I've had this album in my collection for decades, but haven't played it in - well - decades. That's what it feels like, anyway. Then all of a sudden last week I couldn't get the title track out of my head. I don't know where it came from but it was there for days, so I decided to pull the record off the shelf, put it through the ultrasonic cleaner and give it a spin.
This is the Mark III version of Deep Purple, which is different from what many people refer to as the "classic" Mark II Smoke On The Water lineup that everybody knows and loves. But Deep Purple Mark III was no slouch, and included original members Ritchie Blackmore (guitar), Ian Paice (drums), Jon Lord (keyboards) and newcomers Glenn Hughes (replacing Roger Glover on bass) and a then-unknown singer, David Coverdale, who replaced Ian Gillian. Deep Purple Mark III recorded and released two really great albums - Burn, and its followup, Stormbringer. There have been nine different "marks" of Deep Purple, and my favourites are II and III. Mark II has reunited a couple of times - once in the mid-80s (they released Perfect Strangers and House Of Blue Lights), and again in 1992-93, although for no apparent reason.
Burn is Deep Purple's eighth studio album, released on February 15th, 1974. It's an excellent album that more-or-less carries on from where 1972's Machine Head left off. I'm not discounting 1973's Who Do We Think We Are?, which came between Machine Head and Burn, but it isn't in the same league as the other two, despite opening with Woman From Tokyo, a killer of a track that would be released as a single and make a minor dent in the charts.
A bit of a history lesson may be required at this point. Deep Purple was conceived when Jon Lord met businessman Tony Edwards, in 1967. Edwards was looking to invest in the music business and was interested in building a group around Lord, who was a classically-trained musician very much interested in a serious career in music. Session guitarist Ritchie Blackmore was summoned and the business of forming a group began in earnest. A well-regarded drummer of that era, Bobbie Clarke, was first choice for the drum stool, but when singer Rod Evans (of The Maze) showed up to audition for the lead vocal spot (which he got) he brought his own drummer, Ian Paice, with him. Blackmore had previously seen Paice play with The Maze and liked his style, so he set up an audition for him and that was the end of the Deep Purple road for Clarke. Initially called The Roundabout, Deep Purple Mark I was off and running, featuring three of the "classic" lineup members already on board.
A huge part of the Deep Purple Sound is Lord's organ. He was inspired by Bach and Edward Elder, and also by American jazz and blues organists such as Jimmy Smith and Jimmy McGriff. All of this would blend together and result in Lord developing his own sound that is so integral to Deep Purple. Basically, it involved running his Hammond C3 (a heavier but otherwise identical instrument to the B3 that proceeded it) through Marshall amplifiers, which he initially did partly to compete with Blackmore's loud guitar. This resulted in a heavier, distorted sound that unintentionally heralded the emergence of heavy metal - on an organ! - and from this evolved the back-and-forth playfulness between Lord and Blackmore that was in itself something entirely new. Lord created his distinctive sound while other rock organists of the period were under the spell of the Moog synthesizer (Emerson, Lake and Palmer come to mind), and it was a sound nobody else was making. When his original Hammond C3 died, in 1973, Lord bought another one from Christine McVie, of Fleetwood Mac. He would keep that one until his retirement from Deep Purple, in 2002, when he passed it on to his successor, Don Airey. It was itself retired from the stage a few years later when, in Airey's words, it had become "pretty knackered".
In early Deep Purple, Lord emerged as leader of the band, indulging his love of classical music by fusing it with rock stylings. His whims were the wind in the sails that steered the band, and even though their first few records featured some straight ahead rockers (Hush, Kentucky Woman and even a cover of The Beatles' Help!), they needed something original. That's when then things took a really strange and classical turn, resulting in 1969's Concerto For Group and Orchestra, which was performed live at the Royal Albert Hall with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, on September, 24, 1969. Opinions vary, but I like that recording, although I'm not sure it was what Deep Purple's fans were expecting. By then Ian Gillan and Roger Glover had replaced singer Evans and bassist Nick Simper, who were fired because they were getting fed up with Lord's classical leanings. Simper later stated that "the reason the music lacked direction was because Jon Lord fucked everything up with his classical ideas." Say what you will, but this record was strong enough to inspire such other recordings as Metallica's 1999 LP, S&M, and Kiss' Alive IV, in 2003.
