In their "Official Deep Purple (Overseas) Live Series" (which is to comprehend 10 albums of historical milestones and rarities of the band (including bonus material and tons of rare pictures) (sic), were are hereby treated to a re-issue of the Deep Purple's concert at Stockholm's Konserthuset, on November 12th, 1970. Recorded back then for airing over the Swedish radio, the material was bootlegged in that mono version several times (on double LP) before an official release happened in 1988 under the title Scandinavian Nights. By sheer luck, the original 4-track master tapes from that evening were retrieved, and the sound turned out to be good enough to reissue the entire show (in its original running order) in a fully remixed version (taking advantage of the latest digital equipment to retrieve the best possible sound) on Purple Records in early 2005.
If you haven't got any of the concert's earlier albums, but you're into Deep Purple, and into live albums, then by all means you should get yourself a copy of this live album! Why? Simply because DP were at the top of their game at that time! They'd just released the In Rock album (which was the band's statement of what they were really about, following the recruitment of Gillan and Glover for the creation of the band's “Mark II” line-up, and the live recorded Concerto For Group And Orchestra album) and the guys were feeding off each other on stage something aweful. I mean that in a positive way, right! Obviously, none of the tensions that would later come between the members came in pay at that moment, and each member truly had fun on stage, with great interplay between the guitarist and both the singer and keyboardist. On top, the drummer was left space to do his own thing. In intensity, this concert by far outmatches the Live In Japan album, which would be released a couple of years years later. But...if indeed you've already required the 2005 album for your collection, what could possibly induce you into buying this new version? Let's look at the pro's and cons!
Cons: well...you've actually already gót a copy of the concert, right?
Pros: this new version of the album is not limited to the Stockholm show alone! Say again? Well yeah...you see, there's bonus tracks, filling up the two CD's to the gills! You see, the Stockholm versions of “Speed King” (12:30 in length – studio version on In Rock), “Into The Fire” (5:00 – also off In Rock), “Child In Time” (19:00 – again off In Rock), “Wring That Neck” (32:04 – original on the band's 2nd album The Book Of Taliesyn) and “Paint It Black” (10:44; and yes, a “cover” of the infamous Rolling Stones song) make up the material of disc one, for a total of 79:11. Disc two then, contains Stockholm's “Mandrake Root” (30:37 – studio version on DP's debut album Shades Of Deep Purple) and concert closer “Black Night” (7:20 – again off In Rock, and that album's single), plus shorter versions of “Wring That Neck” (11:02) and “Mandrake Root” (14:46) from the Paris show on that same 1970 tour (audio digitally remastered, you know)...to which a 1971 interview with Jon Lord (including a passage with Gillan, 10:46 in length) was added for a CD length of 74:33. But that ain't all, see! Because there's a bonus DVD entitled Doing their Thing – Live at Granada TV 1970, featuring the trimmed-down versions of the songs “Speed King” (3:00), “Child In Time” (9:36), “Wring That Neck” (4:61), and “Mandrake Root” (6:10). The moderate length of the songs is either attributable to the show's requirements or, possibly, because the show was recorded at the beginning of the band's live promotion of the album, and the guys had not had the chance to do any improv jam sessions yet.
Well...there you have it...now it's up to you to decide whether you wanna buy this album or not! Oh...although you'll not hear me say anything bad about the band's material, or even the sound quality of the material, I'll utter this one little bit of negative comment, dealing with the digipak package, which seems to me like made for inflicting damage to the discs by sheer clumsiness of its owner. Seems unfair to rate this, somehow...because DP is music I grew up with...but it's new policy at ConcreteWeb to rate each and every review, so...