Only CDs Is Sounding Like These # 23: Deep Purple, The Deep Purple Singles (1978/1993)

A new occasional series - CDs are coming back baby! And I’m here for it. BIGTIME! Also, some albums just REALLY suit the format, right

If this wasn’t the first CD to enter our family home, it was one of the first — second or third, by my pick. The Animals. Santana. Deep Purple. Mum and Dad were slow to move to the CD format, but quick to replace the records they grew up with but never got around to buying again as adults with a record collection. Their CDs were all of the albums the didn’t ever buy, or never replaced, by band they adored. It was cool. Because it very quickly also became my musical education, well, at the least a very big part of it.

I love Deep Purple:

I’ve been lucky in this life to meet Ian Gillian, and interview him live on TV; to also interview Ian Paice.

But when I was a kid, of course I knew Smoke On The Water — and therefore the name Deep Purple. But it wasn’t until mum started playing The Deep Purple Singles that I got some understanding of the different lineups, the different phases, and indeed the music. All I knew as a kid was Smoke On The Water, and I loved it. But it was a revelation to consider that the same band made One More Rainy Day (of course, technically, it wasn’t the same band, but anyway…

Mum’s favourite song off the album, and one of her favourites ever by anyone is Hush — she reckons she wants it at her funeral. How badass I remember thinking at 13. And still think that now.

The original version of The Singles didn’t have Smoke, it stopped at Fireball, and seemed weird for omitting Machine Head, but it was all new to me on first listen, so I just loved songs like Demon’s Eye and Speed King, and of course Black Night. I quickly became obsessed with Deep Purple, buying up most of the catalogue on cassette tape and even getting a Gillan album, and the Richie Blackmore Rock Profiles compilation. I checked out Rainbow, and all manner of associated bands and side projects and reunion-related attempts. They became my band for a while, on the back of this compilation.

And yeah, I had this on cassette tape too — first I dubbed mum and dad’s CD, then decided I needed the cover too.

But I never owned it on CD — I guess because I had all the other albums (at one point everything). And I had a few on vinyl too. No need. But earlier in the year I was staying at my brother’ s place, and saw he had the updated version (with Smoke and Space Truckin’). I put it on. And thought about how this was such a “family CD”, along with one or two others — we all dug it together, and alone (Tony Bennett, The Doors, Bob Seger, Miles Davis, Fleetwood Mac, a funny list I suppose…)

That confirmed for me that I would need a copy. And I’ve loved revisiting it, as — currently — the only Deep Purple CD I own. Those early songs from the late 60s are almost the work of a beat-combo. Almost. And the 1970/71 material is such classic proto-Metal, all speed-combo energy. A masterful band, that had virtually nothing to say in its songs at all. But hey, that never stopped Iron Maiden, nor Motörhead…