, man, what kind of life are you leading?
- [96:17]
A
You know?
- [96:17]
C
So I think Richie Blackmore got tired of this over time and he started insisting like David Coverdale, like, right. Like I want, I want so songs about the occult or whatever. I don't want another song about trucking or about being a hard rock band on the road or women, you know.
- [96:32]
D
Yes, right, of course. Right, yeah, right, exactly right.
- [96:37]
C
That was why he went that way. By the way, since I've already offended your sensibilities enough, Ivon, I'll point out that I actually think in terms of Deep Purple album covers, Fireball is my favorite of them.
- [96:47]
D
It is great. Yeah. Oh, I wouldn't go that far, but I, I'll grant it. It's great. I, I get that, that. I understand that's what you think and you're all right.
- [96:56]
C
But you know what? I. I have a feeling that you and I will be on the same page when it comes to the next record. All right? And this really is the climax. People are like, this is the band that is building towards something. Although as we've already said, they're really already there, in my opinion. Right. And it all comes to like a head with machine Head. By the way, most people non guitarists at least think that the title Machine Head is maybe some sort of sci fi conceit. A machine head is just literally the tuning peg on your guitar.
- [97:26]
D
Right?
- [97:26]
C
Right. That's all it is. It's how you tighten your. Tighten or lower your strings.
- [97:31]
A
Right?
- [97:31]
C
But I mean, what is there to say about this album. This album, which is more or less a hard rock blueprint. The only song I've ever played on Rock Band, you know, the video game Rock Band, Only song I've ever played ever comes from this record. And I'm pretty sure you know what
- [97:50]
A
it is,
- [98:33]
C
But I'm gonna let somebody else take it because it's just such a ripe subject to open with. A lot of people would say this is clearly Deep Purple's greatest album, as I've already said. I actually would disagree. There are very few flaws on Machine Head.
- [98:47]
B
It's. If it's not, it's awfully close to being the best Deep Purple album. Every song is so well defined. If I was saying, you know, you find a riff and you. And you work in this. Every song has a killer riff. Every song has a really clean and clear hook, and then the playing is outstanding, you know, I think both Page and Glover showed what they could do on Fireball. It was a little more of a team effort, and that continues here. Every part of that machine is operating at the highest capacity possible. It's muscular. It's more polished than in rock, if you like things a little more chaotic and maybe punk, if you use that term. Maybe in rocks. You like the inrock better, right? This is more polished. Yeah, you have the.
- [99:36]
C
They were moving with such confidence at this.
- [99:38]
B
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [99:39]
C
I mean, strength. The strength you're seeing.
- [99:41]
B
You got the three big tent poles here, the three Deep Purple songs. Everyone can sing and hum in their sleep. Highway Star starts it off, Smoke on the Water in the middle and Space Trucking right at the end. And if you take a poll, Smoke on the Water probably is the most well known of those three, I would guess.
- [99:57]
D
Sure, Absolutely.
- [99:58]
C
I think it's probably the most famous song of all time.
- [100:00]
B
I think it's my least favorite of the three. I don't like, but it's, you know, it's just kind of a lumber beast. It's very cigar. It's very simple. The story is actually very interesting. It's a real story. The lyrics are real and the riff's undeniable. But. But Go, go, grab Machine Head, put on Highway Star and try to listen like it's the first time you've heard that song. That song's incredible. Highway Star is. Is an incredible song.
- [100:32]
A
God speed inside my brain but nobody can see my head now that I'm on the road again oh, I'm heaven again I got everything like a movie ground I'm on control and everything I love It. I mean, it. I mean, it's. The.
- [101:23]
C
The story about how they wrote Highway Starsky.
- [101:25]
B
I read it.
- [101:26]
A
It was.
- [101:27]
D
There was.
- [101:27]
C
There was a journalist there on their tour bus. They're riding to a gig and it's like, you know, the journalist naively asks like, well, how do you write your songs? And Richie Black for. He takes out his guitar as a. I write him like this. And he just starts playing this riff. And the band is like, that's really good, actually. And they literally work the song up that day and play it that night at the gig for the first time ever. And there are actually very, really good live versions of this from late, late 1971. It's the first song before it was recorded.
- [101:55]
D
Yeah, yeah.
- [101:56]
C
This is what I meant when I said they're moving from strength to strength with such confidence at this point. They can literally just dash off a song as epic and as legendary as Highway Star on a Bus. Just like on the moment, you know, to impress somebody on a dare.
- [102:09]
B
And, you know, those spaces in between the verses are so fun that the double track guitar solo, it's. It's just a real centerpiece that comes at the front the of. Of an album. And, you know, lyrically it's probably one of the more memorable. I mean, Smoke on the Water has the story, but just the little couplets and little lines, you know, It's a killer machine. It's got everything. Eight cylinders, all mine. All right, hold tight. It's Highway Star. I mean, that is. It's bigger, it's thicker than what they had done previously. It is, right?
- [102:36]
C
This is an album that opens and closes with two car songs, right? Two of the greatest car songs of all time. It's like we're back in the Beach Boys era of the 60s, actually. Nobody realizes it. We're right in groovy songs about little deuce coups or maybe popping into our groovy Scooby Van. And that's Space Truck.
- [102:52]
B
That's a point I actually wanted to make. Which this is. This is a road record. This is like a top down, high speed. Highway Star, Space Trucking, but like Pictures of Home. That is. That is a song that makes you want to put the pedal to the metal and go 100.
- [103:05]
C
Never before to Me. Classic. Never before to Me is the perfect example of that because it begins a little bit slower. It's kind of like a little bluesy, and then it just kicks into that beat. And that to me is like, I'm on. I'm on the highway now.
- [103:25]
A
I'm tired I'm crying I'm sick and sad I'm not a woman A dead woman I just wasn't right Help me now Please myself I never felt so bad before
- [103:53]
B
Never, never before Pictures of Home has such a great pace, great tempo. You can't help but bob your head. I mean, it's not a headbanger, it's a head bobber. Like you just can't help be swept up in that. In that rhythm that flow out a song like Pictures of Home Somebody shout
- [104:12]
A
as a mountain Only my own words return Nobody's up there It's a deception when will I ever learn? I belong here with emptiness, egos and snow Unfriendly Chilling my body un. Whispering pictures of.
- [104:55]
B
Lazy I think is. You know, there's minimal lyrics on a song like Lazy, but Lord's organ opens with those runs. Blackmoore is outstanding. Gillen gets a harmonica opportunity on Lazy. I mean, there's so many fun things throughout. Machine Head. And again, yeah, pop it in. Go for a Ride. It's an open road kind of record.
- [105:16]
D
You know, I think this album is really where the myth making of Deep Purple happens, right? They become something more than a band. They really become a myth. And especially in the United States, I think the impact of those car songs, especially in the US and the muscle car culture, right, it's like, my God, if you're going to have a Camaro or Trans AM in 1972, 73, right, what are you going to listen to? You're going to listen to Highway Star and Space Trucking, right? Those are the songs that really capture the feeling of those muscle cars, right? And so maybe in Britain it was not. Didn't have that same kind of impact, but it was an album that just exploded in the US and made them just superstars, right? Absolutely massive,
- [106:05]
A
Sam.
- [106:37]
D
And, you know, when you look at the myth of the recording of the album, I mean, just every part of it is crazy, right? So, you know, they are about to move their gear into the. The grant or what was it, whatever the. The venue was that burned down, right? And the. The guy's like, wait, hang on. Yeah, the casino. Thank you. Yes. And. And the guy's like, well, no, we have the Zappa show here tonight, so just wait. Right, right. And then the whole place burns down. And apparently there was a funny story that, you know, they said Zappa, when he saw the fire is like, okay, we have a fire and nobody panic. Stay calm. And then Blackmore said. And immediately Zappa jumps out of the window. So he panics himself. But, you know, so you have that amazing event and they're like, what the heck? What are we going to do? Where are we going to record? And they have this pavilion. The guy, Claude Knob, right, Is like, all right, I'll find you another place. So he puts them in the pavilion, which is. Is in the middle of the town. And they start recording Smoke on the Water before it has a vocal line, before it has the lyrics. And. And you know, they're waking up half the town because they're in ungodly loud. And so within minutes, the cops are like knocking on the door, right? And like, shut it down. And they're like, no, we're not going to let them in until we get the takedown and take. And they.
- [108:01]
A
It was empty, cold in there. But with the Rolling truck, Stones thing just outside, making our music there with a few red lights, a few old bits, we made a place this way. No matter what we get out of this. I know, I know. We'll never forget Smoke on the Water.
- [108:42]
D
They record the backing track of Smoke on the Water and then they go into this. Into the mountains right outside of the city in this deserted, mass, massive grand hotel that is freezing. It's the middle of the winter, it's December 1971, right.
- [108:56]
C
And actually record there afterwards. Proko Harem. I don't know.
- [109:00]
D
Oh, did they really? They went back there.
- [109:02]
C
They actually. The album is called Grand Hotel because they recorded it at the Grand Hotel.
- [109:07]
D
I did not know that. But it's not actually. I mean, if you look where they're recording, they are not taking advantage of the acoustics. They're in the hallway and it's a very dry album. And you would think you would go into a big space or something. They don't do that. They go into this very narrow, small, small hallway. And you can see how they are eyeball, eyeball to eyeball. I mean, they are really standing right next to each other. It must have been ungodly loud. I can't even imagine. But, you know, that is how they record. And you can see this is the peak of their personal relationships. And that really bleeds into the music where the interplay. They are just so in tune with each other, right? The ideas are flowing. They are. They know exactly when to turn it over to the next guy, right? And somebody else adds something else. And it's. It's an amazing piece of work.
- [110:15]
A
Sa.
