How would you rank all DP line-ups 1968-2011?

  • Hi GHCP,

    There's a thread on "favourite/best Mk." & there may be similar discussions here so please forgive me if such a forum topic has already appeared in these pages!

    Here's a little something I'm curious about: top to bottom, which DP line-up do you like/love/worship the most?

    Obviously, being "objective" is impossible but I guess it would make things more complete & sincere if, when possible, both studio & live works were taken into consideration.

    The way I see things is: only personal taste should count, not historical influence, musical proficiency, sales, professional journalists or online reviewers.

    Hopefully this will be entertaining & thought-provoking...I greatly appreciate the "favourite Mk" thread, yet this site's readers - nevermind its contributors! - probably have a natural Mk. III/IV bias...what about the other line-ups, e.g. are you more "Book of the Bananas" or "Perfect Slaves"?

    I've included ten line-ups: I & III-VIII are the usual ones (let's not forget the Satriani period!) plus - this may seem a little unorhodox - , as others already have, I've split Mk.II into three groups: II a (Concerto-WDWTWA), II b (PS/THOBL) & III c (TBRO). The players are the same, but the albums certainly aren't & the performances vary in many ways.

    Laughably long introduction given the modest size of the list below, sorry! So, though this might seem trivial by those who aren't 1968-2011 DP heads, or impossible for diehard "DPCP" freaks, here's my ultra-subjective hierarchy. What's yours?

    Position / Mk.

    *1* = III
    #2 = II a
    #3 = IV
    #4 = VIII
    #5 = I
    #6 = VII
    #7 = II b
    #8 = V
    #9 = VI
    10 = II c

    Peace

    *

    A

  • Shirean, David,

    Thanks for your quick replies &, more generally, your great great work throughout the years!

    I guess what I had in my mind was along the lines of "what does a McCartney fan think of All Things Must Pass?" or "are Stevie freaks interested in Syreeta's post-Wonder output?" or, slightly closer to home, "does a Coverdale/Page-listening Led Zeppelin head have a favourite Whitesnake album?", etc.

    So it's precisely a brief Glenn Hughes fan perspective on the DP tree I was curious about.

    Curiosity kills! :)

    Cheers,

    *

    A

  • funny.. we do exactly the same on my forum now... :D so here's mine :

    1. Mk III
    2. Mk IIa
    3. Mk IV
    4. Mk VII
    5. Mk V
    6. Mk VIII
    7. Mk IIc
    8. Mk VI
    9. Mk IIb
    10. Mk I

  • 1. Mk III
    2. Mk IV
    3. MK II (a, b & c - this is the same band)
    4. Satriani era
    5. Mk 1
    6. Morse era (with Lord)
    7. Morse & Airey era
    8. Turner era (I love 'Slaves And Masters', but it isn't DP)

    :ghcp:

  • Thanks everyone! Stormy, I've had a good but not (yet) thorough look at your forum; great work! I had already visited in the past but I've got some catching up to do! Not much love for Mk I, I guess, les goûts & les couleurs... ;) Joyeux Noël! * A

  • Thanks everyone! Stormy, I've had a good but not (yet) thorough look at your forum; great work! I had already visited in the past but I've got some catching up to do! Not much love for Mk I, I guess, les goûts & les couleurs... ;) Joyeux Noël! * A



    tout à fait ;) thanks for your advice about my forum.. you're welcome mon ami... :)

    Joyeux Noel... :thumbup:

  • Im pretty much in agreement with Wolfysmith. obviously a big Glenn fan, and DC\Whitesnake, but i think mk 2 edges it. I think just not quite enough consistently good material on the mk 3 albums, although Burn is my favourite DP song [followed by Child in Time]. Id have mk2 placed above mark1 though.

  • Dp's "Made in Japan" had a tremendous effect on me. I think it was the best live recording of it's era. Still sounds fresh out of the can.

    Having said that, being a Trapeze fan in that same time frame, Glenns' vocals and bass playing have always been top notch to me. So when the news appeared of MKIII being formed, i couldn't have been happier.

    With MKIII the overall vibe became multi-dimension as evidenced by each players' contribution to the new material.
    My vote - MKIII

  • Mk 2 is the classic line-up, with best DP studio album ever: Machine Head.
    Mk 3 is second best with the second best DP album ever: Burn
    Mk4 is third with te 3rd best studioalbum ever: Come Taste The Band.

    The present line-up (what is it Mk 20 ;) ???????) is a very good live line up. Don Airey is for me THE musician in the band nowadays. But if the will ever make a studio album of the quality of the above mentioned: I doubt it. But as long we got a great live band, it ROCKS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

    | Burn | Stormbringer | Come Taste The Band

  • MK 2 to me is the best :bow: Even though I am a huge Glenn fan, I also

    love Gillan & was into that version of Purple first.

