1207. Deep Purple / Nobody's Perfect [Live]. 1988. 5/5

In many ways, the release of this new live album by Deep Purple came at the right time. Having brought back their classic line up, toured the world endlessly and brought out two brand new albums, ones that showcased each member of the band perfectly and also showed that they could still write songs and albums that were contemporary of the time yet retained the essence of what made them Deep Purple, all that really remained was to show that they were still doing that on stage as well.
On top of this, the ability to not only play their newer material live was counter argued that they had to show they could still pay the older material with the fire and passion that they always had in the past, and that they still deserved in the next decade.
Recording of the live tracks took place in several locations, including Irvine Meadows California, Phoenix, Oslo and Milan. As it is a collection of live tracks from several shows rather than just one concert, there is a fade in and out between most of the songs on the album, which is something with live albums that can sometimes annoy me greatly. However, it is done so seamlessly here that it doesn’t affect the enjoyment of the album at all. Roger Glover as producer finds a way of putting these fades in without destroying the live appearance which is excellent. The mix between the old, well known songs and the newer material is also well done, so that it doesn’t feel as though there is a proliferation of one over the other when listening to the album for the first time.

The first half of the album concentrates on material from the two albums released in the 80’s, “Perfect Strangers” and “The House of Blue Light”. “Perfect Strangers” and “Knocking at Your Back Door” both come from the aforementioned album, while “Dead or Alive”, “Hard Lovin’ Woman” and “Bad Attitude” are from the album they were touring on at the time. Other songs were played on the tour from that album, including “Call of the Wild” and “The Unwritten Law” but didn’t make the cut here, which seems unusual as “Call of the Wild” was the single released from that album. All the new tracks sound great here, which makes it unfortunate that most rarely saw the light of day live again.
Of the rest, all the great songs from the bands golden era are here - “Highway Star”, “Strange Kind of Woman”, “Child in Time”, “Lazy”, “Space Truckin’”, “Black Night”, “Woman from Tokyo” and “Smoke on the Water” - songs that would be hard to leave out of any Deep Purple set list.
What is also great about this album is that it shows the play off that goes on stage during their gigs, banter between Ian Gillan and bandmates and the crowd as well, Ritchie Blackmore chiming in with doodles and riffs from other songs which Gillan then plays along with. For two guys who had a long running disagreement while in the band together, they still did this kind of stuff really well.
The last song on the album is a reimagining of one of Deep Purple’s earliest hits, “Hush”, this one with Ian Gillan on vocals and a modern sound to it. Personally, I love this version, more than the original. It’s how the song always sounds to my ears now even when I hear the other versions that have been recorded.
The band, as you would expect, sound brilliant as always. Apart from Gillan and Blackmore, Jon Lord’s organ playing is magnificent, and his little solo leading up to “Knocking at Your Back Door” is wonderful. And the rhythm of Roger Glover and Ian Paice as always drives the band from the back seat, rarely afforded a leading position in front of the other three, but just as important in bringing the power to the songs, and in particular to the intro to one of Purple’s best ever songs.

There were several releases of this album with different variations of the songs available on them due to time constraints of the audio device produced, and I have owned all of them over the years. I initially bought the cassette version because it was the only copy available at my local record store when I found it, and so it went into the car and was played a lot at that time. Eventually I bought a CD copy of the album some years later to complement it.
I loved both of the albums the band released in the 1980’s, and therefore loved this album that combined the old and the new together in a terrific format. And given that I never believed I would get a chance to see the band live, this was as good as it got for me. Fortunately, down the road, I got that opportunity.
As live albums go, this gets an A from me. You know my opinion of lie albums, they should ALL be good because they contain the best songs, but as this one does combine the two eras of the Mark II lineup, it is especially good. Sure, you won't get any of the Coverdale/Hughes/Bolin songs here, as is also the case since the 1970’s sadly, but you will get some great songs performed excellently. And that in itself is worth the price of admission.