In October-November 1971, the group is touring the United States. Gillan falls ill, and Roger Glover singer improvised time some concerts, but the group should pack up and returned to England. Forced rest. And the opportunity to look ahead ...
And already Ritchie Blackmore (guitarist) is considering to christen the new album: MACHINE HEAD. To put what is not known, but there's already the title! We remember that for FIREBALL , drummer Ian Paice had recorded its parts outside the studio, in a corridor, to benefit from better acoustics. The group wants to push the experience further, and they agree to save, not at a professional studio. And outside Great Britain. Why? Blackmore asks tone. " To avoid that taxes fall on us ! There is probably a background of reality, but in fact the real reason lies elsewhere. DEEP PURPLE had already occurred at the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland and had sympathized with Claude Nobs who worked at the local Tourist Office and founder of the festival. But the idea of the group was to record an album in live conditions, on stage, but in a room vacuum, without an audience! However, the hall of the casino in Montreux was the perfect place, and Claude Nobs had convinced the co-organizers of the festival to give him the room for three weeks. For the management, the microphones are connected to a truck parked outside, a little technological marvel, called "The Rolling Stones' mobile truck, built at the request of Mick Jagger in 1968, then used by the Stones Villefranche-sur-Mer, for recording EXILE ON MAIN STREET (and Led Zep, The Faces, The Who ...). To thank Claude Nobs, the group had planned, once the album is completed, to do a real concert, with the public, which would be recorded too, and would be subject to a second drive. MACHINE HEAD was therefore expected to have a disk "studio" and record "live". 
The group arrives in Switzerland 6 December 1971, and attended the evening's final concert of the season at the Montreux Casino, that gives Frank Zappa . During the concert, a spectator pulls a flare toward the roof, covered with strips of bamboo, fire instantaneously. Frank Zappa, calmly announces something like, "uh, I think it is now Cramer, thank you to leave here in peace ... "The room literally ablaze, firefighters will control two days in the fire. Zappa used his Gibson to break a large window, and evacuate the spectators. And dreams of Ritchie Blackmore fly, as the thick black smoke above the icy waters of Lake Geneva ... (it's nice eh? But it's not really me, you will understand later ...). 
The question for the group now is: where to save? They try a fallout shelter (yeah, they are in Switzerland!) But its not worth anything, then settle in a theater, the "Pavilion". Martin Birch the sound engineer, complained of the echo, and the scene is closed by curtains. The group rehearses a new theme, a riff idea of Richie Blackmore. After two trials, the piece is in the box and hear the results coming out in the truck-studio, the group realizes that the police knocking at the doors of the theater (blocked by rodies) alerted by the noise unbearable In the night! The song in question, which has not yet text will become "Smoke on the Water" 
Ian Paice on drums and Jon Lord on keyboards, in the corridors of the hotel. 
Ritchie Blackmore, the man in black in the character of a dog, never satisfied.
A lot just before turn 45, it will be "Never before" considered by the group as a hit irrefutable, their finest creation. Result: a total flop! Suddenly, the B-side goes to the dustbin of history, with "When A Blind Man Cries." But the album himself, sells, much, much, ranks first in the UK charts, and " Smoke on the Water "is the single that DEEP PURPLE waiting for years, the group's favorite song, anthem unbeatable Hard Rock 70's, one hundred thousand times scratched by apprentices guitarists of all stripes, until today yet.
- Quick, you're hungry!
- Yes I'm coming! Here is the menu, choose it as the best, or rather not take it!
"Highway Star" : As usual, an album of DEEP PURPLE begins with a fast song, it is a model of its kind, stamped hard, that opens the concerts at this time. For his solo, Blackmore said he was inspired by JS Bach arpeggios, a gimmick he said in very original, but effective! Rather unusual at the time, the process has been to school for heavy metal guitarists ...
"Maybe I'ma Leo" originally called "One Just Before Midnight." The tempo is slower, but Ian Paice strives to enrich its partition by multiple figures, which sometimes give the impression that the downbeat shifts constantly, leaving a space as if suspended before its breaks. We hear two tracks of keyboards, hammond organ accompaniment, and an electric piano for the chorus. In its structure, this piece is neither more nor less than a blues ...!
"Pictures of home" tumbling to 100 mph on a ternary mode, boosted after an intro on drums. This title evokes the snowy mountains of Switzerland. The machine is run swing, a bridge on bass, hammond skids, and Blackmore splits two flawless chorus.
"Never before" released as a single in March 1972, " When A Blind Man Cries "B side, and although the group considers him a hit in power, the public does not adhere. While this song is in my view to the best of DEEP PURPLE . Intro drums, funky and exposure before starting aggressive. Again, typing Ian Paice hit their peak, combining binary and ternary. Jon Lord played on electric piano, sounds very rock'n'roll at all, airlift, and wham, Blackmore sends its chorus, concise, perfect. You'll understand that I love this track, I am not tired, year after year. If perfection exists, it is in these four minutes of music.
"Smoke on the Water" : arrrfff say ... that was never said! The lyrics evoke the group's adventure in Montreux, describing the burning of the casino, and how the musicians ended up at Grand Hotel. The group will sing to Claude Nobs, as a gag gift, saying that they do not count include in the album. Nobs suggest they think twice ... Beyond his famous intro (guitar riff, then the organ comes in, then the bass, the battery grafting on to As, charley first, and finally snare drum) it must be said and repeated that whole song is awesome and a vein in the R & B quintet mastered. An absolute killing. It seems that we should title of the song to Roger Glover (Smoke on the water = Smoke on the Water, referring to the fire, the song Funky Claude is Claude Nobs). Ian Gillan there is obviously wonders.
