The Silent Deep

Deep Purple have never quite been placed in the revered 1960s canon that includes the Who, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, or any of the other British rock bands who continue to reunite in various configurations to tour and even periodically release new albums, but given that the group has always been a riveting and brilliant live act, part prog, part heavy metal, part funky R&B, and imminently theatrical, that second-tier designation seems like both an oversight and a shame. Returning with this set, the band's first since 2005's Rapture of the Deep, and featuring a near-classic lineup of vocalist Ian Gillan, guitarist Steve Morse, bassist Roger Glover, drummer Ian Paice, and keyboardist Don Airey (Jon Lord, whose distorted organ parts were so much a part of the classic Deep Purple sound, left the band in 2002 and died in 2012 of pancreatic cancer), one can only marvel at how timeless it sounds, as if it were actually recorded in the early '70s and not tracked a little more than a decade into the 21st century…

Innovatively fusing traditional ethnic musics with state-of-the-art rhythms, the work of Deep Forest was best typified by their 1993 smash "Sweet Lullaby," which brought together the contemporary sounds of ambient techno with a haunting traditional lullaby from the Solomon Islands…

Innovatively fusing traditional ethnic musics with state-of-the-art rhythms, the work of Deep Forest was best typified by their 1993 "Sweet Lullaby," which brought together the contemporary sounds of ambient techno with a haunting traditional lullaby from the Solomon Islands. The project was primarily the work of the French keyboardists and programmers Eric Mouquet and Michael Sanchez; after the latter returned from Africa with boxes of records he'd picked up across the continent, he and Mouquet began sampling the native sounds for use with their atmospheric dance tracks, and with the aid of producer Dan Lacksman, their eponymous debut LP appeared in 1993. Propelled by the international hit "Sweet Lullaby," Deep Forest was a surprise success; Mouquet and Sanchez soon began work on a follow-up, this time exploring such areas as Mongolia, India, and Hungary, recording several tracks with singer Marta Sebestyen…

Deep Purple have never quite been placed in the revered 1960s canon that includes the Who, Pink Floyd, Led Zeppelin, or any of the other British rock bands who continue to reunite in various configurations to tour and even periodically release new albums, but given that the group has always been a riveting and brilliant live act, part prog, part heavy metal, part funky R&B, and imminently theatrical, that second-tier designation seems like both an oversight and a shame…