Ελληνικά
Last Updated on 01:43 PM by Nikos Nakos
Genre: Hard Rock/Heavy Metal
Country: U.K.
Label: earMUSIC/Edel AG
Year: 2024
The return of Deep Purple is a huge surprise, full of charm and energy, like an old friend that reminds you why you loved this music, without falling into the trap of nostalgia. He does it where it counts, in the present, where everything seems so overcomplicated and complex.
“=1” is an authentic Purple record full of references to the past but with an irresistible freshness that wins you over from the first listen and energy that much younger bands would envy. In the 52 minutes of the 23rd album by the evergreen Ian Gillan and company, we are treated to a ride that starts from the band’s rich heritage in the 70s and stops outside a pub in 2024 to tell us its stories.
We enjoy pure, uncontrolled hard rock energy in “Lazy sod” – “Sharp Shooter”, which without exaggeration could stand up to their greatest tracks from their golden decade. It seems like 1984 and Perfect Strangers again, when we hear the guitar hugging the keys so harmoniously again on “Portable Door”, in a pattern that only Deep Purple knows how to compose so compellingly. We feast on the rich compositions of “Pictures of You” and “Bleeding Obvious” that reveal the veterans’ unquenchable thirst to play more epically. We smile when they rock out with almost funky rhythms on “Old-Fangled Thing” and we feel melancholic when they release incalculable amounts of energy on “Now you’re Talkin”, where younger people are left out of breath and inspiration on the third album.
New guitarist Simon McBride wins the bet with ease and flexibility, sounding familiar and at the same time fresher than freshly fried fish and chips, hungry and energetic in every guitar phrase. Freaky where it needs to be to drag the rest, melodic to reward the musical wisdom of Gillan, Paice and Glover and extremely playful to build Purple’s trademark sound with Airey. McBride proved to be a multi-tool in the hands of the multi-talented Bob Ezrin, who pushed the band to write a complex patchwork of references to the past with clear stride in the present. Enjoy the warm sound this legendary producer makes, and if you haven’t missed that vibrancy in the notes, then you deserve dozens of plastic productions that make everything sound the same.
The time has come to talk about the titan Ian Gillan and the reservoir of words is running alarmingly dry at the most crucial moment. This legendary voice is not trying to fool you, nor mislead you, because it has aged for good. He cannot conceive of catching moments of the glorious past and neither does he want to. What it can do, however, is tell you a story with excess expressiveness and charm. Even today, he can dress up a song in theatrical costume, just to get drunk on cheap beer. Ian has lived it all and is with us, to sing it without being pretentious, but with the confidence that only six decades in the music business can give you. He’s seen so many pass and fade away and he’s still here at 78 to continue making his own history in Rock n Roll.
Deep Purple’s new album doesn’t feel like a goodbye, and that’s a giant feat. They are a band reborn, enthusiastic and determined to write one of their best records. They succeeded, with a 10 out of 10 album.
