Title: “Stormbringer”
Format: Album track
Written by: David Coverdale, Ritchie Blackmore
Performed by: Deep Purple
Genre: Heavy Metal
Taken from: Stormbringer
Year: 1974
Acclaim: n/a
I'm not the hugest Purple fan. I like the usual albums, but outside of the classics I'm a little meh about them. This was apparently the album that began to turn them away from the hard rock/heavy metal of albums like
In Rock and
Machine Head and would lead to the departure of a disillusioned Ritchie Blackmore and indeed later David Coverdale too, as one went to form Rainbow and the other Whitesnake.
You can hear sort of funky elements already leaking into the music here from the beginning of the track, and to me it sounds very Zep. Is that wrong? It also features the lyric
”Ride the rainbow” – is this a prophecy being fulfilled?
It's still heavy but nothing like “Speed king” or “Highway star”. Blackmore puts in a fine farewell performance and I guess it's kind of the end of an era. Kind of sounds like a sped-up “Wrathchild” too, though I know that wouldn't be for another six years.
Things I like about this :
1. Still heavy, I'm glad to hear
2. Though apparently it's nothing to do with same, I loved the Michael Moorcock books about Elric of Melnibone, whose magic sword was called, you guessed it, Stormbringer
3. Great solo
Things I don't like about this:
1.The riff sounds very like a Zep song, not sure which one. Chula?
2. A little funky. Man.
Rating: 