- [110:49]
D
And for Highway Star, you know, I think this is really the beginning of what, again, we came to know as the shredder guitar of the 1980s. Yeah. You know, the whole neoclassical thing, I just want to actually play a little bit of that because it's such an amazing solo, and Scott all already mentioned that. It's got that amazing harmony line. And it's. Because it's one of the few solos that Blackmore composed rather than just improvised. And so, you know, they had finally a little bit of time to just, you know, take a breath before they recorded this. This album. They were not on the road the entire time. So Blackmore had the opportunity to develop these ideas. Right. And by the way, for the Highway Star, you know, the whole story on the bus, this is what Blackmore came up with. All right. This is the beginning of Highway Star. So when the journalists ask him how you write songs, he does. He's just playing one chord, and it's like a joke, right? That's all it is. He's not actually serious about it. And then they decide to turn it into a real song that night. So, you know, it's. It was. It's typical Blackmore right over his, you know, kind of mocking the people around him and. But anyway, so he comes up with the solo, which is an incredible combination of classical music, like Mozart and Bachelor and blues and rockabilly. And he's got all these influences that he loves. You know, he's.
- [112:11]
A
He.
- [112:12]
D
He can channel every one of them. So, you know, it starts off with.
- [112:31]
A
Sam. It.
- [113:37]
D
I mean, it's a. This genius.
- [113:39]
C
Yes. I'm gonna tell you, it's safe to say that that's the most impressive piece of commentary anybody's ever.
- [113:46]
D
Just playing the actual solo.
- [113:47]
A
Right? Yeah, yeah.
- [113:48]
D
It's an incredible solo. And Satriani talked about how, like, you know, if you're a guitarist, you really have to ask yourself, if you can't play that solo, should you actually call yourself a guitarist? Right. Are you really a guitarist? And that is the thing that he does something again, that was unprecedented. And by the way, you know, you have this crazy thing, the crazy run at the end, right where it goes. That comes from a guitarist by name of Cliff Gallop, who was Gene Vincent's guitar player. Okay, so it's a totally rockabill thing.
- [114:20]
A
Yeah.
- [114:21]
D
That he did. And actually, Jeff Beck really adored Cliff Gallup, Even did a whole tribute album to Cliff Gallup. But Cliff Gallup was a virtu. Virtuoso guy that played rockabilly. And, you know, he. So Blackmore finds a way to incorporate all these bluesy bends. The classical runs like Mozart and Bach and Then ends it all with, you know, this crazy rockabilly lick. You know, brilliant. I mean, crazy. And, you know. I mean, who did this back then?
- [114:47]
A
You know?
- [114:49]
D
Yeah. Hey, that's incredible.
- [114:54]
C
So, you know what's so funny? I have to tell you, you have singled out, like, one of the great aspects of Richie Blackmore's guitar on this record. Right. Which is defined soloing work, and, as you said, is the one that's really written out. And yet there's an entirely different aspect of Richie Blackmore's guitar work that is just as effective on this album, which is writing rock. Simple.
- [115:17]
A
Stupid.
- [115:18]
D
Absolutely. Yeah. I was going to say that. Yeah.
- [115:20]
C
Okay. Now, we've already talked about Smoke on the Water. That's the most obvious one. But to me, there's one that's even more important than that. And Space Trucking is the one that. Yes, it's the one. Okay. I consider Space Trucking to be kind of a platonic ideal of what a hard rock song should be. Everything about it, to me, is perfect. The theme is perfect. Ian Gillen's lyrics are just so much fun. It's. It's a groovy good time songs. Since I was 20 years old, I've referred to this as the, like, hey, let's all hop in our groovy Scooby Van. You know, we're gonna go space trucking around the stars. We're gonna meet all sorts of cool chicks, and, you know, we're smoke, smoke a little bit of weed, drink a few beers and throw some peace signs. But there's just nothing but good times to be found in that song. And there's nothing but hard rock to be heard in the music. That riff in the chorus worth. Come on, come on, let's go. Space Trucking, where both Lord and Blackmore double up one another, is the thing that Scott mentioned earlier. Earlier, they double that. That riff is, I would argue, made the most effective hard rock riff I've ever heard.
- [116:52]
A
Come on, come on, come on, come on, come on, come on.
- [117:10]
C
Led Zeppelin on A Whole Lot of Love doesn't have anything on what Space Trucking brings.
- [117:14]
D
I can't. I couldn't agree more, and I'll say this, actually. Blackmore talks about how he was chatting with Pete Townson of the who, and, you know, it's a. Blackmore was this incredible technician, right? And he could just play incredible runs. But Townsend told him, you have to keep it simple for the people, Right. If you want to actually compete, communicate to the people, you. You can't play all this fast stuff, you gotta keep it simple. And that is actually how we came up with the space trucking thing. Right. So you. You have that. You know, so the first part of it is so great. Right, so.
- [117:51]
C
Right.
- [117:58]
D
So, you know, that is already just phenomenal. But then, yeah, when it goes into the. The main riff, Blackmore talks about his inspiration behind the Rift. Do you either of you guys know what that is?
- [118:08]
B
No, I don't.
- [118:09]
D
It's the old Batman, the 60s Batman.
- [118:12]
A
I'll buy it. Sure.
- [118:14]
D
So this is the. This is the Batman riff. Okay?
- [118:21]
C
Right, right. And a lot of 60s bands covered
- [118:23]
D
this, by the way.
- [118:24]
C
Right.
- [118:24]
D
And so you go, so. And this is the riff that Blackmore came up with.
- [118:43]
B
You could say it's almost surfy.
- [118:44]
D
It is, absolutely. I know. And. And. And Blackmore approached Gillen with this, and he was embarrassed by it. He said, you know, this is so simple, you think it's stupid. And. And it was Gillan that immediately was like, no, no, that's gonna work. Right?
- [119:02]
C
That's a classic, actually.
- [119:04]
D
Yeah. And that's, you know, that's what. Actually, you have that. What I mentioned, that relationship is at the kind of the peak, right. That they are really working together. They seem to enjoy being with each other, which is also reflected in the lyrics for the B side. For what, Smoke on the Water or something, which is when a blind man cries. Right.
- [119:22]
C
Where he saw, actually.
- [119:23]
D
Yeah. And a great, beautiful, bluesy song.
- [119:25]
A
Right.
- [119:25]
D
But I had, you know, I had a friend once in this. In this col, and he talks about. And it seems like the relationship started breaking down already by the end of the album, but when they were working together, they were just in absolute harmony. And if I can just talk about the pictures of Home as well. I mean, there are so many amazing songs on there, but Pictures of Home, to me, is the greatest song on this album. And just because it has these incredible, beautiful, exotic runs by Blackmore. And it's so different from anything that anybody had done before. You know, all of this stuff, this is hard rock, the rest of it. Right. But this is doing something different, and it's actually anticipating Rainbow in many ways. Right. And apparently Blackmore says that the way he came up with the main riff is that he was able to tune his shortwave radio into a Bulgarian radio station, and this Bulgarian radio station was playing some folk. Bulgarian folk music. And that's where he got the riff. And it led to the joke that actually all the Deep Purple guys, you know, so around 71, 72, Blackmore would often wear Like a pilgrim hat or a top hat. Right. And that they would joke that he had like a shortwave radio tuned to a Bulgarian radio stations in his hat.
- [120:41]
C
Yeah.
- [120:41]
D
You know, and see, and he increasingly was coming up with these very exotic sounding riffs. So it's like there goes Blackmore again, tuning into Bulgarian shortwave radio stations. Right. And that's the first time he does that. And it's such. I mean, I love the lyrics. You know, you get this sense of desolation. You can see the isolation that they were experiencing being in the mountains, right. In the cold, cold, there's nobody around and just starting to get kind of bored and, and sick of it and. And then Blackmore just plays beautiful lines and you get the interaction between organ and guitar and then even, you know, there is the. The basal. Another bass solo that's just perfect. Absolutely perfect. Leading up to the. The chaos in the middle where all the instruments just start seemingly playing totally discordant stuff. Right. It becomes incredibly dissonant and then just stops. And then I just builds it up a little bit and they kick back into the song with a little, you know, bluesy solo by Bad Blackmore. I mean, I think that's just freaking genius. There is nothing better. That's one of my actually all time favorite tracks by Deep Purple.
- [121:59]
A
Sam.
- [122:26]
C
Scott, any last thoughts on Machine Head before we move on to yet another trend that Deep Purple started?
- [122:32]
B
Nope. Let's move on.
- [122:34]
C
Well, everyone's got to have a Big In Japan live album, right? You know, we think of Cheap Trick, we think of the band. In fact, there's a band out there that is named Big in Japan. I don't actually know if they were ever big anywhere, but it's a really good aspirational name for a group.
- [122:48]
D
Doubtful. Yes.
- [122:50]
C
And this takes us to an aspect of Deep Purple that we really haven't discussed. Discussed nearly enough yet. Okay. Which is that they were one of the best live acts of this year.
- [122:59]
D
Absolutely.
- [122:59]
C
Now, in fact, I was actually mentioning this earlier on our email thread. The thing that really made me fall in love with Deep Purple was, was like hearing them, hearing their live shows. And I think it was like 6970 basically after Ian joined and you know, we got those big long guitar showcases on stuff like Ring that Neck and Mandrake Root and you get that finally with Made in Japan, an album that has become iconic. But of course, the band themselves swear that they didn't really care about and they weren't trying too hard. Maybe, maybe they were just trying to create A myth here, you know, like, yeah, we didn't really, you know, mean that much by it, but it became legendary anyways. Made in Japan has become sort of like in a lot of ways one of Deep Purple's most well known albums in the United States. Smoke on the Water, as it turns out, I don't think was a huge hit as a single in America. It was the live version of it from this record that became huge. And basically what this is. I know Scott doesn't love live albums, but Scott is wrong. This to me is like a perfect encapsulation of the way I want to hear these guys. There are no overdubs on this record. It is 100% honest. It doesn't sound like, you know, it suffers from that for even a slight moment. These guys were pros. And yeah, this is just the mid greatest hits of their Ian years. You've got some stuff from Enrock, you got some stuff from Fireball, you've got about half of Machine Head and boy, I. I mean aside from like the overlong drum solo on the Mule, I really love the Mule on Fireball, but I don't know if it needed to be extended to nine and a half minutes on this record with a drum solo. And that's just about it. I don't really have anything to criticize about this, but of course I get off on the energy of live performances in a way that I know that my co host unfortunately never will. It seemed like he hadn't even listened to this when we were doing a review. He said he was going to enjoy his first live Deep Purple with. What was it? Last concert.
