SoundBoard

The tape for this show first surfaced in 2001 and was released as Purple Blitz on the Demon’s Eye label. Subsequently, it appeared as Berlin 1973 from Darker Than Blue.

One fan site describes this as “surprisingly good quality, slightly overloaded and powerful sound.” It is a bit overloaded on the low end but the upper frequencies are clear allowing guitar, keys, and vocals to cut through but the low end lacks some definition. It does seem to improve slightly after the first track and luckily crowd noise isn’t a factor.

Ian gives the usual Montreux story introduction before “Smoke On The Water” and Ritchie noodles around for a bit before starting the song. The quality improves some and by the solo is very clear and better balanced. Blackmore features some awesome guitar work in “Strange Kind Of Woman” which contains very friendly guitar/vocal interplay.

The intro for “Lazy” is pushed to the limit and is almost seven minutes before the vocal even enters. There is a harmonica solo played by Gillan and eventually the song breaks down into Ian Paice’s drum solo… A great night gets even better during the encore section. Blackmore again is burning things up during “Black Night” and they finish off with a fired up version of Little Richard’s “Lucille”. A great performance for the start of the [1973] European Tour but sadly this lineup would split later in the year… Anything from the [Deep Purple] Mark II lineup is worth investigating!