#715 Deep Purple - In Rock

Riffs!

This is stripped down proto-heavy-metal, pretty much what you'd expect if you've heard any Deep Purple songs*. The songs lurch and roll, slow and go, riffs pushing on and on, seemingly content to go on and on forever until wrestled to the ground by their makers. This is music that's playing downhill.

Meanwhile Ian Gilian moans and wails over top in ecstatic pre-cliche. Seriously, this is the blueprint, it cannot be overstated, to a thousand heavy metal albums.

Which leaves it as a first-but-not-necessarily-best entry in rock history; even when the tempo's high the blunt-instrument chug of these songs is more likely going to put you to sleep than slap you awake. This is rock. Hard like a rock, simple like a rock, heavy like a rock, steady like a rock. If you're looking to bob your head endlessly like an Oregon-bound ox, then this will do the job, your head will bob and bob and bob. And hey, that's worth something 3/5

* easy "have I heard any Deep Purple songs?" test. Have you ever played Rock Band? You've heard Highway Star. Have you ever seen a band that learned how to play their instruments exactly a year ago? You've heard Smoke on the Water