10 Best Hard Rock Albums Of The 1970s

Throughout the 70's, most of the records that were selling were borrowing primarily from blues traditions and cranking it up to 10. While Deep Purple started out as a bit of a bluesy act, they never were poised to stay that way for long.

Deep Purple's sound quickly evolved to incorporate elements of classical, Eastern, and jazz styles into the hard rock sphere. After some experimenting, Machine Head arrived and delivered the right amount of musical muscle to cross over. The band's improvisations while recording sparked riffs that were simple yet powerful like "Space Truckin" and every guitar store employee's worst nightmare, "Smoke on the Water."

The perfect combinations in Purple lie in the midrange, starting with Richie Blackmore's guitar, which takes these songs through classical arpeggios and bluesy fire without batting an eye. At the other end, keyboardist Jon Lord plugs his organ into a Marshall to rival Blackmore's attack, making for great moments on songs like "Highway Star." And out front, Ian Gillan is the mad singer whose high notes reach into the stars and absolutely pummel your eardrums.

At only 7 tracks, Deep Purple made every song count on Machine Head and came out of the studio with a hard rock stunner.