I have a surplus of options for p-o-t-d on Feb. 16, so I’m going to take this opportunity to preview the concert by classic British rockers Deep Purple (pictured) that goes Thursday at 7:30 p.m. at Brandt Centre (7:30 p.m., tickets $77.95-$97.95).
Over the 40 plus years the band’s been together, there’s been a few personnel changes. But they still perform regularly and deliver a solid show. To give you a taste, here’s video from 2006 that shows the band performing “Smoke on the Water” at the Montreux Jazz Festival.
Montreux was an appropriate place to record the performance, because the song describes an actual event that occurred in 1971 when the band was in Switzerland to record their breakout album Machine Head which was released in 1972. On the night prior to the session starting Frank Zappa & the Mothers of Invention played a show at the Montreux Casino. During the concert, someone shot off a flare gun, which caused a raging fire that destroyed the entire casino complex — including all of Zappa and his band’s equipment.