Smoke on the water band. History of Smoke on the Water

Enver fans know the epic associated with the recording of the famous hit deep purple Smoke on the Water. There were copyright issues. They, of course, had to be bought, which was done. Then the arrangement of the classics began. You understand that it is not easy with living geniuses. In the opinion of experts, Enver introduced his own interpretation and his own style, which added new intonations to the composition. Lenya rehearsed the vocal part selflessly. She just grew in her own eyes, for which she has a separate respect. Recording a clip deserves a separate story, but more on that another time. In fact, the question arose, does anyone know what this song is about, and why "Smoke on The Water"?

The song describes real events. In December 1971, the band traveled to the Swiss town of Montreux to record new album in a mobile studio leased from the Rolling Stones and known as the Rolling Stones Mobile. It was decided to record in the entertainment complex of the Montreux casino (in the song - "the gambling house"), in which they had already been to concerts. On the eve of the studio session, on Saturday, December 4th, Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention played a concert at the Casino Theater as part of their European tour. It was last concert in this hall, after which he was supposed to be at the disposal of Deep Purple to record an album. In order to avoid misunderstandings, the group decided not to unload the equipment for the time being, which later turned out to be a happy decision.

About an hour after the start of the concert, during the synth solo on King Kong, sparks appeared from behind the suspended bamboo ceiling and then a fire - apparently, one of the spectators (who could not be found) fired a flare gun at the roof (the line "some stupid with a flare gun"). Zappa calmly said “don't panic, we're on fire” (maybe they didn't notice anything and told them themselves), after which the musicians left the stage. Spectators were evacuated in a fairly organized manner, there were no casualties. The song mentions "funky Claude" who "ran in and out" - this is the director of the Montreux Jazz Festival, Claude Nobs, who helped the audience out of the hall. Among the audience were members of Deep Purple. According to Glover's memoirs, the fire was initially so weak that during the evacuation he managed to re-enter the hall during the evacuation, get closer to the empty stage, examine Zappa's equipment with the band, and be impressed by the two newest synthesizers.

As a result of the fire, the entire multi-storey casino complex burned to the ground, along with concert hall and The Mothers' equipment (which was insured, but concerts in France and Belgium had to be cancelled). From the Europe Hotel where the Deep Purple members were staying, the musicians watched through the restaurant's large window as the casino was engulfed in flames (helped by the wind blowing from the mountains) and saw a curtain of smoke over Lake Geneva.

The group, which had already rented an expensive studio, had to look around the city for new premises. Nobs soon found The Pavilion Theater for them, located in the city center. The equipment was moved there and work began in the middle of the day on an instrumental track with a new riff prepared by Blackmore, still without lyrics, under the working title "Title # 1". Debugging the equipment and developing arrangements took the rest of the day, and the actual dubs began to be recorded already after midnight. The third double was successful, and they stopped on it. As it turns out, all this time service staff tried to keep the police squad behind the locked doors, which was called by the neighboring residents because of the noise. It was thanks to the fact that the police were detained that it was possible to finish recording the track.

Since working only during the daytime did not suit the musicians, they had to look for a new hall. There were many requirements for the premises, and its search took 5-6 days. On one of these days of waiting, Glover woke up in a hotel room, uttering the words "smoke on the water" at the moment of awakening. When he later reported these words to Gillan, he said that they sounded like “drug” (“sounds like a drug song”), and, referring themselves exclusively to “drinking” groups, they initially rejected these words.

In the end, already in time trouble, the group rented the entire Grand Hotel, which was on the outskirts and almost empty, and therefore practically unheated in December ("We ended up at the Grand Hotel, / It was empty, cold and bare") , turning her T-shaped hallway on the first floor into a makeshift studio. A carpenter had to be specially hired to build a wooden shield that blocked off the foyer, and to overlay the shield with mattresses from hotel rooms. An industrial heater was rented, which was turned on during breaks several times a day. Cables were run from the studio parked nearby to the hotel. Since the entrance to the foyer was blocked by a shield, the musicians got inside and got out back to the street to the mobile studio through the side corridor and balconies of the adjoining adjacent rooms. The space where they played was lit up with red spotlights to create a creative atmosphere ("With a few red lights and a few old beds / We made a place to sweat..."). The drum parts were recorded separately in the hallway of the hotel, as Ian Paice liked the reverb of the hall between the numbers.

Under such conditions, the entire Machine Head album was recorded. And on the instrumental track, recorded earlier in the "Pavilion", the newly written text was superimposed with the chorus "Smoke on the Water».

