ABANDON

I remember buying this album and rushing home to hear it. After the great "Purpendicular" I thought they were now on a roll.

The opening song "Any Fule Kno That" was actually used for their Greatest Hits compilation, not the best song on the album but still a good opener "Bludsucker" is revamped for this album, I´m not sure why, maybe to let us know Ian Gillan can still hit those high notes? There are some great compositions like"69" and "Seventh Heaven" and my personal favourite "Fingers to the bone", a nice laid back track which sounds like it could be off the album "Purpendicular"

This isn´t one of their best albums, but there are still some great songs on this release, actually the more you listen to it the more it grows on you. At first I gave this album a 2 star rating, but after digging it out again I have decided it is definitely worth 4 stars

Since 1969, we were not really used that the Purple delivered a lot of prog moments in a row. In "Abandon", there are eleven of them. Each break between the numbers. Between them, awful heavy metal songs (not even hard rock) for the huge majority of the tracks.

Some of them sound like very poor Black Sabbath (probably the line-up with Gillan in the "Born Again" album). "Seventh Heaven" is a good example to illustrate this. Gillan seems bored to death on this effort (listen to "Watching The Sky"). "Almost Human" is almost good. Same for "Don't Make Me Happy" which is a bluesy rock song with a great guitar play from Morse.

"Fingers To The Bone" is an insipid rock ballad. "Jack Ruby", "She Was" and "Evil Louie" are probably the worse tracks on the album, although they could probably compete for the all time lows from the Purple (all Marks).

The Purple even released a remake of "Bloodsucker", renamed "Bludsucker". It was the only weak track on "In Rock", being one of the heavier. On "Abandon" it sounds almost fresh and light !

The sole real good number (yes, there is one) is "69" : back to the typical hard-rock song with great rythm and a very good Gillan on the vocals. It is, by far, the worst Deep Purple album with Gillan on the vocals. This "work" is only equalled by the infamous "Slaves & Masters".

Same crap, same rating : one star.

P.S. : What annoys me a lot with this effort, is that it will the last studio one from Jon Lord with the Purple. He was a founding memebr and never left the band while active as such. He will retire from the Purple in 2002.

Jon, you have been wonderful. During so many years you have filled my musical dreams. I was lucky to see you three times on stage. I will (can) NEVER forget you. Thanks for all these fabulous keys moments.

i never care much for deep purple after blackmore left [or get fired !] .so a couple of weeks i listen to "Purpendicular'' and just blow me away . so i get this album last monday and ....how can i describe this .it was a bad experience really depressive.with Purpendicular'' they were at the top of the mountian .with ''Abandon'' they go at the botton of the ocean .the only song that i like is ''Bludsucker''[but that one is from ''in rock ''album].a poor album IMO.

Don't make me happy more often please

The mark 7 line up was rapidly becoming the most stable, and undoubtedly the happiest, of all the versions of Deep Purple. In 1997, they returned to the studio in Florida to record this the their second album. Once again, the song-writing credits are democratically distributed, all the songs being written by "Deep Purple" with the exception of the closing reworking of "Bloodsucker" (subtly renamed "Bludsucker") which is credited all five members of the mark 2 band. The album is self produced by "Deep Purple", although interestingly Roger Glover receives his own additional name check for these duties.

The opening "Any fule know that" is a rather ordinary funky number with the Aerosmith style semi-rapped vocals which have become a feature of at least one track on recent albums. The song is certainly no match for some of the wonderful introductory songs which have adorned previous albums.

"Don't make me happy" is actually the first track here to do just that. The song is a bluesy number whose lighter backing is exploited by Ian Gillan. The louder choruses are followed by some fine organ backed lead guitar.

"Seventh heaven" and the following "Watching the sky" see the band putting slightly more effort into the arrangements, but overall the songs feel underdeveloped in terms of both song writing and performance. While it might be wishful thinking to look for another "Child in time", there is nothing here to match even the likes of "Sometimes I feel like screaming" from the previous album. "Fingers to the bone" probably comes closes to the latter song, being a surprisingly reflective, mainly acoustic number.

There is some frankly poor material here, "She was" being an uncharacteristically messy and unfocused number, and "Whatsername" being unworthy of any Deep Purple album. Thankfully, such dips are still rare and while the album as a whole is far from a classic, it is an adequate Deep Purple release.

Although Steve Morse adds regular guitar interludes throughout the album, these are less obvious than on the previous "Purpendicular", where the band appeared to have a point to prove. Likewise, it seems that an extra effort was made on "Purpendicular" to come up with some really strong material, "Abandon" having a more run of the mill feel overall.

The main significance of this album in terms of the band's history is that it marks the swansong of founding member Jon Lord.

I am surprised to see that Abandon is the least appreciated or maybe it's everyone's least favourite Deep Purple album (that would be Slaves and Masters for me), i find nothing wrong whatsoever with it, honestly. I don't feel the absence of Blackmore at all, they made a great choice in having Steve Morse as their guitarist, and i simply love Morse's guitar work on Abandon.