"Lazy" : re arrffff ... what about that firebrand timeless jazz-rock boogie that reigns on Olympus of genre, amazing swing, an original structure. After a long intro on the organ, exposed to the theme, three racks of guitar chorus, three organ, verse / chorus, harmonica intervention, before the second chorus guitar (grounds around the theme) and tempo change blues in 12 / 8 on the end. It's huge, grand, Everest is in good time, hitting his head against the walls. It may die after the consciousness of having finally hit rock nirvana! (Only that? Yes yes). Yet Blackmore was not fully satisfied, the chorus is also the assembly of two shots (a man decidedly demanding with himself ... that's what we said coyly when talking about personality changes, another term for the shit disturber!). The theme draws openly "Spettin 'out" by Eric Clapton (John Mayall period).
"Space Truckin '" : re re arrrfff ... the piece of hard-rock par excellence, speed tempo, howling Gillan, mini chorus of drums. A piece without the usual solo. The words are phrases and without logic, about the idea we had of a trip into space in the 50s. "Space truckin '" be quickly adapted to the stage in long (very long ...) musicians then developing improvisations, by abusing their equipment, thus supplanting "Mandrake root" in the role of défouloir song, played at the end of the concert.
"When a Blindman Cree" is not pressing on the 33 final round, Blackmore disliked this song (a shit disturber, I tell you ...). It is a slow-blues of rare purity, poignant, clear, crystalline, chorus Blackmore is crying beauty and simplicity, just built on a pattern and a few notes (a case study, approach after the jazz / blues). The organ plagued the latter part of the song, giving it a more dramatic tone. Gillan is also in sobriety. Faultless. The song returns to the detention of five members of the Grand Hotel in Montreux.
In a cold month, I'm his room
We found a reason for The Things We Have To Do
I'ma blind man, a blind man EMI, now my room
Is Cold When a Blind Man cries, Lord , you know, he feel it from His Soul.
Roger Glover, bassist, and designer bags of the group. Well then, what about MACHINE HEAD if not rehash the superlatives about him. If "Picture-of-home may seem more basic than the other tracks, all songs on this disc are successful. Regrettably "Never before" or "Maybe I'ma Leo" not be played on stage, which seems to relegate to second place, while I say this with full authority that I deploy know when the situation demands: those are two brilliant songs. Soon after, DEEP PURPLE recorded a set for the BBC, a double album released years later, and it is to my knowledge the only resume that almost the entire MACHINE HEAD live. This is the album of the consecration, finally. It contains its share of classics, who once played on stage will take yet another dimension, a fantastic firepower, enabling musicians to display their virtuosity and their freedom of invention. This is the album that made me finally go in the "Rock" led me to the blues made me choose to play the drums. I love the sound of drums in this disc, like other instruments, the mix is perfect. There's this velvety bluezy few tips aggression is strong, sweet and nasty at times, is masterful! I had made, kid, a battery with buckets of paint, a trash can to the bass drum, pan lids as a cymbal, hanging by a thread to a ladder! And strove to imitate the style of Ian Paice on "Space truckin '". I also remember rerecorded "When A Blind Man Cries" with two magneto batteries, superimposing the tracks on my keyboard Bomtempi, a harmonica, flute, and a simulated battery. The tape piled where the tracks for play-back, while another allowed me to add a layer ... Once the song is stacked, the first track was almost inaudible! I'll have you done well to take this musical experimentation and sensory quite fascinating, but lawyers for Ritchie Blackmore ordered me to burn the tape ... unfair competition, it seems. I did not obey, and work has languished in I do not know what cardboard between two Sylvain and Sylvette ... But I digress, if I let myself go, on my vacation j'embraye Pornichet in 1974 ...
group before the truck studio.
In 1997, MACHINE HEAD spring with two CDs. The first, the eight tracks on the album, remixed slightly. Titles are more muted (not melted) and end the coup in lollipop, but I really like! And you can hear on alternative chorus "Smoke on the Water" or "Picture of home." Success is usually the version I listen to. For purists, the second CD offers the original recording, remastered, and two titles in quadraphonic. No bonus track, because the group had just recorded what they needed. No waste. Everything that had been made, has been kept, which was also the case for IN ROCK . With this disc DEEP PURPLE fiber revives the hard rock, left side when FIREBALL . Less metal, more bluezy, a perfect musical coherence, it confirms the orientation of the group to a raw music, borrows less psychedelic and progressive. An album recorded on the spot, the victim - so to speak - the circumstances which gave rise, and 40 years later, dominates my pantheon of pop music.
And you know what? Four months after the release of this album, the band entered the studio again, this time in Rome to record the latest installment of this training ... ... We will return
Well, enough of talking shop, music room . I will spare you "Smoke on the Water" which anyway will be in the curriculum of colleges next year, in English (read the second verse), geography (which countries they border on Lake Geneva?) in art history (from the influence of Deep Purple on the heavy metal), and mathematics (knowing that there are four black to an extent, How many are there in the sixteenth chorus?). A small
"Never before" because I love it, even if the version here (live) is not exactly the same, without a piano, and played a bit faster. Cons by mounting images is awful ...
"When a Blindman Cree" because it is less famous but beautiful. You can cry, nobody looks at you ...
MACHINE HEAD (1971, reissued in 1997)
1. "Highway Star" - 6:39
2. "Maybe I'm a Leo" - 5:25
3. "Pictures of Home" - 5:21
4. "Never Before" - 3: 59
5. "Smoke on the Water" - 6:18
6. "Lazy" - 7:33
7. "Space Truckin '" - 4:52
8. "When a Blind Man Cries" - 3:33
Other articles DEBLOCNOT'concernant this group:
http://ledeblocnot.blogspot.com/2010/09/deep-purple-in-rock-1970-par-luc-b.html
0 comments:
Post a Comment