- [124:52]
B
Last concert, that's right.
- [124:54]
C
Not a way you should hear Deep Purple live for the first time.
- [124:56]
D
It's about the opposite of Made in Japan. Yeah, yeah.
- [125:00]
C
And so this. Yeah, both in Japan, of course they understood how iconic the record was. This is famous for all of the right reasons. There isn't even a ton to add because these are the songs that you've already heard, you know, plus basically perfect performances and great little extra solos. But of course, since I'm a live maven, this is one of the first places I could go to when I want to hear Deep Purple.
- [126:00]
A
Oh my soul I love you, baby
- [126:07]
D
yeah. I adore this album. And what is amazing about it is the sense of danger and chaos, controlled chaos. And they really sound at many points like everything's just about to fall apart, but they keep it together and then they somehow continue to up the excitement level. And I think that's the Case with Highway Star, which in many ways I even prefer to the studio version. It's sloppy. And especially Richie. Richie is super, super sloppy on it, but it's so perfectly sloppy. It's like. It's perfect in its imperfections. And. And you can just see Richie does not give a crap. He's just gonna play what he wants. He does not, you know, really recreate the solo. Doesn't even try to completely. He does recreate some parts of the solo, but he's, you know, having feedback going. He's just, like, abusing the hell out of the whammy bar, you know, just. I mean, really. I don't know how he was able to keep that. That guitar in tune back then. He actually, he. He had built into his two main Stratocasters in 1970 through 72, you know, so they. The tremolo bars are fairly thin, and they can break off pretty easily because they were not designed for that.
- [127:20]
C
Was he actually snapping off his Tremolo?
- [127:22]
B
Absolutely.
- [127:24]
D
Yeah. So he. He would go to a technician, say, you know, do something for this, and the guy built a double fat tremolo bar that he was not able to break. And if you look at the. Those early photos of. From the early 70s, look at Rich's guitar, you can see this insanely fat Tremolo bar that he would just take and just start, you know, abusing to the level that even Hendrick did not.
- [127:48]
C
The size of a bicycle break.
- [127:50]
D
It was. Exactly. That's right. And. And, you know, he would just. He would actually put the guitar down on the st. On the stage. He'd step on it, and then it start Yang on the bar. Okay. The guy was such an amazing showman, right? I mean, he really. He learned from Hendricks, he learned from Townsend. He picked up all those things, right? And he said, I'm gonna do it even more.
- [128:40]
A
And.
- [128:40]
D
And he did it. I.
- [128:41]
A
He.
- [128:42]
D
You know, all the stuff that he was doing in stage was the. I. I don't think anybody ever did it better, you know, that he's so spontaneous.
- [128:52]
C
They went back and they released, I think, the full run of these. These shows, like, you know, like 40 years later. Yeah, I've listened to that. I don't get bored with that.
- [128:59]
D
Yeah, it's totally different.
- [129:01]
C
It's the same set list.
- [129:02]
D
Yeah.
- [129:02]
C
But they're all fun, so they play with such excitement. They're fresh, and they're different every night. And of course, if you like, I have at this point, like, really dived into the Deep Purple bootleg catalog. There's Just like, you'll find a lot more of this too.
- [129:16]
D
Well, you know, that's, that's the amazing thing is that they really knew how to jam and that is something that they had an opportunity to. To build. Right? They. To learn how to do, which many bands do that anymore because that's not what audiences want to hear. But they did back then. And so they had an opportunity for
- [129:33]
C
the older aesthetics I get.
- [129:35]
D
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Because it's so exciting to see them just winging it, right, and going for something totally new and reacting to one another. And that was what made Cream special, right? They. They kind of opened the doors to all of that stuff, but it was
- [129:50]
C
that entire style in a lot of ways.
- [129:52]
D
No question. Yeah, absolutely. And of course the, the huge volume, you know, the massive Marshall stacks, you know that really.
- [129:58]
C
And incidentally that, by the way, I'm not a huge Cream fan, Yvonne. The part of them that I ironically love the most is their live stuff. Oh, live music to me is far more interesting than anything they did in the studio. And even though that's the stuff that I think Eric Clapton made him say, like that was when I feel like I wanted to quit. I was like, man, you guys were actually hitting the stride at that point.
- [130:16]
D
Well, I think it was just. It was painfully loud. I think that was. They couldn't hear each other. And so, you know, they pioneered that
- [130:24]
C
and then evolution amplifier technology. Right. You know, things are a little different by the, you know, 1972 or not.
- [130:30]
D
Sure.
- [130:30]
C
I know you don't love live albums the way you should, but did you actually listen to Man Japan?
- [130:37]
D
Hang on, I. Can I just say one final thing, please? Sorry, sorry to interrupt, but I, I just want to point out that actually I'm, you know, so we'll at the end, we'll pick up, we'll pick our favor. Favorite tracks. And one of those for me is the Made in Japan version of Space Trucking, so Which of course goes into
- [130:55]
C
20 minute long epic.
- [130:56]
D
The 20 minute long thing which goes into the. The jam part of what's it called from the first album, the track Mandre A Mandre Crew. Thank you. Yes. And. And you know what they do with that, with that whole jam session, which is like 15 minutes long. You know, it's peaks and valleys and you know, first John. John Lord goes off and just goes onto. On a really like a John jazz odyssey journey. Right. And, and, and, and, but brings it down and they have these kind of cues like, okay, when you finished, start playing this line. And when they hear that line, the others fall into that line and that leads to the next part, right? And so you have, Then, you know, when Blackmore comes in and it's all kind of volume swells and it's very low key and you hear just Ian Pace just keeping this groove, but very low, low, a very low level. And then, you know, they build it up and you have this, you know, Blackmore starts playing a lot more. You, you get to the chaos and then it just stops and the audience thinks it's done right, and they have just like a 10 second break and then they kick into it with this massive intensity that was, I think, completely unmatched at that point. Nobody else was doing that sort of thing. The speed, the volume. And it must have been. I can't even imagine what it must have been like to be in the audience there. You know, just the sheer physical impact of what people were hearing. And then they go, they go on for the. Another five minutes or so and, and Blackmore is just, you know, again, you know, yanking on the whammy bar, going absolutely nuts. Lord is like crashing the, the, the Hammond organ, getting those reverb crashes, right? Really using noise in an, in a very musical way to up the intensity. And then they end the song and they're just 10 seconds of complete silence, right? Where the, the crowd, the audience seems stunned and you know, they just seem like, what the hell just happened?
- [133:42]
A
Like.
- [133:42]
D
And you know, finally after about 10 seconds, somebody starts clapping. Maybe they weren't sure that it was finally finished, right, but they just seem like completely stunned into silence at that point. I mean, my God, that is incredible. And I'll say this final thing. I think that is the greatest drumming performance by any drummer ever. So what, what Pace does on Space Trucking on Made in Japan is mind blowingly great. You know, he just plays his ass off and is it's remark remarkable. So I'll, I'll stop there.
- [134:14]
C
It's fine. Scott, any thoughts on Made in Japan?
- [134:17]
B
You know, I'd like to talk about Japan, but I really want to talk about Tokyo instead of, you know, Japan generally, my Tokyo.
- [134:26]
D
Oh, wait, just. Before you move on, a quick anecdote. I. The one time I traveled to Japan, I went to a conference, it was 2008. And so I'm sitting on the plane and I'm sitting next to a Japanese guy that was maybe 10 years older than me or so. And you know, this is back in the day when you could listen to music on the, the system, the, on your seat and what does he pick? He actually picked Deep Purples Made in Japan. And I could see him listening to that on his headphones and I'm like, well, that's just perfect. And that is actually. And you know the reason, by the way, I don't know if you guys know that why they named it Made in Japan. It was a joke. Because in 1972, the stuff that was coming out of Japan was junk. It was considered. Yeah, it was like, you know, cheap.
- [135:09]
C
But I grew up with it. It was quote, cheap Japanese crap.
- [135:12]
D
Yeah. So they were, you know, being very. They were.
- [135:14]
C
Generation would use.
- [135:15]
D
Yeah, they were being very self deprecating, like, oh, here we go. This is Made in Japan. It's. It's, you know, low quality. Right. And then it becomes this iconic album. So I. I just wanted to throw that into the mix there.
- [135:25]
C
All right. And then they hit their. This is their triumph. This is their peak. And then they. Then things finally kind of fall apart. So, like, what did they bring back from their Japanese tour? Well, they brought back a woman from Tokyo and we mentioned that Ian Gillan is kind of obsessed with seductive ladies. This is the most iconic version of that.
- [136:06]
A
Smiling everyone. Yeah, she is a whole new tradition.
- [136:24]
C
This is, of course the lead song, the lead track off of who Do We Think we are? The 1973 Deep Purple album. That is basically the end of the golden years, so to speak. Although I don't actually think the golden years really end at this point.
- [136:38]
A
Yeah.
- [136:38]
C
But it's Ian Gillan's last album with Ben, of course, Gillen and Glover lead as pair because apparently Richard Blackmore never liked Roger Glover that much anyway.
- [136:46]
D
This is the one, I think that's right. I'm gonna take. Take issue with that.
- [136:50]
C
Well, you know, he. Eventually he ended up playing him in Rainbow.
- [136:53]
A
Right.
- [136:54]
C
Obviously didn't dislike him that much, but apparently they had some creative differences. What matters is this. This is the first Deep Purple album. Worse than what had come. Yeah, very clear. You can hear about the second half. First half of this album which has again, Woman With Tokyo. I like Mary Long, even though it's a little bit mannered. I like Super Trooper. And then the second half of this record kind of falls apart. I just feel like they become winded and tired and no longer do the blues rock, blues, rock cliches that we associate with Deep Purple. No longer do they sound fresh, now everything sounds labored. And there's clearly some sort of like, you know, bad blood in the air. No one is quite playing in tandem with one another. I Actually don't really have too much to say about this album. Except that Rat Bat Blue is the stupidest name they could have. Actually somewhat decent song.
- [137:51]
A
You, what's your name? Can I drive you? Home sweet woman I all in love and you're the one for me.
