Deep Purple was essentially a different band by 1975. If you walked into a record store looking for the screaming high notes of Ian Gillan or the neo-classical, grumpy brilliance of Ritchie Blackmore, you were out of luck. What you got instead was Come Taste the Band. It’s the only studio album from the "Mark IV" lineup, and honestly, it’s a miracle it even exists given the state of the band at the time.
Most purists hate it. Or they did, anyway. Time has been surprisingly kind to this funky, drug-fueled, messy masterpiece. When Blackmore left to form Rainbow, he took the medieval darkness with him. He was replaced by Tommy Bolin, a skinny kid from Sioux City who played like he had something to prove and a lot of substances to ingest. The result wasn't the heavy metal thunder of Machine Head. It was something greasier. Something leaner.
The Bolin Factor and the Death of the Stratocaster Sound
You can't talk about Come Taste the Band without talking about Tommy Bolin. The guy was a lightning bolt. David Coverdale actually suggested him after hearing his work on Billy Cobham’s Spectrum. Think about that for a second. A hard rock singer recommending a jazz-fusion guitarist to replace the most iconic silhouette in British rock. It was a massive gamble.
Bolin didn't play like Blackmore. He didn't care about the Bach-inspired scales. He brought an American sensibility—slap echoes, slide guitar, and a heavy dose of funk. Listen to the opening riff of "Comin' Home." It’s aggressive, but it swings. That’s the keyword for this whole era: Swing.
The sessions happened in Munich at Musicland Studios. It should have been a triumph. Instead, it was a bit of a nightmare. Bolin was deep into a heroin addiction that would eventually claim his life just a year later. Glenn Hughes, the "Voice of Rock" and the band's bassist, was also spiraling. It's wild that an album this tight came out of a group of people who were largely falling apart at the seams.
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Why "Gettin' Tighter" Is the Secret Heart of Mark IV
If you want to understand why people still defend this record, just listen to "Gettin' Tighter." It’s a Glenn Hughes showcase. It’s basically a funk song disguised as a rock track. Most Deep Purple fans in '75 weren't ready for that. They wanted "Smoke on the Water" parts two through ten. They got a groove that felt more like Sly and the Family Stone than Led Zeppelin.
But that’s the beauty of it.
- The interplay between Bolin and Jon Lord is surprisingly democratic.
- Lord’s Hammond organ doesn't just provide a bed of sound; it fights for space against Bolin’s fuzzed-out guitar.
- Ian Paice—the only member to stay through every single version of the band—proves here why he’s one of the best. He adapts. He finds the pocket.
"You Keep on Moving" is the other pillar. It’s a haunting, bass-heavy track that Coverdale and Hughes wrote back in the Burn days, but Blackmore reportedly hated it. Probably because it was too "soulful." On Come Taste the Band, it serves as the perfect closer. The vocal harmonies between Coverdale and Hughes are arguably the best they ever recorded. It’s moody, it’s dark, and it’s deeply human.
The Disaster of the 1975-76 Tour
The album was great. The live shows? That’s a different story.
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You’ve probably seen the footage or heard the bootlegs from the Indonesian or Japanese legs of the tour. Bolin’s arm was often messed up from bad injections, meaning he couldn't play his parts properly. Jon Lord had to cover the guitar lines on his organ. It was a mess. Fans in Jakarta were rioting. Bodyguards were dying in elevators. It was the kind of chaotic rock-and-roll circus that defines the mid-seventies, but it effectively killed the band.
By the time they reached the UK in March 1976, the writing was on the wall. Coverdale was done. Lord and Paice were tired of the drug drama. They played their final show at the Liverpool Empire, and that was it. Deep Purple was dead for eight years until the classic Mark II lineup reunited.
Re-evaluating the Legacy
Is it a "real" Deep Purple album? Honestly, who cares? Labels are boring.
If you approach Come Taste the Band as a standalone hard rock record from 1975, it’s easily in the top ten of that year. It’s more interesting than most of what their peers were doing. It’s "Drug-Rock" at its most polished. The production by Kevin Shirley on the 35th-anniversary remix actually brought out a lot of the grit that was buried in the original vinyl pressings. If you’ve only heard the muddy 70s version, go find the remix. It’s a revelation.
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"Dealer" is another track that hits differently now. Knowing what was happening to Bolin and Hughes, lyrics about the "man in the back" feel less like rock clichés and more like a cry for help. It’s heavy, but not in the way In Rock was heavy. It’s heavy because it’s weary.
What Most People Get Wrong
People think this album failed because it wasn't good. That's a lie. It failed because it wasn't what the brand "Deep Purple" stood for at the time. It was a stylistic pivot that was too sharp for the 1975 audience. Today, we don't have those tribal hang-ups. We can appreciate Bolin for the genius he was. He wasn't a Blackmore clone; he was a pioneer of fusion-rock who just happened to be in the biggest band in the world for fifteen months.
The musicianship is objectively insane. Coverdale’s voice was at its peak—raspy, powerful, and not yet the "hair metal" version of himself he’d become in the 80s. Hughes was a monster on the Rickenbacker. Lord was experimenting with synthesizers in a way that bridged the gap between prog and pop.
Actionable Next Steps for Fans
If you're ready to actually give this record a fair shake, don't just put it on as background music. Do this:
- Listen to the Kevin Shirley Remix: Specifically, the 2010 version. It separates the instruments and gives Tommy Bolin’s guitar the space it deserves. The original mix is a bit thin; the remix hits like a sledgehammer.
- Watch the Documentary "Phoenix Rising": It covers this specific era in painful detail. It includes interviews with Lord and Hughes about the internal collapse of the band during the world tour. It provides the context needed to understand why the songs sound so desperate.
- Spin "Lady Luck": This is the ultimate "what if" track. It was written by Bolin and Jeff Cook before Tommy joined Purple. It’s catchy as hell and shows the commercial direction the band could have gone if they hadn't imploded.
- Compare it to "Teaser": Tommy Bolin released his solo album, Teaser, around the same time. Listen to them back-to-back. You’ll see exactly how much of his DNA he injected into Deep Purple.
The story of the Mark IV lineup is a tragedy, but the music they left behind is anything but. Come Taste the Band is a testament to what happens when incredibly talented people collide, explode, and leave a trail of fire behind them. It’s funky, it’s loud, and it’s finally getting the respect it deserves from the rock community. Stop comparing it to Made in Japan and start listening to it for what it is: a masterclass in 70s groove-rock.