Fast forward a few years to 1973. Deep Purple were at their peak, but tensions between guitarist Blackmore and singer Gillian, which had been percolating below the surface for ages, escalated and Gillan left the group after a performance in Osaka, Japan, on June 29, 1973 (you can read more about that in the Bonus Track section of my Machine Head ramblings). Not long after that, bassist Roger Glover departed when he was told that Blackmore would only remain in Deep Purple if he left. Glover decided to quit rather than be forced out.
Lord called the end of Mark II Deep Purple "the biggest shame in rock and roll. God knows what we would have done over the next three or four years."
Rather than breaking up - the thought had occurred to each of the remaining band members - they brought in replacements Hughes and Coverdale and began recording what would become Burn in November of that same year. Mixing was done in Britain and then tour rehearsals began. Deep Purple Mark III was set to debut in Aarhus, Denmark, but that show was canceled when the plane carrying their equipment arrived too late. Their next scheduled gig, in Copenhagen on December 9th, was the actual debut of the new lineup. All indications are it went well.
Burn kicks hard right out of the gate. Blackmore's style is so unique. All of the band members are hugely talented musicians, but Deep Purple had by then long been Ritchie Blackmore's band, and when he starts playing his guitar you immediately know who it is. Other guitarists have their own distinctive sounds, but Blackmore - to me - actually sounds like a guy playing a Fender Stratocaster. He brings out the natural tone of the instrument and it's a very pure sound. No other guitar sounds like a Strat, and no other guitarist plays a Strat like Blackmore. To mimic his sound all you'd really need is a standard-issue Strat with the middle pickup screwed all the way down so as to silence it, played through a tape-echo into a Vox AC30. That's the equipment side of things. But to emulate his playing style - good luck with that - would require the frets to be scalloped (cut and sanded into concave curves) which is what allows Blackmore to bend the strings just by pressing harder or softer. That and a lot of talent. I've never heard a sound like it anywhere else.
The opening guitar lick that announces the title track is almost as iconic as the opening riff of Smoke On The Water. Well, actually no. It's not. Nothing is that iconic. But if you're a Deep Purple fan you know this riff, and it's a great start to a great album. The second track, Might Just Take Your Life, opens with a riff that sounds, to me, kind of like the beginning of Woman From Tokyo. But then it goes off in an entirely different direction and Coverdale's singing really starts to make an impression. Add in the interplay of Ian Paice's drumming - he is one of the greatest drummers in rock - and this record is a delight to listen to start to finish. Paice doesn't ride the cymbals and knows where to insert a fill and when to hold back. He plays clever patterns in addition to beats. He's a melodic drummer, and he and bassist Hughes come together to form a really solid and heavy foundation over which Lord, Blackmore and Coverdale engage in their flights of fancy. The result of all this is that there isn't a bum track anywhere on this record.
I think this LP redeemed the one that came before it. Who Do We Think We Are? isn't a bad record, but Machine Head was a great album, and so is Burn. It's lyrically strong - its predecessor isn't - and although each song has its own distinctive flourish you immediately know you are hearing Deep Purple DNA. Coverdale, it turns out, is a great rock singer. If Gillian had to leave, Coverdale was the perfect replacement. Anybody else might have sunk the already beginning-to-sink boat, and the band was taking a huge risk by bringing such an unknown into the fold. But maybe that's also why it worked. The fans didn't know what to expect, and were certainly not expecting as good as they got. A better known singer might have set expectations and perhaps caused problems - ego problems - that could possibly have finished the band off for good. It was a strategy that worked well and brought the band back into focus. It also cemented Coverdale's reputation as one of the best rock singers on the planet, which he absolutely deserved.
My pressing - a Warner Bros. 1974 vintage - sounds big and spacious and is, despite its age, remarkably quiet, especially after being put through the iSonic. And ya just gotta love the cover! This album, with its new lineup, probably saved Deep Purple, and just for that reason is …
I've had this album in my collection for decades, but haven't played it in - well - decades. That's what it feels like, anyway. Then all of a sudden last week I couldn't get the title track out of my head. I don't know where it came from but it was there for days, so I decided to pull the record off the shelf, put it through the ultrasonic cleaner and give it a spin.