- [138:33]
B
I'll defend the album a little bit. It's certainly not as good as Machine Head or Things that Had Come before, but I've been reading around a bit. It seems to have a very poor reputation among Deep Purple fans. I don't think it's a poor out album by any stretch.
- [138:46]
C
It's not a disaster. It's not very interesting.
- [138:48]
B
I like Women From Tokyo, to Ivan's point earlier. That is a really great example of the way that they can build the tension and release in multiple points in Women From Tokyo. And I think I love that tremendous riff. That's just an outstanding riff. I like Mary Long. That sort of cynicism that dips into the lyrics of Gillan in that particular song. I like that.
- [139:11]
A
When the nation knew you'd have Cheers it came as such a surprise. We really didn't know you'd had it in you. How you did it. We can only smile how did you lose your virginity? Mary love when will you lose your stupidity? Mary loves.
- [139:55]
B
That Blue, which Jeff already mentioned, has a very Moby Dick feel to it from. From Zeppelin. That same sort of. Even down to the cowbell.
- [140:02]
C
Even down to the title, frankly. Right.
- [140:03]
A
You know.
- [140:04]
B
And I like the closer Our lady, which doesn't go so far as to be overblown and so of over modeling. But it slows things down a bit. Kind of a gospel tinged. It was a grower for me. I came back to it a couple of times during the. Listening to this album. Now I'll agree with Jeff that things become a little more. A little more flat, a little more generic. You know, super trooper, smooth dancer. Those are not hitting as hard. They're sort of unfinished. They feel unfinished in a way that that song's impressive. Previous albums didn't. But I think there's enough really good stuff here to make it at least, you know, a decent record. I don't think it deserves the sort of poor reputation that it does have in some quarters.
- [141:02]
A
Faith. And there is no other way. I.
- [141:40]
D
Yeah, I actually. I love Woman From Tokyo. I think it's such a great song. It's such a great riff, actually. So it's.
- [141:46]
C
It has such another. It has another Spinal Tap moment. Do you remember Stonehenge? We're like. Or no rock and Roll creation. That's the one I'm thinking of from Spinal Tap, where, like, it suddenly breaks off from that hard rock riff into that little beautiful, like, almost church, like,
- [142:00]
D
little heart in the middle. Yeah, yeah. That's Woman From Tokyo, right?
- [142:04]
C
Has that little quiet interlude and then suddenly goes back there. My Wanted from Tokyo again. These guys were stealing their ideas from. From Deep Purple I.
- [142:19]
A
Night.
- [143:09]
D
They stole a lot from Sabbath, too, actually, so. Including the Stonehenge thing. But. But yeah, you know, the. The thing about it. So, first of all, just. I just want to play that riff because I love the riff, but apparently Blackmore hated it, so. But, you know, I mean, that's such great. Such so great. So simple, right?
- [143:37]
B
Yep.
- [143:42]
D
And what's very interesting to me is that, you know, the. The Gill and Blackmore relationship hit completely broken down by this point, which is very sad. But apparently what drove it is that it seems like the whole band got really tired of the music they were playing, in a sense. And I really get that because actually, when I played with the Space Caustics, we were playing very loud and fast stuff. And after about two years of doing it, I got really burned out on it. And I was 29. I think that's about how old these guys were at this point. And. And I remember thinking, I. I gotta slow this down. I gotta start writing some prettier songs, some nicer songs. Right. And Blackmore got enamored of Free and Paul Rogers at that point, which was so different. It's a good band, but come on, to compare it to Deep Purple, but I think they just got so tired of the volume of the speed. Right. And something a little bit more emotional. And, and, and. And Blackmore got fed up with the screaming by Gilmore, by Gilman Gilmore, by Gillen. And. And, you know, Gillan, you crossed over
- [144:51]
C
to Pink Floyd at least twice now.
- [144:53]
D
I know. Sorry about that. Yes. You know all these Bread guys. I do all the time. But, you know, Gillen actually asked him. You can see that Gillen was trying to repair the relationship, at least somewhat. And he says, what do you want me to sound like? And he said, I want you to sound like Paul Rogers. And he's like, okay, I'm going to try. And Blackmore said, well, there's no way. But, you know, there was a way. And that's Woman From Tokyo. If you think about how Gillan sings on Woman From Tokyo is very bluesy. And he's, you know, he's actually kind of lowered the register of his voice. And what I think is Amazing about that song is how close Gillen sounds to Coverdale on that song. Like, if you listen to it and compare it to the Burn album, it's like, that's not that far off, you know, and so I've never considered this
- [145:41]
C
a very sharp transition, as it turns.
- [145:43]
D
No, I think that's right. But you can see how the rest of the album is really. Again, it's. It's force. And you could see, like, Blackmore checked out. You know, he was just not into it at all. He was not coming up. He was just phoning it in and he was bored.
- [145:57]
B
Place in line is very unmemorable. It's just 12 bars.
- [146:00]
D
A lot of unmemorable.
- [146:01]
C
Yes, that is exactly where I was thinking of. Just phoned in.
- [146:03]
D
Apparently they were not even in the studio at the same time. So Blackmore would do his stuff and then leave and go, and Gillan would come in and would do his stuff. And you can see actually the. The song Smooth Dancer is Gillan's plea to Blackmore. Right. So it's actually. It's trying to say that I don't understand you. Like, what do you want from me? And that's so interesting. And it's kind of a very interesting follow up from When a Blind Man Cries too, which is, I think, also aimed at sort of Ed Blackmore and this deteriorating relationship. And I think, you know, Gillan is sad by it.
- [146:56]
A
I know what to do.
- [147:11]
D
But Blackmore would have none of it. You know, he's done. He's ready to move on. And it's really actually very mercenary.
- [147:18]
C
Like. Like feel that comes from Blackmore.
- [147:20]
D
Yeah.
- [147:20]
C
It's hard to escape it. Like, he's just like, about business.
- [147:23]
D
Business only, I think actually even more he's an incredibly em. Old guy. And when his emotions say, I'm done with this, he's done with it, he
- [147:33]
B
has to turning back.
- [147:34]
D
Yeah. And, you know, he talked about how he's like a vampire, that he feeds off the people. And once he sucks all the blood out of a particular musician, he discards them. You know, that's how he talks about it about himself. He at least recognizes about it with this man. Well, but the thing is that everybody that plays with him becomes kind of legendary. Right. And.
- [147:56]
A
And they.
- [147:56]
D
Most of them talk about that even though, you know, he became. Becomes a total jerk and a hole. Right. At some point they all say, you know, it was such a wonderful. Almost all. There are a few that are an exception, but they say what an incredible experience it was to play with him, right? It was.
- [148:11]
C
It's like playing with Miles Davis, you know, it's going to do good things.
- [148:14]
D
Buddy Rich, you know, Buddy Rich was. No, not a nice guy. So, yeah.
- [148:20]
C
Okay. So that takes us to, I guess, the Mark three. Now we're in Deep Purple. So Ian leaves, so does Roger Glover along with him.
- [148:28]
D
So. And by the way, we should point out that Glover is fired. Right. So Gillen leaves and he gives a way advance of a notice, a big letter. Right, yeah, Right. Which is actually very classy of him, you know, and explains exactly the reasons why he's leaving. And I think on the last tour of Japan, Blackmore tells the manager, tell Glover he's out too. And Glover is inconsolable. He's like crying, literally, just tears pouring down his cheeks the entire trip back from. From Japan to England. So, you know, real jerk move. And Blackmore just comes, you know, comes up to him and says, hey, you know, it's nothing personal. It's just business, right? It's like, what does that mean? Like, you know, what a jerk. Anyway, yeah, business.
- [149:11]
C
Okay. So anyways, they get. They get both Glenn Hughes on bass and vocals, which is important. And David Coverdell. David Coverdell is a guy no one's ever heard of at this point.
- [149:22]
B
One, of course, at this point. I think, yeah, you're gonna.
- [149:24]
C
You're gonna know it later as, you know, the guy in White Snake. But the funny thing is, is that there are people I know who's just, like, suddenly become, like, repelled by Deep Purple at this moment. They're like, wow, this is no longer the band that it once was. Is no longer the band for me. I think Burn is a really good album. I think it is clearly superior to who Do We Think We Are? And it begins with one of their single greatest songs of all time.
- [149:48]
A
Yep.
- [149:49]
C
Deep Purple at their peak strength. John Lord and Richie Blackmore twinning up, showing off everything that they bring to the group, along with Ian Pace's furious rhythm. I'm talking about Burn. It's from the album Burn. It is track one. And to me, it basically justifies the entire record. The entire record is good. I can actually say something nice about every single one of these songs, but Burn Stands Apart, the title track is. It is one of the most iconic hard rock songs of all time.
- [150:19]
A
Sam Hands, She Makes A. City the blame, we call.
- [151:12]
C
It, is in fact, to me, semi criminal that it isn't as well known as it is because I can't find a flaw. There's these wonderful solos that Both Blackmore and Lore played that are clearly classically influenced. And it's like, you know, take your pick as to who wrote it. Like, was that. Was that Richie's or was that John Lord's? I don't know. But to me, that is the essence of what Deep Purple brought to the table musically is really actually encapsulated in this after their so called classic years. There's some weak songs on this. I don't really care for the instrumental that ends the record. I don't really need the. What's going on here doesn't do much for me. But other than that, this is a shocking improvement and it proves that there was a lot more gas left in this tank than we might have thought.
- [151:54]
B
I, I love this record. I really love this record. And it might not be a surprise because this is where, you know, they're. They're changing a little bit, sliding more toward the rhythm and they get a little. Much more funky in the next album, which I don't like quite as much. But, but, but here it's that wonderful marriage of the two. I, I don't think they lose too much in the. In the singer swap. You have two for one with Hughes and Coverdale and, and Hughes provides a
- [152:24]
C
really kind of nice alternate sound.
- [152:26]
B
It's different, right? Different. But Burn might be my favorite Deep Purple song and I, I hadn't heard.
- [152:32]
C
Good.
