Blurb:

As Simon Poole importantly notes in Chapter 3, it is Ian Paice’s ‘energising’– not to say ferocious – 242 beats per minute, constant single stroke, double kick sixteenth-note drum intro to Deep Purple’s ‘Fireball’ (1971), that arguably defines the double-kick style that later metal drummers would replicate and advance, notably Simon Phillips’ work on Judas Priest’s Sin after Sin (1977), especially the tracks ‘Call for The Priest’ and ‘Dissident Aggressor,’ and Phil Taylor’s 238bpm power-drumming on Motörhead’s anthemic ‘Overkill’ (1979) – and on into the world of the blast beat in thrash, death metal and grindcore. Yet Paice employed his double-kick pattern only once in the studio and then afterwards in only a few early ‘70s ‘live’ performances as an encore track. Happy with the single-bass drum kit he had bought as a teenager, for Paice it was the intros, fills and trills that highlighted his virtuosity, but never at the expense of the group sound, underlining the maxim that it is not ‘where you put the note, it’s where you don’t put the note.’ Poole argues that it is this disciplined ‘non-attention seeking’ approach by Paice to his work, and drumming for Deep Purple in particular, that goes some way to explaining why his position in the canon of heavy metal drumming is often marginalised, despite the fact that Paice, along with Bill Ward of Black Sabbath and John Bonham of Led Zeppelin, are equally credited with founding the rhythmic rules of the genre. Yet Bonham and Ward have comparatively elevated status, due in part to the mythologising of Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath as hard rock and metal pioneers. In addition to this, many of the drummers ranked above Paice, such as Bonham, Ginger Baker, Keith Moon and Carmine Appice, are seen to exhibit a combination of ‘primal, powerful, virtuosic and exhibitionist,’ traits, especially through their on-stage visual performance of virtuosity and/or exhibitionism.
In the main part of his chapter Poole seeks to redress this imbalance by framing Paice’s style as drawn between the ‘sparing’ and the ‘flamboyant’ and he does so by examining his intros on nine example tracks from across the Mk2 album output, including the simplicity of ‘Woman from Tokyo’ (1973), to the complexity and flamboyance of ‘Pictures of Home’ (1972), to the choice of ‘a space or not’ that creates the dynamic and colour of the contrasting songs, ‘Black Night’ and ‘Living Wreck’(both 1970). To date, Paice is the longest serving founder member of Deep Purple and a drummer who has influenced a whole host of bands, from Iron Maiden to the Red Hot Chilli Peppers to Opeth.
Roger Glover’s bass-playing was central to the rhythmic discipline that defined the Mk2 Purple sound, along with drummer Ian Paice, most noticeably on anthemic tracks like ‘Highway Star’ and ‘Smoke on the Water’. But Glover was also the key band member who held everything together, especially in ‘live’ performances, allowing the virtuosity of the other bands members, including Ian Paice’s fills and trills, along with the duelling Lord and Blackmore and the duelling Blackmore and Gillan (see Chapters 4 and 5). Glover was also a lead riff writer on influential metal tracks, such as ‘Speed King’ and ‘Hard Lovin’ Man,’ on In Rock (1970), and ‘Maybe I’m a Leo’ and the driving ‘Pictures of Home,’ on Machine Head (1972), with his virtuoso bass solo ending the song. Glover also co-wrote some of Purple’s lyrics on their classic 70s albums, such as ‘Space Truckin’, as well as coming up with the title for the iconic, ‘Smoke On The Water’. Beyond Purple, Glover was co-songwriter, lyricist, arranger and producer of Rainbow from 1979-84, and producer and co-producer of albums recorded by the reformed Mk2 Deep Purple from 1984-1994, based on his experiences producing notable hard rock and metal bands, including Judas Priest’s classic, Sin After Sin (1977), Nazareth, Elf, David Coverdale, Status Quo, and the Ian Gillan Band. Glover also supervised the digital remastering and remixes of the classic 70s Deep Purple albums and key tracks, such as the Quad remixes of ‘Maybe I’m A Leo’ and ‘Lazy’ that feature on the special edition 2CD of Machine Head (1997). He also contributed liner notes to the CD reissues, In Rock, Fireball, Machine Head and Who Do We Think We Are, in collaboration with Simon Robinson (see Chapter 12). Glover was also the Mk2 band member who helped to design the covers of key Purple albums, such as Machine Head, and also took responsibility for their naming (Longfellow 2002).
The vocal performances of Ian Gillan, on the track ‘Child In Time’ (1970) and on the ‘live’ album, Made in Japan (1972), as well as the original version of the Andrew Lloyd-Webber musical, Jesus Christ Superstar (1970), articulate a debate about the wide octave range of the singer and his influence on other hard rock and metal lead-singers, such as Rob Halford, Freddie Mercury, Ronnie James Dio, and Bruce Dickinson, to name but a few. It is the development of distortion techniques, especially in the high register that defines hard and heavy rock singing, characterised by Gillan’s high octave screams, and his powerful, often first-take studio performances, especially on the classic In Rock and Machine Head albums, as well as the development of a layered-vocal delivery on later albums, that define the template, range and distinctive timbre of the hard rock and metal singer.