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Machine Head
Deep Purple
Warner Brothers Records, 1972
REVIEW BY: Christopher Thelen
ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 12/29/1997
It's amazing how one can overlook a classic when that classic
becomes one of the most overplayed records of the classic rock
era.
Take Deep Purple's 1972 masterpiece
Machine Head. Every half-ass guitar player starts off
figuring out the opening riff to "Smoke On The Water" (no offense,
Bo and the guys in Bogart), and it's almost a guarantee that you'll
hear it on your local classic rock station at some point today.
But if you take the whopping 37 minutes out of your day that it
will take to listen to
Machine Head, you'll realize what made this record so
special in the beginning.
The classic second lineup of Deep Purple (known as Mk II in the
band's circles), Ian Gillan and crew are as tight a unit as they
could have ever hoped to be. Jon Lord's keyboard work was the
antithesis to the high-tech noodlings of other keyboard
artistes like Rick Wakeman, while Ritchie Blackmore's guitar
work still continues to amaze me, even if he wasn't one of the most
technical guitarists out there. To this day, I hear Blackmore's
riff on "Highway Star," and my jaw hits the floor. Roger Glover's
bass work is no less important than his other bandmates'
contributions, and Ian Paice... well, there's a reason Metallica's
Lars Ulrich idolized this guy.
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