As a result, the song became a hit, and the rock intro went so deep into the minds of the musicians that, according to Enver, in America, in guitar stores, there are signs “smoke on the water do not play!”

Here are the lyrics of the song in Russian and English:

We all came out to Montreaux
On the Lake Geneva shoreline
To make records with a Mobile
We didn't have much time
Frank Zappa and the mothers
Were at the best place around
But some stupid with a flare gun
Burned the place to the ground

smoke on the water
And fire in the sky

They burned down the gambling house
It died with an awful sound
Funky and Claude was running in and out
Pulling kids out the ground
When it all was over
We had to find another place
But Swiss time was running out
It seemed that we would lose the race

smoke on the water
And fire in the sky

We ended up at the Grand Hotel
It was empty cold and bare
But with the Rolling truck Stones thing just outside
Making our music there
With a few red lights and a few old beds
We make a place to sweat
No matter what we get out of this
I know we'll never forget

smoke on the water
And fire in the sky

We arrived in Montreux
On the shores of Lake Geneva,
To record a record in a mobile studio.
There was little time
Frank Zappa and the Moms
Occupied the best places in the district,
But a fool with a rocket launcher
Burnt it all down.

Smoke on the water
And fire in the sky

They burned down the gambling house
He died with a terrible sound
Funky and Claude were running back and forth
Rescuing children from the danger zone.
When it was all over
We had to look elsewhere
But the time spent in Switzerland was running out,
It looked like we weren't going to win this race.

Smoke on the water
And fire in the sky

We settled in the Grand Hotel
It was empty, cold and poor,
But when the Rolling Stones gave us Stone's move, we made a new record,
In the meager light of red lights on a couple of old bunks
We sweated a lot
It doesn't matter what we got out of it
I know we will never forget

Smoke on the water
And fire in the sky

This is such an unusual story that has become a legend.

"Fireball" (1971)

Success immediately tightened the concert schedule, so the material for the new album was composed and recorded in fits and starts during and between concerts. Maybe that's why Blackmore considered the next disc "Fireball" a failure. And, it's true, it came out not as rocky as "In Rock", but I personally liked it more. By the way, Gillan still calls "Fireball" his favorite album. The listeners also voted "yes" - it was the first DP album to take 1st place in Britain.

Despite the stylistic diversity of the record, it opened traditionally - with a fast-paced track with by the same name. Literally "Fireball" is " fire ball”, but in this case it means a comet or a meteor, which can also be seen from the cover of the disc. Gillan's lyrics were inspired by his unrequited love for a girl, about which he said: "She was a complete mystery to me." However, the text of the DP was rarely important. Is it the music...

The song opened with a strange sound. Although the musicians for a long time told reporters that it was a “special synthesizer”, in fact they simply recorded the hum of the air conditioner turning on (oh, and the air conditioners were loud then!).
Then came the frantic drumming of Jan Pace.

Jan Pace.

As a child, there was a legend among music lovers that Pace was able to hold a coin on the wall with sticks. I don’t know how it is with the coin, but the curious calculated that at the beginning of “Fireball” he knocks out 240 beats a minute! It is also a rare song of the group where the drummer used two drums (the extra drum was even specially taken out during concerts only for the performance of this song).

In terms of energy, the song was in no way inferior to "Speed ​​King", even seemed more energetic due to the lack of a traditional guitar solo (a rare case!). Instead, they play energetically at the end: Glover on bass, Lord on organ and Gillan on tambourine. True, in the bins of rarities there is a version with a guitar solo (bonus "Fireball instrumental" to the reissue of the album).

"Smoke on the Water" (1972)

If in the West the favorite guitar move was “too-doo-doo” from “Stairway to Heaven”, then for the Soviet music lover it certainly was “tam-tam-tam, tam-tam-tam” from the song “Smoke on the Water” » manufactured by DEEP PURPLE.

As I wrote before, the lyrics of the Deep Purple songs were for the most part artless. So the text “Smoke over the water, fire in the sky ...” did not contain any symbolism at all, but was a scrupulous documentary description of the events that happened to the group in Switzerland at the end of 1971 ...

