Highway Star
Written on a tour coach in front of a journalist, and the opener of Machine Head.
Deep Purple, from Machine Head (1972)
- Written by
- Ian Gillan, Ritchie Blackmore, Roger Glover, Jon Lord, Ian Paice
- Released
- 1972
- Length
- 6:05
- Album
- Machine Head
It was written on the coach to Portsmouth on 13 September 1971, when a journalist asked how the band wrote songs. Blackmore played the riff, Gillan improvised lyrics, and the band performed it that night. Blackmore's solo is based on a figure from Johnny Burnette and a Bach-like chord progression of D minor, G minor, C and A.
The first released live version came from the German TV programme Beat-Club in September 1971. The best known is on Made in Japan, from Osaka on 16 August 1972. Guitar World readers placed the solo at number 15 of the 100 greatest in 2015. The song opened the band's set at the 2016 Rock Hall ceremony.
Sid Smith of the BBC singled out Gillan's singing on Highway Star in his 2007 review of Machine Head, and AllMusic's Eduardo Rivadavia later compared Burn to it as an opening track. Burn replaced it as the concert opener for about two years.
Covers and versions
- Chickenfoot
- Glenn Hughes, Steve Vai and Chad Smith (2012) on the tribute Re-Machined
- Dream Theater
- Faith No More
- Type O Negative
- Buckcherry (2009) used for NASCAR on TNT
More songs by Deep Purple
Smoke on the Water, Child in Time, Black Night, Hush, Space Truckin', Strange Kind of Woman, Woman from Tokyo, Burn, Perfect Strangers, Knocking at Your Back Door, Speed King
Sources
- Highway Star (song), Wikipedia
- Machine Head (album), Wikipedia
- Deep Purple song statistics, setlist.fm
- Machine Head, BBC Music (2007)
- Burn (Deep Purple album), Wikipedia