SCANDINAVIAN NIGHTS [AKA: LIVE AND RARE]

IMHO this album is almost as good as famous (and perfect) Made In Japan. It sounds less dense, a little less heavy - there's more space here. Singing is simply great. Comperatively short versions of Into the Fire, Black Night are the highlights. Drums solo based around Rolling Stones "paint it black" theme is good also. Extremely long versions of "Wring that neck" and "Mandrake root" are rather too long, though. In fact the idea is rather simple - they play "wring that neck" with solos - for 10 minutes, and then we have 10 minutes of organ solos, and next 10 minutes of guitar solos - and then "wring that neck" theme as the final. But Lord's and Blackmore's solos do not emerge logically from the composition - it's just random playing: good but not very good. It's rather simple way of improvising - if you compare it for example with King Crimson, or any other real progressive group. So - shorter tracks sound better. Anyway - it's good to have this album. Really good, and different enough from other live albums.