This is the Mark III version of Deep Purple, which is different from what many people refer to as the "classic" Mark II Smoke On The Water lineup that everybody knows and loves. But Deep Purple Mark III was no slouch, and included original members Ritchie Blackmore (guitar), Ian Paice (drums), Jon Lord (keyboards) and newcomers Glenn Hughes (replacing Roger Glover on bass) and a then-unknown singer, David Coverdale, who replaced Ian Gillian. Deep Purple Mark III recorded and released two really great albums - Burn, and its followup, Stormbringer. There have been nine different "marks" of Deep Purple, and my favourites are II and III. Mark II has reunited a couple of times - once in the mid-80s (they released Perfect Strangers and House Of Blue Lights), and again in 1992-93, although for no apparent reason.
Burn is Deep Purple's eighth studio album, released on February 15th, 1974. It's an excellent album that more-or-less carries on from where 1972's Machine Head left off. I'm not discounting 1973's Who Do We Think We Are?, which came between Machine Head and Burn, but it isn't in the same league as the other two, despite opening with Woman From Tokyo, a killer of a track that would be released as a single and make a minor dent in the charts.
A bit of a history lesson may be required at this point. Deep Purple was conceived when Jon Lord met businessman Tony Edwards, in 1967. Edwards was looking to invest in the music business and was interested in building a group around Lord, who was a classically-trained musician very much interested in a serious career in music. Session guitarist Ritchie Blackmore was summoned and the business of forming a group began in earnest. A well-regarded drummer of that era, Bobbie Clarke, was first choice for the drum stool, but when singer Rod Evans (of The Maze) showed up to audition for the lead vocal spot (which he got) he brought his own drummer, Ian Paice, with him. Blackmore had previously seen Paice play with The Maze and liked his style, so he set up an audition for him and that was the end of the Deep Purple road for Clarke. Initially called The Roundabout, Deep Purple Mark I was off and running, featuring three of the "classic" lineup members already on board.
A huge part of the Deep Purple Sound is Lord's organ. He was inspired by Bach and Edward Elder, and also by American jazz and blues organists such as Jimmy Smith and Jimmy McGriff. All of this would blend together and result in Lord developing his own sound that is so integral to Deep Purple. Basically, it involved running his Hammond C3 (a heavier but otherwise identical instrument to the B3 that proceeded it) through Marshall amplifiers, which he initially did partly to compete with Blackmore's loud guitar. This resulted in a heavier, distorted sound that unintentionally heralded the emergence of heavy metal - on an organ! - and from this evolved the back-and-forth playfulness between Lord and Blackmore that was in itself something entirely new. Lord created his distinctive sound while other rock organists of the period were under the spell of the Moog synthesizer (Emerson, Lake and Palmer come to mind), and it was a sound nobody else was making. When his original Hammond C3 died, in 1973, Lord bought another one from Christine McVie, of Fleetwood Mac. He would keep that one until his retirement from Deep Purple, in 2002, when he passed it on to his successor, Don Airey. It was itself retired from the stage a few years later when, in Airey's words, it had become "pretty knackered".
In early Deep Purple, Lord emerged as leader of the band, indulging his love of classical music by fusing it with rock stylings. His whims were the wind in the sails that steered the band, and even though their first few records featured some straight ahead rockers (Hush, Kentucky Woman and even a cover of The Beatles' Help!), they needed something original. That's when then things took a really strange and classical turn, resulting in 1969's Concerto For Group and Orchestra, which was performed live at the Royal Albert Hall with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, on September, 24, 1969. Opinions vary, but I like that recording, although I'm not sure it was what Deep Purple's fans were expecting. By then Ian Gillan and Roger Glover had replaced singer Evans and bassist Nick Simper, who were fired because they were getting fed up with Lord's classical leanings. Simper later stated that "the reason the music lacked direction was because Jon Lord fucked everything up with his classical ideas." Say what you will, but this record was strong enough to inspire such other recordings as Metallica's 1999 LP, S&M, and Kiss' Alive IV, in 2003.
Fast forward a few years to 1973. Deep Purple were at their peak, but tensions between guitarist Blackmore and singer Gillian, which had been percolating below the surface for ages, escalated and Gillan left the group after a performance in Osaka, Japan, on June 29, 1973 (you can read more about that in the Bonus Track section of my Machine Head ramblings). Not long after that, bassist Roger Glover departed when he was told that Blackmore would only remain in Deep Purple if he left. Glover decided to quit rather than be forced out.
