Chasing Shadows 5

A great track from their mid- 1969 third album. While it still has one foot in the pop/psychedelia of their early style, it foreshadowed their hard rock that was soon to come. A somewhat eerie track, sort of a hallucinogenic nightmare, a mix of hard psychedelic rock and proto-metal, with some superb African style drumming from Ian Paice. At this time, some new loud hard rock/ early metal acts like Led Zeppelin and Grand Funk Railroad were coming out and becoming very successful, and Blackmore, who was becoming more and more of a dominant force in the band was starting to steer them in that direction. At this point, Deep Purple were probably at the lowest point of their career in terms of sales, excepting some of their albums of the 90's and beyond. Ironically, this album was the best of the three early ones from a musical standpoint though.