From meagre and humble beginnings, this is where it all started for British hard rock legends Deep Purple.
Written by: Eric
ARTIST: Deep Purple
ALBUM: Deep Purple
LABEL: Harvest (UK), Tetragrammaton (USA)
SERIAL: SHVL 759, T-119
YEAR: 1969
CD REISSUE: 1989, EMI (UK), CDP 7 92409 2 * 2008, Victor (Japan), VICP-64304
COUNTRY OF ORIGIN: England
LINEUP: Richie Blackmore – guitar * Jon Lord – keyboards, backing vocals * Rod Evans – lead vocals * Nick Simper – bass, backing vocals * Ian Paice – drums
TRACK LISTING: 01 Chasing Shadows * 02 Blind * 03 Lalena * 04 Fault Line * 05 The Painter * 06 Why Didn’t Rosemary * 07 Bird Has Flown * 08 April
WEBLINKS: Site Link
Deep Purple Background
The last and arguably best of three Rod Evans fronted Deep Purple albums. It’s bewildering why British audiences avoided this version of the band, who found greater success in the USA. The sounds and smells of Carnaby Street dotted the first album. So did the cover tunes with the ornate ‘Book Of Taliesyn’. They offered up more of the same baroque Vanilla Fudge-isms, but none of it landed on English ears.
Could it be that Rod Evans’ vocals were just a little too much in the crooner camp which didn’t go un-noticed by Lord and Blackmore. They were already on the hunt for his replacement as this album languished on American store shelves. This was due to a record company in serious need of a cash injection.
The Songs
Sporting the creepy Hieronymus Bosch painting ‘The Garden Of Earthy Delights’, this album offers up some serious proto prog. Hints of what would come the following year with the mighty ‘In Rock’.
Chasing Shadows’ opens the record and Rod Evans detached vocals sound like he’s coming off a bad trip. The classically trained Jon Lord rips it up here and even throws in some baroque harpsichord on the Gothic ‘Blind’.
Their cover of Donovan‘s ‘Lalena’ is super. The rest of the album is all Deep Purple culminating in the prog rock tour-de-force ‘April’. Clocking in at twelve minutes and including a string quartet, it’s one of the band’s finest efforts. If it had been released on the Vertigo swirl label, collectors would be touting it as a masterpiece.
In Summary
Rod Evans and Nick Simper departed, clearing the way for the classic line-up and world domination. Evans would eventually go on to form Captain Beyond. They released a classic debut and the not-so-great ‘Sufficiently Breathless’ before calling it a day. Nick Simper put together Warhorse with mixed results.
‘Deep Purple’ won’t overshadow ‘In Rock’ or ‘Machine Head’ in your collections. However it’s worth owning not only from a historical perspective, but it is a fun listen every once in awhile.
Deep Purple on Video
Click to go to YTM album page.
Rod Evans also formed a DP cover band called the Bogus Deep Purple. He got into a lot of trouble over that, in fact his royalties were stopped.