Deep Purple revisited

So, what was it with Deep Purple? They achieved significant success in North America, but not so much in the UK. I am replaying the Peter Mew 2000 remaster and thoroughly enjoying it. Back in the day, though, this band was scorned by many (audiences more than critics, I feel). I remember organizing a great day out with friends: hitch-hike down to Brighton (from Horsham), watch the newly-released Woodstock in the afternoon and then see Deep Purple in the evening (of course missing the 10:39 last train home!). Anyway, some friends (who perhaps felt they were 'cooler') virtually stopped talking to us because of our evidently appalling lack of good taste ("I mean, Deep Purple, never!"). OK John Lord could push it over the top with his classical influences, but the show was amazing, and the record (dated as some prog-style blues-rock can be) is still a great listen. So, question is...why the bad rap for Deep Purple back in the day?

Hi gradier, welcome to the board. I can't honestly say I was aware of this at the time, though I never saw them live. The Mark 2 version achieved a few chart hits such as 'Black Night', 'Speed King', 'Fireball', along with others. This launched them into a much wider audience, with appearances on 'Top of the Pops'. They were always a band who were difficult to pin down in any particular genre. Heavy rock/metal with a touch of prog maybe? There was a lot of 'rock snobbery' around at that time (still a bit now) and it's possible that the Top of the Pops stuff may have played against them in that respect. Me - I always loved them.

Johnny-Too-Good said:

Hi gradier, welcome to the board. I can't honestly say I was aware of this at the time, though I never saw them live. The Mark 2 version achieved a few chart hits such as 'Black Night', 'Speed King', 'Fireball', along with others. This launched them into a much wider audience, with appearances on 'Top of the Pops'. They were always a band who were difficult to pin down in any particular genre. Heavy rock/metal with a touch of prog maybe? There was a lot of 'rock snobbery' around at that time (still a bit now) and it's possible that the Top of the Pops stuff may have played against them in that respect. Me - I always loved them.

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Musical taste is a hard thing to pin down. Deep Purple were popular here in the U.S., wheras the similar Uriah Heep was criminally underrated here (outside of possibly Demons And Wizards).

And the also similar Lucifer's Friend was almost unheard of here in the U.S.

UFO were fairly underrated here as well.

Ar-Pharazon said:

Musical taste is a hard thing to pin down. Deep Purple were popular here in the U.S., wheras the similar Uriah Heep was criminally underrated here (outside of possibly Demons And Wizards).

And the also similar Lucifer's Friend was almost unheard of here in the U.S.

UFO were fairly underrated here as well.

Click to expand...

Yes I'll be with you on this

Interesting. In the mid-70s my mates (and some of us still) were massive Purple fans. I can't say that I ever noticed any significant anti-Purple sentiment here in the UK. Most of us were equally enthusiastic about Zeppelin and Sabbath - and to a lesser degree bands like Heep. Our musical tastes were broad enough to encompass Yes, Genesis, Tull and many other of the bands of the day. We really sniffy about any of them (although perhaps we were and they were the ones that ultimately fell by the wayside because everyone else felt the same?).

Even when Blackmore left we remained interested in what the band could do. Hell, when "Come Taste The Band" was released, Alan Freeman played the entire album one afternoon on the Saturday Rock Show on R1. I've got cuttings from Sounds, Melody Maker and NME from the time and even the latter were not unfairly critical. So I'm a bit curious as to where any anti-Purple snobbery came from.