- [152:33]
B
And that riff, that is the riff that birthed 100 Aerosmith songs. I mean, that's. That's just. Joe Perry bends that riff in 12 different ways and you can create 60 different Aerosmith songs. Coverdale has no trouble, you know, filling in or taking over lead vocals on Burn. I love that. The neoclassical, you know, solos that Jeff talked about. It's six minutes. It doesn't feel, it doesn't feel more than two minutes.
- [152:59]
C
Feels like four, right? It feels really short.
- [153:01]
B
Yes, yes. Lord's got a great solo. Burn might be my favorite favorite tea Purple song at this point. Might just take your life. That's where you start to get that funkiness. That groove sounds like. Like chest fever, like Lord's playing. Like chest fever from the band at the start of it. And I love that sort of sing along. Might just take your life. That's an outstanding tune. Sail Away. I like Sail Away. Those kind of tender moments.
- [154:02]
C
As I said, there very few bad songs on this record. Five of them, I think are all
- [154:06]
B
great where Coverdale turns it down a bit, you know, Sail Away Tomorrow. That's a brilliant little portion of that song. Infectious groove.
- [154:19]
A
Sailing far away the finest feeling I'll be there someday.
- [154:58]
B
I. I like what's Going on here. It's a very American track for a British hard rock band, and they sort of, again, continue that metamorphosis into the next album. But that. That sounds like a very American track from a British band like Deep Purple. But I like what's Going on, you fool. No one has a great paced drum intro.
- [155:16]
C
He's the rhythm approach.
- [155:18]
B
I agree with Jeff. The instrumental at the end probably just could have been cleaved off. We wouldn't know any different. Everything else I can defend Everything else I really love burns a great, great Deep Purple record.
- [155:29]
A
You can hold me I am told you to. Take your life. Every time I take a look there's someone close behind they never used to make a pass the things that cost their mind now they tell me that it's all right and they want to be my friend they're riding on my bed when is it going to end?
- [156:31]
D
I. I agree with most of what you guys said, with one very notable exception I'll get to in a second. But the. The title track is amazing in every possible way and ushers in an even more of a neoclassical turn for Blackmore. And his guitar playing takes a pretty big step at that point. So if you look at all the.
- [156:55]
C
Do you know, by the way, you von if. If that was Lord's idea or if it was black.
- [156:59]
D
So actually the song. You. Do you mean the riff?
- [157:02]
C
Yeah, exactly.
- [157:03]
D
That's neither. It's actually stolen, right? From a George Gershwin song. Oh, you're kidding me.
- [157:10]
C
The riff. The riff I'll buy.
- [157:12]
D
You know. Right? They develop it beyond that.
- [157:14]
A
But.
- [157:14]
D
Yeah, but it's. There's a Gershwin track I actually listen as part of the prep for this called Fascinating Rhythm. And. And it's like right there. There it is. There's the riff. And. And that's the thing. It's like, ge. What the heck? Where is, like, Blackmore's head at? You know, he's able to just tap into all this stuff and that nobody else was doing, right. But he comes up with this. You know, he. The riff in the Fascinated Rhythm song is just a very short snippet, but he focuses in on that, takes it out of that longer piece and obviously turns it into something totally iconic and, you know, so driving and so heavy and so beautiful and actually, let me allow. If you allow me to play it here. Let's see. I mean, that is so beautiful, but it's simple.
- [158:06]
A
Yeah.
- [158:06]
D
And then it goes into the solo, which is, you know, I mean, obviously there's all this other stuff, which is amazing, you know, in Coverdale, you know, to come out of nowhere and to be able to sing like that. Holy cow. You know. And that was Blackmore's ability to find these guys that were completely unknown prior to that and then become iconic legendary singers. Right. So here's another one. But what happened with Blackmore there is that I think he's increasingly losing the bluesiness of, in his playing.
- [158:36]
B
Sure.
- [158:37]
D
And there is some more through the album, but I think the, the Burn song is where he is heading. And he actually does something very important in terms of his guitar sound, which is already so identifiable, so unusual, so characteristic of him. But he, he gets this. I mean, again, this is so typically Blackmore. He has this reel to reel tape player. Okay. Recorder Iwa, if you remember those. Oh yeah, Japanese brand. And he's looking at this thing, he's like, I gotta do something with this. And it turns it into an echo unit. So, you know, whereas other guys are using like actually, you know, built for purpose echo units, which started being commonly used by Jimmy Page and Tommy Boland, who we're going to talk about here in a second, he actually looks at this realto real player. He's like, I'm going to modify this and turn it into an echo unit. The echo unit part is not that important. What's important is that from there there on, starting with the Burn album until today, every show, every album that he's ever recorded, he's plugged into this machine. And the preamp on this machine gives him a color to his guitar, guitar tone that is completely unique. Nobody else has ever done this. And, and that. I think with Burn, his tone becomes so recognizable, right. And so you have that, that incredibly precise cutting tone. Like Steve Vai in the Blackmore documentary says that, you know, when you listen to his tone, every note has its own zip code. You know, there is like, it's like this, you know, clean but heavy sword that cuts through, right. There's such clarity and that's the Strat. Whereas all of these heavy metal guys and hard rock were playing Gibson guitars with fat sounding humbucker pickups. Blackmore was using a Strat and he has these single coil pickups that give you a thinner sound. But if you're an individual player, it, it translates your characteristics much better. You can, you can play a Strat and if you are unique and have something different to offer, it's going to amplify those aspects and that's what Blackmore is able to do even more. More on the Burn album. And this is why I actually strongly disagree with you guys on the instrumental at the end, because that, I think, features so a 200. It features the greatest Blackmore playing up to that point. So, you know, it's like the synthesizer stuff, right? And it's most. And maybe even the drum machine, I can't remember. And, yeah, I think it's catchy,
- [161:13]
A
Sam.
- [161:48]
D
But then when Blackmore starts soloing and it's obviously all improvised, it's all spontaneous, but, my God, I mean, that just gives me chills every time. He's just playing, again, very exotic scales he is doing. He's really pushing forward with his playing. And I'll just play if. If you'll allow me, just a little bit of the solo of Burn because it is so phenomenal. And again, I think it's even pushing forward with the neoclassical kind of shredder stuff. Right? So, you know, And then it goes.
- [162:31]
A
Sam,
- [163:06]
D
Something like that. It's hard to play this stuff when you. I don't then have a chance to warm up, but, you know, that is
- [163:11]
C
like, we're not gonna hold it against you.
- [163:13]
D
Well, thank you. I appreciate that.
- [163:14]
B
But Jeff thinks he can do better, by the way.
- [163:16]
D
He's like. Yeah, that's what he's thinking, I'm sure. Yeah.
- [163:19]
C
But, you know, like, amateur.
- [163:20]
D
You listen to this and it's like, that is Engva Momstein right there. You know, that is the prototype for everything that came in the 80s. And you can see even Eddie Van Halen listening to something like that. It's like, all right, we gotta, you know, up the flash kind of element of all of this stuff. So I think that's really where Blackmoore starts developing what he ultimately was able to develop to its fullest in Rainbow. I think this is where his style is really coming to that. To that stage.
- [163:47]
C
So that brings us back to the last album of the Blackmore era. And, of course, Blackmore has had very mixed feelings about both Burn Bizarrely and Stormbringer. He says he didn't like the way that the band was being pushed. He didn't like the fact that he was becoming more, quote, funky. But I think it was actually. I can't remember which of them. It was a Hughes, Glenn Hughes, who said, look, listen, I know. I know Richie Blackmore doesn't like Stormberger, but don't listen to the man. Funky Richie is worth hearing. And I can kind of have to surprise myself by agreeing. This is an Album. I remember being kind of razzed when I was a kid and people was like, oh, gosh, it looks like it's Frank Frazetta crap on the COVID And it. It sounds like weird, funky blues music. I like Stormbringer. I like the title track a lot. I even like the ballads on this one. I like Holy Man. I like Hold On. Hold on has a gospel chorus on it and it works. It's kind of lightweight. Yeah.
- [164:41]
B
But it's the only thing. And I know you don't like it.
- [164:45]
C
I don't know.
- [164:46]
B
Here's the thing. It just. It sounds like a totally different band.
- [164:49]
C
So it depends on it Totally sounds like.
- [164:51]
B
I think. I think hold on sounds like it's Boss Gags. Like it's got that Boss Gags kind of funky Breakdown dead ahead.
- [164:58]
D
And I like that stuff.
- [165:00]
A
I do.
- [165:01]
B
But so. So you. You have to judge it by, I think, totally different standards at this point. That's what it comes down to.
- [165:08]
C
Blackmore hates it.
- [165:09]
B
I like. I like Stormbringer as a. As a record. It's pleasant to listen to. It's. But compared to even Burn, it's not that close to the.
- [165:18]
C
Because I think Burns are real high point. Right.
- [165:20]
B
But I mean, it's just not. It's not the same sort of band. It's not the same sort of record.
- [165:24]
A
They.
- [165:24]
B
They lean and, you know, the funkiness and rhythm, those are things I like. But it's really hard to try to compare Stormbringer to in rock. They're trying to do different pizza.
- [165:36]
C
It's like, you don't want ice cream on top of your pizza. Yeah. It's not going to taste that good.
- [165:41]
A
Yeah. I got to love you when I want to. You got to love me when I want you to. I ain't going to let you leave me, baby. No, never. I know you're playing. I guess you think I. I get
- [166:00]
D
it, but I think it's. It's a. It's actually. When I was prepping for this, I went back and listened to it for the first time in a very long time because I had a low opinion of it and I ended up enjoying it a lot more than I thought I would.
- [166:15]
C
I think it's a cromulent record.
- [166:17]
D
Yeah. Well, you know, Stormbringer is a great track, of course, and that's one where
- [166:20]
B
Blackmore, they picked good tracks for openers.
- [166:24]
D
They picked good openers. Yeah. Well. But that's the one track that screams Blackmore. Right. And in fact, Coverdale said that the only. The only times he ever wrote lyrics for somebody else was for Blackmore, for Byrne and Stormbringer. Right. Where you were trying to get more mystical. Right, Right, right. Rather than just chicks and stuff, you know, that he always sang about, otherwise,
- [167:00]
A
God is coming me.
