A few months after the groundbreaking remake of ‘You Keep Me Hanging On’, the English answer to Vanilla Fudge was this early version of Deep Purple, featuring vocalist Rod Evans and bassist Nick Simper, as well as core members Richie Blackmore, John Lord and Ian Pace. This, their second album, followed ‘Hush’, a dynamic arrangement of Joe South's melody, far from the flavour of one of his own hits, ‘Walk a Mile in My Shoes’. Four months later, this album's cover version of Neil Diamond's gem ‘Kentucky Woman’, which entered the Top 25 in 1967, hit the Top 40 for Deep Purple. Just like Vanilla Fudge, the band's own original songs were creative, thought-provoking, but not as interesting as their cover versions. Vanilla Fudge did ‘Eleanor Rigby’ and Deep Purple responded with ‘We Can Work It Out’ - it comes out of nowhere after the progressive rock jam ‘Exposition’, with Richie Blackmore's lead guitar parts wedged between Rod Evans' smooth and clear vocals. While Vanilla Fudge were gradually leaning towards psychedelia, Deep Purple are the complete opposite. The guys claim that they were inspired by the bard at King Arthur's court in Camelot, Taliesin. John Vernon Lord, under the artistic direction of Les Weisbrich, painted a wonderful wonderland on the album cover, which is equal to the madness of Hieronymus Bosch's cover used for the third album - Joe Viglione (allmusic.com)
