DEEP PURPLE IN ROCK

When Deep Purple was founded, all members mixed an interesting musicial curriculum vitae: singer Ian Gillan had done a wide range of musical styles, drummer Ian Paice was influenced by Buddy Rich, bass player Roger Clover had played folk, guitarist Ritchie Blackmore once joined Chuck Berry and keyboard player Jon Lord had a classical training on piano and organ. They started to blend rock, blues, jazz and classical, rehearsed very often, did an awful lot of gigs and ... THEN DEEP PURPLE CREATED THE HEAVY PROGRESSIVE ROCK SOUND! So please stop nailing Deep Purple as pure hardrock, they added far more variety and musical ideas to their music than bands like Iron Maiden, Motorhead and Black Sabbath, they played hardrock!

On this album we can listen to Deep Purple their finest hour on a studio record: a dynamic and creative rhythm-section, a splendid singer with a very distinctive and powerful voice (screaming sounded never so pleasant!), a top-notch keyboardplayer and a super talented guitarist, exciting soli, outstanding interplay, strong and catchy melodies and rhythms. My highlights are the two long compositions "Child in time" and "Flight of the rat", what a dynamic climates and what an excelent soli on organ and guitar!

THIS IS ONE OF THE BEST HEAVY PROGRESSIVE ROCK ALBUMS OF ALL TIMES!!