Deep Purple, “Smoke On The Water”

I clicked through to some bait on the web promising to tell me the Eight greatest rock albums of all time. No. 1 was Born To Run, Abbey Road was No. something or other. The most interesting choice until the last one was the album by the Clash: Combat Rock, which the inept compiler called the band’s third album. But No. 8, as you might have guessed was Machine Head by Deep Purple, which is not an obvious choice. Except for a mention of riffage, it doesn’t look like we’ve dipped our toes into this at all, here at rock remnants, so it’s about time.

In any case, here is the low-hanging one. It’s one of the rare classic rock songs that still bleeds, at least just a little. Thanks to the riff, sure, but it all hangs together very nicely.

One thought on “Deep Purple, “Smoke On The Water”

  1. I’m sure Machine Head made my Top 50. It’s a pioneering hard rock album with amazingly no bad songs – everything’s at least good with lots of great.

    Particularly surprising in an era when boring noodlers and/or ballads seemed obligatory, even on the best hard rock LPs. Particularly surprising in that Deep Purple doesn’t have another album that even comes close, IMHO.

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