earMusic kicked off in the summer a new round of live releases from the vast catalogue of Deep Purple’s professional recordings. It’s not the first time that the label attempts a similar approach as a few years back delivered 6 classic live records from the band (although it was first announced that it would be 10 in total from that bunch). This time around the first offering came with the double CD “Live in Newcastle 2001” and quite literally nobody heard about it. On the other hand with “Live in Rome 2013”, the production department of the label did a fine job thus all the Purple die hard fans expected it quite anxiously.
For starters let’s just say that this is definitely one of the finest Purple performances of the whole “Now What?!” Tour. I have to confess that I prefer it compared to the two official live albums that were cued from that tour (I am speaking, of course, about the Wacken and Tokyo shows). In Rome the band fired in all calibres with Ian Gillan delivering the goods and the sound being crystal clear. In addition, we are treated with a great version of “Fireball”, a song that was only played in the first leg of the European tour while Morse and Airey are really flawless and impressive during their improvisations.
Now, someone could rightfully ask why earMusic didn’t continue with the classic shows and comes up with those recent concerts? We are not marketing executives to know this answer but all in all we are glad to listen Deep Purple on their natural, live turf despite the fact that we still miss the…unpredictability of the Man in Black.
Highlight: Every single time, I see “Into The Fire” on the set list, I am really worried because it’s such a demanding track but Gillan handled it perfectly in Rome.