- [167:11]
D
But, you know. But then, you know, you go to Love Don't Mean a Thing and Holy man, and that has no Blackmore at all. And I can see why Blackmore, I mean, he's playing a very, very clean sound.
- [167:21]
B
Yeah, there's very little Lord, too.
- [167:23]
D
There's very little Lord.
- [167:25]
B
There's not a lot of Blackmoore. There's not a lot of Lord.
- [167:27]
D
I think he's. He's not playing the organ, he's playing rhodes piano.
- [167:30]
B
There's electric piano.
- [167:32]
C
There's.
- [167:32]
B
There's actual piano. Piano. Electric piano. So it's different kind, but it's not as even.
- [167:37]
D
But that's. Yeah, that's not Lord. You know, those are nice colors for Lord, but. But when he's focused on that, you lose what makes him special. Right. And different. But, you know, you have Lady Double Dealer. That's another kind of Blackmore track. Right. There is quite a bit of heavy guitar there. You can do it. Right. I think is in fact, a track that could have gone on the first Rainbow album, and J could have gone on the first Rainbow album, you know, so there's. You know, it's. It's funny that Blackm leaves the band because he's so ticked off about this funky direction. But then there are all these pretty significant overlaps between Stormbringer and the first Rainbow album. But I think he just grew tired of Hughes. You know, Hughes had a pretty bad drug problem, and apparently he said that if you see him live and he has his shirt off, it's because he was, you know, high on coke. And he was high on coke a great deal. And, you know, you, like, listen to California Joke Jam or something like that, and, man, he's just so obnoxious. He's doing all the. The awful grating screaming. Whereas Gillen could do screaming in a beautiful musical way. Powerful way. When Hugh starts doing it, you just want to shoot him. I mean, I really. That's how I react to it. It's like, oh, my God, make this stop. You know, it is so awful. And so I think, you know, Blackmore is really just getting fed up. That's not what he signed up for. And that's the problem is that when these guys start imposing their own vision on the music, Blackmore becomes very. Blackmore becomes very resentful okay, so that's the thing, Yvonne.
- [169:36]
C
That's the true story, which is that he. He no longer had full control over the band. Yeah, he was like. He kind of reminds me the way Robert Fripp reacted to anybody threatening his power in King Crimson. Robert Fripp, incidentally, is my favorite guitarist of all time.
- [169:49]
D
Okay.
- [169:49]
C
Yours is Blackmore. Okay. Mine's Frip. Frippo's a tyrant, God bless him. He's a brilliant man and a lot of ways, but my. He would not. He would not tolerate equal. He would tolerate collaborators, but his word was final. And if it was his direction or the highway, if he didn't like the way the other guys were trying to make the band go, and he break up King Crimson and then reform it year later with some other guys. So, like, yeah, this is. This is. It's easy to see exactly why Blackmore got the yips and left the band.
- [170:30]
A
Get out of my way get inside of you.
- [170:57]
C
So what does that leave us with? What does that leave us when we get to come taste the bed? By the way, I love the COVID
- [171:04]
B
I love the title. See, I was gonna say, I think. I think for. I think for this episode, when we post.
- [171:11]
C
Title tap cover.
- [171:13]
B
When we post Smell the Glove To Me, when we post the episode, though, our three faces should be. Should be Photoshopped at a. Where they should never be like, I don't know. But that's what we should do for this episode.
- [171:23]
D
You know, I have to say, is it even.
- [171:26]
C
Is this even a Deep Purple album with Tommy Bowen instead of Richie Blackmore?
- [171:30]
D
The thing is that it. Obviously the band was very different, and from any kind of a perspective of what Deep Purple stood for, it lost most of that. But I have to say that Tommy Bowen was an incredible guitar player, and he was a kind of an inspired choice. How do you replace Blackmore? I mean, that's impossible, right? But actually, if you're gonna move in this funkier direction, bluesier direction, Tommy Bolton was really about as good of a choice as you could have had.
- [172:19]
A
When my time comes and I'm 10,000 miles away just lose yourself and watch the band Kick back and play get out Keeping light it's getting tired of all all the time.
- [172:46]
D
All the time the problem was that he was just as bad with drugs as Hughes was.
- [172:52]
C
I was about to say, this is the story of Tommy Boland's junk. Sick arm. It's really a sad.
- [172:57]
D
Yeah, it's so very sad because I think if.
- [173:00]
A
If.
- [173:00]
D
If they could have. If the two of Them could have kept that under control. Which is so ironic, by the way, because of course Mark 2 of Deep Purple was very anti drug. You know, they absolutely abhor drugs. Gillen even had anti drug songs. And then they got these two guys that ruined the band by. By being junkies. Right. And, and it's really. They had, I think, immense potential that was never realized. I think the, you know, come taste the band had some good moments. It was in general not.
- [173:31]
C
Coming Home is a very good song. I, I like, I like that as an opener. I think, you know, they're pretty good still at show choosing that, but there's just too much generic stuff. He's got great guitar tone, he's got some really good smart ideas, but the songs aren't there to surround him.
- [173:44]
B
And of course.
- [173:44]
D
Exactly.
- [173:45]
C
Because Blackmore is not there to surround.
- [173:47]
D
Yeah, he doesn't. Who, who can write the riffs besides, you know, Jimmy Page maybe, or Tony Aomi? Nobody has the rip ability that Blackmore did and certainly Tommy Boland did not.
- [173:58]
A
But.
- [173:58]
D
So it's sad. I mean, it's very tragic how it all came to an end. You know, just kind of. It very, very inglorious. And they played a terrible show. And, and, and Coverdale and Lord are like, we quit. You know, we're done.
- [174:31]
A
Get out of my way. Get out of my way. Get out of my way.
- [174:45]
C
This is, this is the famous last concert in Japan, the one that Scott made it a point to listen to.
- [174:50]
B
Yeah, I went, I went to go find the awful live shows like last show in Japan where Boland either took had some bad heroin or slept his arm for six hours and couldn't move his left arm. So Lord's got to play all the guitar riffs like Burn. It's just Lord on organ playing that riff. It's crazy. And then the other. There's a 94 show just before Blackmoor left for the final time, and it's actually 93. They actually have it on video, like his video release, Come Hell or High Water. Come Hell or High Water. He doesn't come out until three minutes into the first track.
- [175:17]
D
Highway Star.
- [175:17]
B
Highway Star, when he's got to play. And then he plays and he is pissed off beyond all measure, not looking at anyone, and then finds a drink and throws it at the cameraman because I guess he thought the cameraman is not supposed to be there. Jeff. That's the kind of live stuff I want. Awful playing or bad stuff happening that you can't find anywhere else you want.
- [175:35]
C
You want Replacements kind of yeah, you
- [175:37]
D
know, but that actually, that brings up the fans. We should bring this up that, you know, Blackmore thrived. He, he decided when he was a young man to model himself on these very moody artists. And in particular he talked about Django Rya Reinhardt, and Django Reinhardt was notorious for, you know, being a total jerk to people and just not showing up for gigs and all of that kind of stuff. And, and Blackmore thought that's how you have to be. So, you know, before we move on from the Coverdale years here, you know the we should briefly mention California Jam show, right? So that's in 74, one of the
- [176:16]
C
largest concerts in history.
- [176:17]
D
Yeah, 250,000 people. And by the way, this is, I, I, as I was, you know, prepping here, I decided to look up how many shows cover Coverdale played with Deep Purple prior to California Jam. 12. Now imagine, I mean, he was like a small town guy, right? I mean, he never played any kind of a big band. So you play 12 shows and, you know, the show number 13 is California Jam in front of 250,000 people. Right. I mean, it's insane. And he delivers. He absolutely delivered. But you know, what everybody remembers about that show, of course, is Blackmore again getting totally pissed off about the cameraman and smashing his guitar into this incredibly expensive camera. And, you know, the organizers call the cops and they're like waiting for, you know, to call him away and they have to jump in a helicopter and flee immediately after the show. So they're not, they don't get arrested. Right. But what an incredible video.
- [177:15]
C
Is this all not televised on national TV as well? I mean, I remember Cal Jam was like very. Was broadcast. Was this one, like, shown to the audiences across the nation?
- [177:26]
D
It was obviously recorded, I have it on dvd, but I'm not sure if it was broadcast, quite honestly.
- [177:30]
C
Yeah, but yeah, this was a legendary moment. And of course, although of course Blackmore left before the formal end of the band, this is the end of sort of what we consider the main run of Deep Purple. Yeah, they broke up for four years now, actually. Eight years. It was eight years, right? 76. Six to 84. Right, right. And then finally they reunited and we did want to spend at least a little time talking about the many, many, many subsequent marks of deeper right. Deep Purple, I think, are still active to this day.
- [178:00]
B
Yes.
- [178:01]
C
No, we're not going to be able to get to all of them, but we certainly should say something about their first reunion album, because I think their first reunion album really deserves to be Considered with the rest of their work, perfect strangers from 1984 brings the whole band back together. The classic band. Glover for some reason, even Glover's. And I guess he'd been working with Rainbow, so maybe Richard Blackmore had learned to forgive him. Ian Gillan's back, Roger Glover's back, you got Blackmore. Lord and pace. This is classic Deep Purple. Why shouldn't it be great? Well, the answer is actually it's pretty good. It's. It's not great, I think simply because there's age, there's time, there's the attrition of like, effort. You've given all away a lot of your best ideas and then there's inevitably a bit of. Of 80s production that has to sort of sneak into the mix here.
- [179:09]
A
Know the. Aristocracy.
- [179:28]
C
But I'll give Perfect Strangers a lot of credit. It actually avoids most of the worst things that have happened to like, you know, dinosaurs acts that come back together in the 80s to rake in the bucks. It's a pretty fun album. I would not describe it as a great album. I would say it's a 6.5 out of 10. Which means, like, you know, it's funny actually there are two big singles on this. Knocking at your back door. And of course everyone knows the title track. Title track is fine. But the one actually that really always stood out to me is A gypsy's Kiss. Again, that, to me is. It goes right back to Flight of the Rat. That to me is classic D, Purple John Lord in the, you know, in. In the pilot seat, driving that one as well as Blackmore. That, to me takes me back to the early years.