    MK 3 is second because Blackmore, Coverale & Glenn are together,

    real magic! :claphands

    MK 4 is third for me because I really liked the dirty rock guitar style of

    Bolin! :bow: Wish MK 4 could've made a couple more studio albums! :D

    SCOTT

  • Interesting topic.

    MkI was a good and very much underrated band. I learned more about this when listening closer to the band's stuff and when I talked to Nicky Simper in Vienna a couple of times. The approach was a different one anyway. MkI DP was very much 60's sound, as you can easily notice when you listen to it. It cannot be compared with the start of the 70's and its beginning hard rock productions like "In Rock", of course.

    To me, as to probably the majority of people in the world, Deep Purple is naturally MkII. This was the classic DP and the ones who made the name as what it is. "In Rock" is probably THE DP studio album for me. A milestone to this day, I think. "Made In Japan" is to me the greatest live album ever. I can listen to MIJ countless times (and certainly have already done so) without ever getting bored of it. It also helps you to really find out what Deep Purple is (and has always been) all about: The interplay of Jon & Ritchie and typical voice of Ian on that tunes of that time.
    MkIII was a fresh and exciting experiment to me. They couldn't get Paul Rodgers, but David was never "second-best" to me. He didn't even try to fit into Gillan's shoes, he rather made his own footsteps. The deep, warm and soulful, bluesy voice of this "early" David is still outstanding to listen to. Listen to "Sail Away", "Soldier of Fortune" and "Mistreated" and you get chills.

    It seems they really tried to put something extra to it and well, certainly tried to experiment a bit with different settings and elements, to give the music more color. To get Glenn was one of these "measures" for sure. Wether the "experiment" worked or not is in the eye of the beholder and depends on who you ask probably ;)

    However, I like "Burn" a lot and it was different than MkII (and I don't mean better or worse, just different), it was somehow fresh and the approach of having basically 2 lead singers brought some new element to it. If the successor, "Stormbringer", would not have been so funky and souly, the success of MkIII as a whole, could have been tremendously bigger, in my humble opinion.

    MkIV was even more interesting and to me CTTB is definitely a GOOD album, but certainly not what I would call "my favourite Purple incarnation". I always thought CTTB was much better as it was received back in the day.

    Strangely, the re-united MkII didn't do much to me. There was a lack of power and inspiration in that one. It seemed like as if it happened only for the money. I found the music of Rainbow and to what Blackmore had developed the band, much more appealing and there were a lot who thought that he would have rather continued with his own band instead of this MkII reunification. But well.

    Even quite a few people will disagree to this, but I quite liked the MkV incarnation. Maybe because it somehow sounded as if they continued where they stopped with Rainbow and yes, it sounded more like Rainbow as DP but that doesn't mean it was a bad album. It has amazing songs on it and if more people would stop their pigeonholing approach to everything and everyone, they would clearly see this.

    For the rest of the band versions: Steve Morse is a great musician and a funny and kind bloke and the musical talents of Don are unquestionable too, but to me these incarnations of recent Purple are more like a bunch of great musicians "playing Deep Purple songs". It is no spark in there anymore. The key musicians of Purple have left anyway. Lord & Blackmore. They just try to maintain. That's all they do and as long as the Dollar comes in, they will continue to do so, I'm afraid ...

    Cowards die many times, the valiant never taste the death but once - Caesar

  • :cool: alway an interesting topic to think about, and many people still do.
    Well, people who aren't real purplefans sometime wonder about us don't loosing our minds about that difficult bandhistory. Sometimes with a blink of the eye and sometimes shaking head.
    If someone expects from a rockband always having the same singer and guitarist he'd better watch out for some Stones our Queen(?), DP fans can be shure certainly Ian Paice is the only drummer. For gods sake!

    And now i'm having a lil problem with the actually lineup, although they are an amazing rockband, but without Blackmore AND Lord the DP-spirit is hard to achieve.
    Don Airey and Steve Morse having a bonehard job, many respect to them!

    About mk2 reunionlineup i'd say "Perfect Strangers" and "Wasted Sunsets" are terrific purplesongs, milestones, the guitarsolo on "Wasted Sunsets" is so f...g beautiful i was hooked on immediatly.
    But "Knocking At Your Backdoor" i didn't like, it was disappointing to me.

    Glenn twittered a link for "What's Goin' On Here" from 2009 with his soloband and i was so touched again.
    I put my vinyl of "Burn" on again (knister,knister), and got so high on this stuff. What an incredible bluesnumber, what a vocalperformance from Glenn/Coverdale.
    Also "Sail Away" same vocalduet, terrific.
    The whole song is a miracle, i never get tired hearing this piece of music.
    Not necessary to say the song "Burn" is one of the best rocksongs ever been written.
    "Stormbringer" is terrific too, only one more headbanger song on it would have made it perfectly, ok.

    And mk4 was wonderful too, its a pity they only made one record!
    CTTB is one of the best DP albums for me too.
    So mk3 rules! :thumbup:

    greets
    Sigurd
    :bouncer:

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