Well, I listened to the album today and enjoyed every song immensely; the album is made in the manner of their previous one, Purpendicular. I think all members had a lot of fun creating this album, they get along so well musically that is, they complete each other, just listen carefully to Lord and Morse on this album, i feel like their instruments are mingling. I love Paice's drumming that goes nicely with Glover's bass. the rhythm section is great. Then Lord's organ is amazing, both complex and catchy. And last but not least, Gillan provides a very good, soulful vocal performance. I realise i am very subjective, but this is how I see this album.

The highlights for me are the first six songs plus Evil Louie, but I never skip any songs when listening to this album, no fillers in my point of view. Maybe Bloodsucker redone was not so necessary because the song brings nothing new, but, nonetheless, the song is well performed.

Excuse my excessive subjectivity; I really enjoy this album a lot. Abandon is one of Deep Purple's album that I recommend to all those that know this band and have not still listened to this album, or to anybody that loves hard rock - there might be some enjoyment for them while listening to this DP work.

Deep Purple has been around for decades and through this "Abandon" album they still rock! This album is very good in composition and performance. The key attraction for me is Steve Morse guitar style which sounds different than any other guitar players Deep Purple has ever had. This album provides the music themes where the riffs are provided by guitar power chords instead of typical riffs like Deep Purple early albums. The existence of Steve Morse and the fact that members getting older have made the music of Deep Purple evolved in this kind of music.

The opening track "Any Fule Kno That" is a good song with interesting groove combined with riffs. The music sounds cool with upbeat tempo presented in relatively high energy. Guitar and organ demonstrate good combination throughout the song. The music flows naturally to next track "Almost Human" in relatively the same tempo. The third track "Don't Male Me Happy" is a nice song that reminds me to "When A Blind Man Cries" song. This has a good blues style - so it's mellow.

In "Watching The Sky" there is a good attempt by Ian Gillan who tries to deliver his high register notes but Steve Morse' guitar solo covers the singing at high register notes. "Jack Ruby" is an excellent song with great guitar solo followed with organ solo. Through this song Gillan delivers his high register notes - and he does it really well. The next song "Fingers To The Bone" is also another excellent track. Jon Lord gives his stunning organ solo after Steve Morse' guitar solo.

As far as musical compositions, this album is very good with its song-orientated music, heavily centered around vocal line. The music riffs are different with early music of the band while the guitar solo does not seem to match with original style of Deep Purple. However, it creates another experience that makes this album is so interesting. There is no such thing as bad track in this album. The variation of songs does not differ from one song to another. Surprisingly, it does not jeopardize the whole nuance of the music. Keep on rockin' .!

Peace on earth and mercy mild - GW

Abandon (or A Band On as it can be interpreted as well) is the second album from the ongoing Steve Morse era of Deep Purple. Coming two years after the magnificent Purpendicular, the level of music stays roughly the same.

I'm not one of those Blackmore fanatics and I have always been able to enjoy DP albums without him. In fact I think that Come Taste The Band and Purpendicular are masterpieces. It's not the case with Abandon, although what we have here is an excellent album.

The style of the album is quite similar to Purpendicular, but the emphasis being more on guitar than keyboards, and that makes the music a bit more metallic. The production sounds somehow cold as well. Lord is a bit more invisible than with Purpendicula, but otherwise the band sounds like they're having a ball. Gillan sounds especially good, and his lyrics are great. The songs are all good, altough there are some which I would classify as fillers, Jack Ruby for example.

All in all, one of my favourite Purple albums and also one of their most unique ones. 4 stars.

A quite poor album. Unfortunately "Abandon" explores grounds and carries on along the path Deep Purple had started with their previous release "Purpendicular", however missing the point, presenting here a work most of the time weak, full of poor hard rock cliches. The song writing level is quite often low...however there are some more interesting moments like "Any Fule Kno That", a great track to open an album, "Don't Make Me Happy" is pretty good, too, anyway reminding very much "When A Blind Man Cries", one of their songs from the 70's, "Almost Human" could be called nice, if you like, but not a tune that you'd be listening to over and over again; "Bludsucker", a new version of Deep Purple's classic track from the "In Rock" album is quite interesting as useless (what's the point of inserting this track?).

The main problem of the album, it's that it sounds not very inspired, and there's a very strong feeling of deja-vù, in other words: "already done that". Apart from any other consideration, this album's only importance is due to the fact that it's Jon Lord last record with the band. In terms of progressive rock, on this album there is NOTHING: in the end it's just a quite ugly hard rock album, suggested only to Deep Purple fans.

7.5/10

A sufficient accompaniment to the magnificent Purpendiulcar, Abandon is unfortunately the last album with the late Deep Purple Jon Lord.