- [180:53]
A
Far away day. It counts this gypsy kiss. All your.
- [181:06]
C
There are actually no bad so hungry days, by the way. Literally. Name check. Smoke on the water. It's like they're very much looking backwards. Right? Yeah, it's very nostalgia focused album, but for all that it's surprisingly good. It's not great, but it's probably better than it had any excuse to be.
- [181:25]
B
I agree with the assessment. I think that Knocking at your Back Door, which is the first track, both shows why it's a success and why it's not a success on some levels. It's a pretty darn good song everyone's playing. Well, it's good to hear Blackmore and Gillan back together again. And yet that drum sound is more generic, like pace is. Is more locked in than he was in the 70s. Gillan's vocals get a little sweetness added to it, you know, in the. In the post production. It's not quite as clean. It's not quite as raw as it was back then. So the songs are pretty much there, the playing is pretty much there. It's just a cut below on a couple of levels. But Knocking at your Back Door is great song. Perfect Stranger. I think that that's kind of slower ballady. Wasted Sunsets. It's a good track and I really like. Although Siobhan tells me I'm totally wrong. No nobody's Home, which has a great Blackmore riff. I think it's a really good song and Gillen gets to.
- [182:24]
A
To.
- [182:24]
B
To totally wail on that track. But yeah, this is. This is. If it's not a great record and Yvonne might tell us it is in a minute. I. I think it's a very good, very.
- [182:45]
A
And brag. But nobody's home. I say that nobody's home. My belly is aching. Your image.
- [183:08]
D
Yeah. For me, I probably have a very subjective attachment to this album because it came out in 1980.
- [183:16]
C
You already told us.
- [183:16]
B
Right?
- [183:17]
D
Yeah, yeah. And. And it was the first. It was actually the first Richard Blackmore album of any kind that came out when I. That I bought new. So it was only came out whatever, six months after we moved to the United States and I had already fallen in love with Rainbow, you know, back in Yugoslavia. They were quite big and I started to really appreciate what's different about Blackmore. And then when that album came out, you know, it was massive and I. I sent the information to these guys here, you know, it went platinum. It was. It was a huge album in the tour demand. Absolutely, yeah. And the tour became the second.
- [183:58]
C
I mean, think about. This is also Van Halen's biggest year. So there was real appetite in America
- [184:03]
B
for like good old fashioned quiet riot.
- [184:05]
D
You had those deflect.
- [184:07]
B
And you have not N U M metal bands, but new metal bands who are just cresting at that point too.
- [184:12]
D
It was all coming together. You know, Ozzy was hitting it huge. Of course, you know, with 83, 84 was a bark at the moon, of course, was huge. And. And you know what? Yeah, there were a lot of jokes about the Deep Purple guys being old men.
- [184:28]
B
They're probably younger than we are right now.
- [184:29]
D
Oh, yeah, well, certainly me quite a bit. You know, they were, I thinking, you know, almost 40, most of them. So, you know, but Blackmore and Gillen and Glover, you know, they. I think they were all born in 45, so they were like 39 at that point, you know, and Lord was a little bit older, four years older than that. But the fact is that I think they delivered. And yeah, you're right. That there is. The drum sound is not as good. It becomes more compressed.
- [184:54]
C
Everything feels a little bit slower, maybe. Also too, there's a lot of that hyperactive energy.
- [184:59]
D
I don't know. Gypsy's Kiss is pretty impressive.
- [185:01]
C
That's the one. That's the one that stood out.
- [185:03]
D
There's one more I can't remember right now. That. That's pretty fast.
- [185:07]
B
Has that gallop.
- [185:07]
D
Yeah, that's right. That's right. What's the second? So under the gun, I think that's pretty. That's pretty. Pretty good too. And. But the thing is that for me, those intervening years, those nine years where Blackmore was in Rainbow, I think his playing just evolved to something truly remarkable and special. And so for me, that is peak Blackmore, honestly, you know, so for me, his playing on Perfect Strangers is my favorite. He's got this incredible tone. It's. I think it's really. It's fully evolved to something utterly unique. And he is just running around. He's playing this incredible stuff in between all the vocal lines. And that's what I loved about it. And, you know, he actually the. The. The riff for Perfect Stranger, as, you know, the song, you know, so.
- [185:59]
C
So.
- [186:14]
D
This is again, you know, tuning into the Bulgarian shortwave radio station. And that was actually. Apparently they were playing that during sound checks at the last Rainbow tour. So they were working on that idea. And I love it. I think. I think that's one of the most iconic riffs that Blackmore ever came up with. It's just perfect.
- [186:46]
A
A strand of silver hanging through the sky you touch you more than you see the voice mages in your mind.
- [187:22]
D
So I. I do adore this album and I think, in fact, let me. Yeah. Wasted sunsets God, my. My God. Blackmore's playing on that song. You know, it's a ballad. It's very, very much like A Wider Shade of Pale. Right. So Proko Harem, which doesn't have any guitar. Right. It's before.
- [187:41]
C
It's before Robin.
- [187:41]
D
Yeah, even Joint. And so, you know, they do the song with Blackmore's amazing soloing on that, which is, I think, the most emotional soloing that he had ever done. And so for me, that was just an absolutely mind blowingly great album.
- [188:05]
A
Hoping someone else will show. Sam.
- [188:50]
D
I just played that over and over and over again. So, yeah, for me, that's going to be one of the two albums that I pick.
- [188:57]
C
Scott. I know, I know we're running short on Time. But do you want to at least give a few minutes maybe the rest of this show even over to what I. You've already told me is your favorite Deep Purple album of all time.
- [189:08]
B
Oh, it is not the House of Blue Light. You always do this. I. I will. House of Blue Light is where you can see things I think sort of completely coming apart.
- [189:17]
C
We're not going to follow the story all the way to the end but
- [189:20]
B
I mean House of Blue Light I think has some pretty decent tracks and others that real are real failures. And from what I understand the behind the scenes stuff is also sort of
- [189:28]
C
doesn't like it either.
- [189:30]
B
So like something like Call the Wild is not very good. Heart Loving Woman is very bad. But I think the Spanish Archer is a good track.
- [189:37]
D
Yes.
- [189:37]
B
And the first one it's. I should. It's so dumb. You probably shouldn't like it. Bad attitude. But it's very rainbowy. But I really like. They have these lord organ swirls that lead up to the. In the pre chorus and Gillan just delivers the heck out of that track. I mean he is just totally committed to. To the lyrics and the vocals there and now I can't get out of. There are certain songs you can't get out of your head when you prep for shows like this. I can't get bad attitude out of my head. It's 1986. It's not the best song they ever did.
- [190:08]
D
7 yeah but I like it.
- [190:11]
B
I like that attitude.
- [190:23]
A
Turn down. My way I won't hurt you. You got yourself a load of trouble now you got yourself a bad feel. You say I got a bad attitude. How'd you think I feel? Don't want another I got a name, you know.
- [191:09]
D
So that's another album that came out as I was very big into Richie and I bought it right away and I found it a big disappointment. And I think a big part it of of it is that Gillen's voice really starts to suffer at that point.
- [191:24]
C
It's is also becomes an undeniable factor.
- [191:27]
D
Yeah, it's really thinning out. You know you listen to the 70s stuff and it's so big and full and fat and I think it's.
- [191:34]
C
You can even notice it by Perfect Strangers if you're being.
- [191:37]
D
Yeah, absolutely. It's already thinning out by that point. It's almost certainly the alcohol abuse that he was engaging in here. There was a great deal of that and affected him and so how could
- [191:47]
C
anybody shriek at the top of their lungs like that for more without losing it? Yeah, we feel. I mean, it happens to everyone. Happened to Phil Collins, happened to Tom York of Radiohead.
- [191:56]
D
Yeah, it's not normal.
- [191:57]
C
Wear and tear is gonna kill you. And he was pushing it like he was the speed king. He was literally pushing his voice to the max every night, you know.
- [192:05]
D
But the thing is, though, Shocked it
- [192:06]
C
actually didn't happen faster.
- [192:08]
D
A lot of singers lose their high range. That's normal as they age. Right. But I think his voice got thinner.
- [192:14]
A
Power.
- [192:14]
B
Yeah.
- [192:15]
D
Yeah, he lost that. That volume, that fatness that he had. And. And I think that that was due to the alcohol abuse. And that's what. Actually, I think, again, Blackmore started getting pretty resentful because he was seeing Gillen abusing alcohol and he got fed up with it. You know, he was not being professional. He was blowing it on the shows. But in terms of the album, you know, I think another big problem was that Ian Pace, the drum sound becomes even more 80s generic, which is not good for him. It robs him of all of his character and individuality. And John Lord is switching mostly to synthesizer.
- [192:50]
B
Right.
- [192:50]
D
And kill Deep Purple. What are you doing?
- [192:54]
C
Kill Deep Purple.
- [192:55]
D
Yeah. It sounds so generic for the age.
- [192:58]
C
Give me a piano once and twice if you want to change it up, but no sense.
- [193:01]
D
Almost no organ. I think there is very little if. If there is, it's buried, however. And, you know, Blackmore was very outspoken about hating that album. But as Scott mentioned, you listen to Spanish Archer, and that is amazing. Amazingly great playing by. By Blackmore. And in fact, if you listen to Pictures of Home, it's like Pictures of Home Part two. It's got the same shuffle beat. It's got. I think it's even in the same key. And it's again, tuning into the Bulgarian shortwave radio station. Right. It's very inspired by that.
- [193:41]
A
Let's look. I Dr. Like a K me dancing in this season of change it's not hard to explain like leaves on the trees I'm falling and as you turn don't look away the spur sh Is going to make you pay.
- [194:19]
D
And then, you know, there are a couple of tracks at the very end. Dead or Alive, the closing track, actually shows some life, some energy, and I like it. There is a bluesy thing. Mitzi Dupree, where Gillen is again talking about a woman of ill repute, shall we say?
- [194:35]
B
Yes.
- [194:36]
D
That is engaged in some very questionable activities. His favorite. And actually he talks about being on a plane to Salt Lake City and with seats, whatever, 3A and 3B. And I have a Very quick story about that. I was flying to Salt Lake City, and I'm listening to House of Blue Light on my ipod, and I got to be upgraded to first class, and I'm in C3A. Alas, there was no Mitzi Dupree next to me, but. And what's it. What's the kind of epic track there right towards the end? Do you remember what that is?
