Deep Purple - The Very Best Of

State-of-the-art catalogue inside bog-standard reissue

There are more Deep Purple compilations than you can shake a Hammond organ at, but this single-CD career cherry-pick serves a basic purpose for those who want the hits from the 70s and nothing else. Purple fans will be able to predict the tracklisting in their sleep – Hush, Night, King, Child, Smoke, Speed, Highway, Woman, Burn, you know the drill – although the fact that three of the tunes are 90s remasters/remixes may offend the purists. Mind you, The Very Best Of isn’t aimed at the purists, it’s aimed at a) sales reps in Mondeos on the M6 and b) teenage boys who’ve heard Opeth and High On Fire and want to know what all the fuss was about back in ancient times. As such, this album does a simple job efficiently and with no frills. The only sickener is that the sleevenotes are full of punctuation errors and claim that Purple “virtually invented” speed metal with Fireball – a sign that whoever put this together didn’t give a toss about accuracy or, indeed, know much about the band.

EMI | 50999 2 13121 2 0

Reviewed by Joel McIver
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