But that's nothing that hinders the sound of band, thankfully. As I said in my review of the album prior to entry of Steve Morse brought a freshness to band, a musicality more enjoyable and captivating that I could not find from Here Comes Taste the Band (with exception to the great Masters and Slaves). These marks remain here, and it's no wonder the ability of these gentlemen (Even Morse was not as "new" at the time of this album - he was 44 years old). In particular, I would like to congratulate Ian Gillian for its ability to give strong treble even now passing fifty, as evidenced in the new version of Bloodsucker (and it is amazing that in the original version of the song, the famous Rock In, treble it gives even higher). Of all the musicians I've ever heard, Bobby Kimball of Toto only surpasses him in such capacity at such an advanced age. This song, as well as Seventh Heaven and Watching the Sky, here are my favorite.

4 stars.

OK, I am not following mainstream and giving it 4 stars diverges a lot from progarchives scores. So I must defend in details this rating of mine. Let's see if you readers at least understand my reasons; agreement may not be possible :

1 - I do appreciate changes, as I set clear in another review; and Abandon differs a lot from Purpendicular or any other Deep Purple album.

2 - Those changes led them to release what I consider the heaviest album of them. It was very good to see them challenging themselves is this direction, even if there is more weight and less prog here. It didn't bother me although I understand it may not be welcome here; low ratings reflects that...

3 - There are strong compositions here; at least for my taste. The first half being better than the last one. Songs 1, 3, 4 and '69' really got my admiration. A special comment must be set do "Don't Make Me Happy"; this is a song where Ian's voice really shines in extraordinary way, which leads me to consider him one of the two best voices that sings hard rock. It is like "Fools" from "Fireball" and "Mitzi Dupree" from "House Of Blue Light". These are songs that elevates overall quality of their albums; and I would not recommend another singer to cover them.

As a conclusion this is a three stars album. If you miss Mr. Lord shinning Hammond keys, consider it was exchanged by heaviness supported by bass and guitar. I rouded it up one star because it was a bold effort of the band to change and innovate. I like heavy music, and for those about heavy metal this is a work that deserves the receiving of a good amount of attention...

Released in 1998, "Abandon" is the 2nd DP album to feature Steve Morse's guitar as a suitable replacement for Blackmore. The band's previous album proved the new guitarist would fit in well with the rest of the team. However, this follow up seems to see the band falling a bit into using substandard tracks that end up being a bit forgettable. Yes, there are a couple of really great tracks here, and Gillan seems to be sold on this new line-up at times, but the 2nd half of the album really falls into mediocre songs and his excitement definitely wanes. The predictability factor ends up playing a big part after the first 5 tracks, and then you are stuck with a somewhat weaker version of the usual formula. Yes Morse and Jon Lord are great together and seem to hit it off well with this more accessible blues/rock sound, but then it's like the band decided to play it too safe and ended up passing off songs that just don't seem to carry a lot of weight.

Any Fule Kno That - Going for a hard funky sound who's riff borrows from "Walk This Way". Lord adds to the song with his trademark organ in the inst. break.

Almost Human - Smoothed out hard rock that tends to lose any excitement built up over the first track. Morse's blues style rock is more conventional than Blackmore's but the signature sound is lost and the album is already starting to suffer from it.

Don't Make Me Happy - Morse's influence is really felt in this slow-blues track. A bit of an improvement after the last lackluster track as there is a bit of soul to his guitar style and to Gillan's vocals. It works on this one, but the ending sort of dies.

Seventh Heaven - The riff is a little more complex here, but there is a movement towards the more mediocre sound of the album. Gillan looses interest again, but the instrumental break is great.

Watching the Sky - Heavy riff melds into an uncharacteristic ambient and psychedelic verse which continues to alternate back to heaviness and back again. Probably the most original of the songs on the album with a great guitar solo.

Fingers to the Bone - Back to mediocrity with a weaker track and Gillan's not too excited about this song either from the sounds of it. Nice piano in the middle, but it can't save the track.

Jack Ruby - Has a bit of the retro DP sound, blues with a "bop", but the spirit seems to be missing here. Gillan does try to make it exciting with his high pitched insertions here and there, but otherwise seems a little bored with it.

She Was - Again, nothing to get too excited about.

Whatsername - Same as the last track.

'69 - A pretty good hard rocker with a rousing guitar riff and a faster tempo help to wake things back up again a bit. Gillan comes back to life while Lord and Morse play off of each other quite well. The chorus is a bit unimaginative, but overall, it's a better track.

Evil Louie - And it's back to the mediocre again.

Bludsucker - Gillan tries his hand at an earlier DP track that came from the album "Burn" when Coverdale took his place as vocalist. I think he wanted to prove he could easily hit those high notes and belt them out quite convincingly, which he does. However, it's still only an average song in the first place, and not much else changes here. The organ is nice and serves as a swan song for Jon Lord.

This would end up being Jon Lord's last album with the band. With this album, the overall feel is that, other than the 3 really good tracks "Don't Make Me Happy", "Watching the Sky" and "'69", it just doesn't leave much of an impact, which is really too bad after the exciting "Purpendicular" album which was the debut of Morse with the band. Would there be any hope of DP having another great album now with Lord gone? Only time would tell. In the meantime, you have an okay effort here with Abandon, but again, it's not anything to get overly excited about. Just a few great tracks among a lot of average tracks.