Lord called the end of Mark II Deep Purple "the biggest shame in rock and roll. God knows what we would have done over the next three or four years."
Rather than breaking up - the thought had occurred to each of the remaining band members - they brought in replacements Hughes and Coverdale and began recording what would become Burn in November of that same year. Mixing was done in Britain and then tour rehearsals began. Deep Purple Mark III was set to debut in Aarhus, Denmark, but that show was canceled when the plane carrying their equipment arrived too late. Their next scheduled gig, in Copenhagen on December 9th, was the actual debut of the new lineup. All indications are it went well.
Burn kicks hard right out of the gate. Blackmore's style is so unique. All of the band members are hugely talented musicians, but Deep Purple had by then long been Ritchie Blackmore's band, and when he starts playing his guitar you immediately know who it is. Other guitarists have their own distinctive sounds, but Blackmore - to me - actually sounds like a guy playing a Fender Stratocaster. He brings out the natural tone of the instrument and it's a very pure sound. No other guitar sounds like a Strat, and no other guitarist plays a Strat like Blackmore. To mimic his sound all you'd really need is a standard-issue Strat with the middle pickup screwed all the way down so as to silence it, played through a tape-echo into a Vox AC30. That's the equipment side of things. But to emulate his playing style - good luck with that - would require the frets to be scalloped (cut and sanded into concave curves) which is what allows Blackmore to bend the strings just by pressing harder or softer. That and a lot of talent. I've never heard a sound like it anywhere else.
The opening guitar lick that announces the title track is almost as iconic as the opening riff of Smoke On The Water. Well, actually no. It's not. Nothing is that iconic. But if you're a Deep Purple fan you know this riff, and it's a great start to a great album. The second track, Might Just Take Your Life, opens with a riff that sounds, to me, kind of like the beginning of Woman From Tokyo. But then it goes off in an entirely different direction and Coverdale's singing really starts to make an impression. Add in the interplay of Ian Paice's drumming - he is one of the greatest drummers in rock - and this record is a delight to listen to start to finish. Paice doesn't ride the cymbals and knows where to insert a fill and when to hold back. He plays clever patterns in addition to beats. He's a melodic drummer, and he and bassist Hughes come together to form a really solid and heavy foundation over which Lord, Blackmore and Coverdale engage in their flights of fancy. The result of all this is that there isn't a bum track anywhere on this record.
I think this LP redeemed the one that came before it. Who Do We Think We Are? isn't a bad record, but Machine Head was a great album, and so is Burn. It's lyrically strong - its predecessor isn't - and although each song has its own distinctive flourish you immediately know you are hearing Deep Purple DNA. Coverdale, it turns out, is a great rock singer. If Gillian had to leave, Coverdale was the perfect replacement. Anybody else might have sunk the already beginning-to-sink boat, and the band was taking a huge risk by bringing such an unknown into the fold. But maybe that's also why it worked. The fans didn't know what to expect, and were certainly not expecting as good as they got. A better known singer might have set expectations and perhaps caused problems - ego problems - that could possibly have finished the band off for good. It was a strategy that worked well and brought the band back into focus. It also cemented Coverdale's reputation as one of the best rock singers on the planet, which he absolutely deserved.
My pressing - a Warner Bros. 1974 vintage - sounds big and spacious and is, despite its age, remarkably quiet, especially after being put through the iSonic. And ya just gotta love the cover! This album, with its new lineup, probably saved Deep Purple, and just for that reason is …
BONUS TRACK
At the beginning of September, 1973, the Mark III line-up of Deep Purple started a two-week period of writing and rehearsing in Clearwell Castle, at Gloucestershire. During this time David Coverdale was introduced as the band's new singer to the music press. The new album was recorded at the Rolling Stones Mobile Studio, in Montreux, Switzerland, where the group previously recorded Machine Head. Maybe lightning would strike twice - although I'm certain they weren't hoping for another inspirational hotel fire.
They worked with producer Martin Birch, who had produced the group since the recording of the In Rock LP four years earlier. Recording of Burn began on November 8 and progressed quickly, resulting in about one-song-per-day.
Coverdale, despite being relatively unknown, proved both confident and competent. Jon Lord recalls that "if he was overawed to be working with us, it only showed when we were talking between ourselves over a beer later, never during the actual recording." It was a much happier recording session than Who Do We Think We Are? had been, and everybody was energized and excited to be working together. The new blood probably helped invigorate things.