- [195:12]
B
Don't recall.
- [195:13]
D
But it's actually really creative track, too, so I think the whole. Strange Ways. That's it. That's it. So you don't like it? I do. But anyway, for me, the last four songs are quite good, but everything leading up to it is a huge disappointment, so. And of course, it leads to, you know, kicking Gillan out and. And bringing in Jolin Turner, which was a terrible idea. And because they become, like, a generic rainbow cover, this is literally the point
- [195:42]
C
where, like, I don't feel we need to talk about slaves and masters or anything like that. In fact. Yeah, listen, you know, I know we have a little hard time limit here to deal with, but I want to ask, unless there are any huge fans out there in the audience of Perpendicular, their 1996 album, which is like, a hilarious title, we're gonna have to ask your forgiveness. There's just so many. Deep Purple continues on to this presentation day, and there were many albums, but I think we're all willing to acknowledge that the Battle Rages on isn't the most important.
- [196:11]
D
No, it's not. It's not great. But the title track is not too bad, so.
- [196:16]
A
What?
- [196:16]
C
That's precisely.
- [196:18]
A
Yeah.
- [196:19]
C
Ivan and I don't know, Scott, how far you got on this? Are there any further songs from this long, late chapter of Purple wanted to mention before we log off here?
- [196:31]
B
No, I basically only got through this point we stopped at. So he'll be able to.
- [196:35]
A
Ivan.
- [196:35]
B
He's got something.
- [196:36]
D
I'll make it very quick because obviously we're out of time. But I do actually like some of Battle Rages On. And the title track is supposed to be about the fall of the Soviet Union, the fall of the Communist bloc, but obviously it related very closely also to the battle between Blackmore and him. So they bring, by the way, people
- [196:57]
C
who don't know they had the one album excursion with the other guy, and then Ian is back.
- [197:00]
D
Right.
- [197:01]
C
Battle Rages on, which is pretty good out.
- [197:03]
D
Yeah. And because it was the 25th anniversary of the band, and this is where there's money to be made.
- [197:08]
C
Yeah.
- [197:08]
D
And Blackmore is like, I'm not rejoining with, you know, I don't want Gil Gillen back. And they said, what do we have to do to get you to go along with it? Said, you'll have to pay me a mil. I think it was a million dollars. And he just actually gave this sum because he never, never thought it out of the air.
- [197:23]
C
It's like, give me a million dollars.
- [197:26]
D
And then they did it. They gave him the money and he's like, oh, no. You know, now it's stuck. And so, yeah, it's pretty funny, actually.
- [197:34]
C
Like, I wouldn't sell out unless somebody backed the truck up to my door. And like, there's somebody actually right the truck.
- [197:39]
D
And then when the band, you know, the band didn't know about that until way towards the end of it, you know, before Blackmore left. And they were incredibly resentful when they found a second.
- [197:48]
C
He got all that money.
- [197:50]
D
Yeah. So it was just bad all, all the way around. And, you know, Scott talked about one of the final shows, and they did actually four months of touring. I, I, I was surprised by that. Yeah. I thought it was a much shorter tour before Black Finally Pale exactly ripped each other. But, you know, so there were a couple of, you know, Anya was a pretty good track, was also talking about the fall of the, so of the, of communism in Eastern, in Eastern Europe. And she had some beautiful lyrics. And as far as Steve Morris era of, of Deep Purple, I think he was not a good match. I, I think he's the nicest possible guy. He's an awesome guy. He's an amazing guitar player, but he's a fusion guitar player, and he doesn't have the ability to come up with the rock riffs that Deep Purple needs. And he did his best. And there were a few times, I think Rapture of the Deep, the title track is pretty good. That's my favorite of the Steve Morris era. And they did a few good ballads during that time, but in general, I think it's just, it's not the band that it was. And I got to see them live in 2019 with Steve Morris. It was an amazing show. It was great. You know, they really delivered. In fact, they had Judas Priest opening for them, and they blew Judas Priest off the stage, if you can believe that, you know, so, you know, they were, as a live act, they probably still are pretty amazing. You know, Gillen was able to actually deliver as long as he didn't have to sing Child in Time. Right.
- [199:18]
C
But I said, that's forever beyond his range.
- [199:21]
D
So, you know, God bless them. They Continue to doing what they love. You know, they obviously are having fun and it's great to have them around, but, you know, they are, they're the inspiration, I think is not there as much as it used to be.
- [199:33]
C
We have all of these recordings to remind us. And that's the thing is like not only do you have the studio albums, you have all those great live concerts that they tape. So please, again, we'll emphasize to you folks, go back, not only hear the records, but to hear the way they sounded. 1969, 70 71. You're going to hear some of the greatest live performances that I think you probably didn't realize you were missing out on right now. I know, Scott. That brings us to the end of the show, the moment where we do our picks. Do you want to kick it off for us?
- [200:03]
B
The two albums you should own, the five songs you have to hear from Deep Purple. Our guest Yvonne Pongrasic will start us off. Albums and songs, please.
- [200:12]
D
So I'm going to pick in Richard Rock and Perfect Strangers. For me, those are really the peak and I just love them both and they're so different and they, you know, they were so iconic for their time, at least for me, but I think for, you know, the US in general, for Perfect Strangers, as far as the tracks, I think I'm going to go with Hard Loving Man Child, In Time, the studio version, Pictures of Home, the Made in Japan version of Space Trucking, and then the title track for Perfect Strangers. I think that really encapsulates Deep Purple and Richard Blackmore for me. And I quickly mentioned that, I forgot to mention it earlier, but I got to see. The one time that I got to see Blackmore play live was in 1987 on the the House of Blue Light of the Blue Light tour. And I got to stand right in front of him and I was. I think I had not yet turned 18, I think I was 17. And it was truly a life changing experience. He was, he, he. I've never, never seen this before since. He really was like a God, a rock God. He. He would. Seemed massive to me in front of me and that is probably one of my favorite memories. He actually smashed up a Strad right in front of me. I was there with a buddy, high school buddy that we were both guitar players that adored Blackmore and, and we were just looking at each other like screaming with pleasure and joy, like, can you believe this? You know, it was, was incredible.
- [201:44]
B
All right, my two albums, I can go with Machine Head. It's got the songs you know, but the other ones are just as good and probably the peak of of that era. And then I think Burn Burn's just an incredible record. My songs, I took one from each of the albums from that prime period. Speed King.
- [202:03]
D
No, no, no.
- [202:05]
B
Highway Star. We'll go with Our Lady.
- [202:09]
D
No kidding.
- [202:09]
A
Wow.
- [202:10]
B
And Burned.
- [202:11]
C
Those are the five.
- [202:12]
D
Our Lady.
- [202:13]
A
Really?
- [202:13]
D
You sure that's what you want to pick?
- [202:15]
B
I like it.
- [202:16]
C
That was a left field one there, Scott. I had to get with you.
- [202:18]
D
That's impressive.
- [202:20]
C
All right, so I'm gonna, I'm gonna. For my picks, I'm going to go with the heuristic that I've used a lot of times now, which is spreading the love. So I will pick as my two albums, Deep Purple and Rock of course, and Fireball, which I've already told you, I think is like the underrated, greatest Deep Purple album of all time. And therefore I'm not going to pick any songs that come from those records. You get those records records and then you get these five. And I'll actually start with the pre. The pre Ian Gillan eras. I love the early Deep Purple. So Help, their cover of Help actually reinterprets the Beatles version better than the Beatles did themselves. It's a great song. This is the version that John Lennon actually wanted. Second shield from Talisman. Not talked about, but a very interesting and complex John Lord. John Lord and Blackmore collaboration that shows them at their early. Really Prague rock. This. There's. There are many different paths that Deep Purple could have gone down and one of them, as it turns out is progressive rock. There's really actually Anthem and Shield on that record are very prog songs. The third, since I'm obviously skipping Deep Purple and Rock and Fireball, we're gonna go back to Machine Head and it'll be Never before, which is something we didn't really talk about on. On our discussion, but geez, you know, just talk about meat and potatoes. Perfect Deep Purple rock rocker. That riff, that riff is basically you close your eyes, you imagine something about them and you're going to come up with what they did on Never Before. Then title track of Burn Burn is great. Finally, J's kiss from the latter day years of Deep Purple. I. If we're going to pick one, I would say that from Perfect Strangers. And then because you know, I'm the host and it's host prerogative, we got to end with a sixth pick and it's Space Trucking from Machine Head, the greatest heart rock song of all time. Arguably the greatest hard rock riff ever written. Sometimes less is more, sometimes simplicity is perfect. And that's it. I'm so glad we got to talk about this great band.
- [204:34]
A
Come on, come on, come on, let's go. Come on, come on, come on.
- [205:04]
B
There we go, the Political Beats. Look at the music and career of Deep Purple. We thank our guest, Dr. Yvonne Pongrasic Jr. William E. Hibbs. Ludwig von Mises professor of Economics here at Hillsdale College. Been here since 2000. Check out his surf guitar work in many bands as well. Yvonne, thanks for joining us.
- [205:21]
D
It's been a true pleasure. Thanks so much for having me, Jeff.
- [205:24]
B
We look forward to the next couple months. We have a few things bubbling under the surface.
- [205:29]
D
We'll get there soon.
- [205:30]
C
Many things, in fact, we're looking forward to a lot of exciting developments.
- [205:33]
B
Jeff is on x@ esoteric CD. I'm there at Scott Bertram. Don't forget to join us at Patreon, please. Patreon.com politicalbeats maybe if enough of you join, we'll invite Yvonne back just to play guitar, you know, talk about anything,
- [205:46]
D
hopefully stay in tune.
- [205:48]
C
Oh, I think he's, he's welcome back whenever he wants.
- [205:51]
B
Also, subscribe for new episodes. Leave reviews where possible. Find us at nationalreview.com or on X@politicalbeats this has been a presentation of National Review. This is Political Beats.
- [206:17]
A
Sam.