March 15 - Space Truckin'

  Some days, traveling to Albuquerque is just not taking you too far enough away. On days like that, it's really nice to have Deep Purple take you all the way out into outer space.  In the early 70s, there was just not any other band quite like Deep Purple. Their Mark II line up was as talented group of musicians as you could find. The rhythm section, with left-handed drummer Ian Paice and bassist and producer Roger Glover laid down a great groove that the rest could play with. Classically trained Jon Lord distorted the living daylight out of his Hammond B-3 organ, playing heavy chords as proficiently as the classically inspired runs, and his style allowed guitarist extraordinaire Ritchie Blackmore to play all over and all around the rest of the band while Ian Gillan stretched his vocal chords higher than any man should.

In August, 1972, touring behind the great album Machine Head, they found themselves in Japan. Hiring in Martin Birch as an engineer, they brought recording equipment to their shows, and the shows were recorded and this helps make it a a stellar live document. According to Jon Lord, there are very few, if any, overdubs on this spectacular live performance of this extremely powerful band. Here is Space Truckin'.