21/08/2025
On this day in 1971, the Deep Purple LP “Fireball” debuted on the US Billboard 200 Albums Chart at #184 (August 21)
“Fireball” is one of Ian Gillan's favourites.
He said in a 1974 interview: "The reason I liked that so much was because I thought, from a writing point of view, it was really the beginning of tremendous possibilities of expression.
And some of the tracks on that album are really, really inventive."
The album also has some high profile fans from outside the band…
On 9 April 2011 episode of That Metal Show, guitar virtuoso Yngwie Malmsteen said that his older sister had given him Fireball when he was eight years old, and "it changed everything" for him.
Similarly, Metallica drummer Lars Ulrich stated that he purchased a copy of Fireball within 12 hours after his father had taken him to a 1973 Deep Purple concert in Copenhagen, and he credits the concert and album for sparking his interest in hard rock music.
On the charts, it went all the way to #1 in the UK, Germany, Sweden, Denmark, Belgium and Austria, #2 in Norway and Finland, #3 in France, Italy and the Netherlands, #5 in Australia, #24 in Canada, and #32 in the US.
The original UK version had "Demon's Eye" as its third track, but did not include "Strange Kind of Woman", which was instead released as a single there.
The US version includes the latter track in place of the former.
The boogie-inspired "Strange Kind of Woman" single reached #8 in the UK and Germany, and #1 in Denmark.
Click on the link below to watch “Strange Kind of Woman”:
https://youtu.be/01-2-7_IRFA
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