review by thomas

Black Sabbath is often looked upon as the creators or pioneers of heavy metal, and I don’t argue with that. Bands like Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin, Mountain and Uriah Heep did, however, all contribute with their distinctive style to the genre heavy metal, or hard rock if you prefer that name. So in year zero in the heavy metal world – that is 1970 – Black Sabbath released their self-titled debut, Uriah debuted with “Very ‘Eavy, Very ‘Umble”, Zeppelin came forth with “III”, although “IV” (or “Four Symbols” or “The Runes Album”) from the year after and “II” from the year before are more “hard rock-ish”, and Deep Purple released their first album in this new style, called “In Rock”.

Purple was the wild, hard, noisy and sensitive keyboard playing of Jon Lord, the metallic riffs and heaviness of guitarist Ritchie Blackmore, Roger Glover’s fine bass playing, the excellent drum sound of Ian Paice and the sharp voice of Ian Gillan complete with leanings towards screaming. The voice of the latter could go too far, as could the whole group, as is the case with “Bloodsucker” and “Into the Fire”. “Speed King” has two good intros – first the organ intro and then the heavy riff intro – but the song doesn’t hold for repetitive listening. The other four tracks of the album are real good and especially the power and passion of “Child In Time”, a classic song.

Very good and, for the most of the time, enjoyable hard rock with touches of progressive rock.