When the recording was finished, the band flew back to London where Birch mixed the record at - ironically - Ian Gillan's studio, Kingsway Recorders. Birch made certain Paice's drum levels were normalized, while Blackmore made sure his own guitar was clearly audible in the mix. But this caused a problem when mixing the song Mistreated, for which Coverdale and Hughes had overlaid a dozen vocal tracks onto the final chorus, Blackmore thought the layered vocals overlapped his guitar too much, so the they were severely muted. This upset Coverdale, who felt the drama created by the strengthened vocal tracks had been completely lost.
Also, with this album Blackmore changed the way the music was credited. Where it had before been equally divided between group members, he was tired of dividing the royalties into five parts, especially if some of the others had little or no involvement in the creation of the composition. "Everyone should get what they do," Blackmore said, seeming to forget that the recording process - which involved everyone - was also a creative process. The new practice was followed only for the credits on the songs Sail Away, Mistreated, (credited to Blackmore and Coverdale) and A 200 (credited to Blackmore, Lord, and Paice). While Hughes participated in the songwriting, he ended up not receiving any credits at all due to unexpired contractual obligations from Blackmore. I have no idea what this involved, but I'm pretty sure it pissed off Hughes. This omission was corrected for the 30th-anniversary edition of the album. Hopefully, his cheque was back-dated.
The song Burn, with its intense forward energy, proved to be a suitable concert opener, replacing (for a while) Highway Star, which had long held the honour. By the time I finally saw the band perform many years later - with a 30-piece orchestra, no less - Highway Star had been restored to the opening slot. But Ian Gillian was also back in the band! It was a great show!
At the beginning of September, 1973, the Mark III line-up of Deep Purple started a two-week period of writing and rehearsing in Clearwell Castle, at Gloucestershire. During this time David Coverdale was introduced as the band's new singer to the music press. The new album was recorded at the Rolling Stones Mobile Studio, in Montreux, Switzerland, where the group previously recorded Machine Head. Maybe lightning would strike twice - although I'm certain they weren't hoping for another inspirational hotel fire.
They worked with producer Martin Birch, who had produced the group since the recording of the In Rock LP four years earlier. Recording of Burn began on November 8 and progressed quickly, resulting in about one-song-per-day.
Coverdale, despite being relatively unknown, proved both confident and competent. Jon Lord recalls that "if he was overawed to be working with us, it only showed when we were talking between ourselves over a beer later, never during the actual recording." It was a much happier recording session than Who Do We Think We Are? had been, and everybody was energized and excited to be working together. The new blood probably helped invigorate things.
When the recording was finished, the band flew back to London where Birch mixed the record at - ironically - Ian Gillan's studio, Kingsway Recorders. Birch made certain Paice's drum levels were normalized, while Blackmore made sure his own guitar was clearly audible in the mix. But this caused a problem when mixing the song Mistreated, for which Coverdale and Hughes had overlaid a dozen vocal tracks onto the final chorus, Blackmore thought the layered vocals overlapped his guitar too much, so the they were severely muted. This upset Coverdale, who felt the drama created by the strengthened vocal tracks had been completely lost.
Also, with this album Blackmore changed the way the music was credited. Where it had before been equally divided between group members, he was tired of dividing the royalties into five parts, especially if some of the others had little or no involvement in the creation of the composition. "Everyone should get what they do," Blackmore said, seeming to forget that the recording process - which involved everyone - was also a creative process. The new practice was followed only for the credits on the songs Sail Away, Mistreated, (credited to Blackmore and Coverdale) and A 200 (credited to Blackmore, Lord, and Paice). While Hughes participated in the songwriting, he ended up not receiving any credits at all due to unexpired contractual obligations from Blackmore. I have no idea what this involved, but I'm pretty sure it pissed off Hughes. This omission was corrected for the 30th-anniversary edition of the album. Hopefully, his cheque was back-dated.
The song Burn, with its intense forward energy, proved to be a suitable concert opener, replacing (for a while) Highway Star, which had long held the honour. By the time I finally saw the band perform many years later - with a 30-piece orchestra, no less - Highway Star had been restored to the opening slot. But Ian Gillian was also back in the band! It was a great show!