In the resort town of Montreux, DEEP PURPLE was driven by the desire to record a new record. There was a mansion on the shores of Lake Geneva, where on the second floor there was an excellent recording studio. Unfortunately, there was a casino on the first floor. And when Frank Zappa's band played there on December 3, one zealous fan fired a flare gun into the air. The ceiling of the building was bamboo, and soon it was on fire like a matchbox. Fortunately, no one was hurt, but the casino, along with the studio, burned to the ground. All of Frank Zappa's equipment worth $50,000 was also destroyed.
The DEEP PURPLE musicians contemplated the fire in horror from the window of their room at the Grand Hotel. Fire lit up the sky, and smoke drifted over Lake Geneva. According to legend, vocalist Ian Gillan heard bassist Roger Glover muttering in a sleepy delirium: "smoke on the water ... smoke on the water ...".

The same smoke over the same water.

In the morning, Gillan sat down and began to record all of the above events in poetic form on a napkin. He did not forget to mention even Frank Zappa, who distinguished himself in the fire, and the organizer of the concert, Claude Nobs, who were able to bring out all the people in an organized manner.

“SMOKE OVER THE WATER” (translated by A. Evdokimov)

We all went to Montreux
On the coast of Lake Geneva.
To make travel notes,
There wasn't much time.
Frank Zappa and the Moms
occupied the best place in District,
But some dumbass with a rocket launcher
Burnt it all down.

Smoke over the water
Fire is in the sky.
Smoke over water.

They burned down the gambling house,
He died with a terrible sound
Funky and Claude ran back and forth
Pulling the guys out of the danger zone.
When it was all over
We had to look elsewhere
But Swiss time was running out
It seemed that we could not win this race.

And indeed, with the death of the building, the situation with the new album was up in the air. DEEP PURPLE's recording equipment was borrowed from the ROLLING STONES. But the question remained open - where to find a room to record loud hard riffs? Finally, we decided not to go far and took off for recording ... "Grand Hotel". Fortunately, it was winter and the hotel was empty. But the room was not heated at all and had terrible acoustics. Covering themselves with mattresses and turning on the heaters, the group heroically set to work. The last verse of “Smoke on the Water” tells about all this:

We ended up at the Grand Hotel
It was empty, cold and bare.
But we're rolling with the freight
Stones thing at the gate
They made our music.
In the dim light of red lanterns
and in the presence of several old beds,
We made everyone around sweat.
It doesn't matter what we got out of it
I know one thing - I will never forget.

"Grand Hotel", where the recording of "Machine Head" took place.

As a result, the album "Machine Head" was born, containing, among other things, the story of its appearance in the form of the song "Smoke on the Water". Ritchie Blackmore recorded the famous riff of this song before coming to Switzerland.

True, nosy music lovers managed to find the song of the Brazilian singer Astrud Gilbert "Maria Quiet" in 1965, the loss in which strongly resembles the riff of "Smoke on the Water". However, as for me, both songs are very different and their similarity is purely accidental.

Compare:

When Machine Head was released in 1972 (1st in England, 7th in the US), the musicians assumed that the songs "Maybe I'm a Leo" and "Never Before" would become hits. But the listeners fell in love with "there-there-there, there-there-tatam" ...

R. Blackmore:
“Simplicity is the key to the success of this song. People still play it in guitar shops today. I started writing after hearing things like "I Can't Explain" and "My Generation". They are built on very simple riffs. I then thought: “Well, if Pete Townshend has songs coming out, then why am I worse?”.

"Smoke on the Water" will forever remain a symbol of DEEP PURPLE. In 1989, she became the center song of the album "Rock Aid Armenia", the proceeds of which went to the fund for the victims of the terrible earthquake in Armenia in 1988.

Then in the recording of "Smoke on the Water", in addition to the group DEEP PURPLE, many famous performers Cast: Bryan Adams, Keith Emerson (ELP), Tommy Yommi (BLACK SABBATH), Brian May and Roger Glover (QUEEN), Bruce Dickinson (IRON MAIDEN), David Gilmour (PINK FLOYD) and others.

"Highway Star" (1972)

Since the members of DEEP PURPLE almost unanimously consider "Machine Head" as their reference album, one more famous track of this record cannot be left out.

On the cover of "Machine Head" the faces of the musicians are reflected in a sheet of metal.

We are talking about a song with the eloquent name "Highway Star" ("Freeway Star"). It was the fastest track on the album and therefore, by tradition, was the first track. The meaning of "Highway Star" was simple: "I'm a cool guy and I'm rushing in a cool car."

The music, as usual, was much more interesting. The song was rehearsed first, before the Swiss session. It was written, however, almost by accident - during the 1971 tour. One of the journalists asked the musicians to show how they write songs. Blackmore took acoustic guitar and began to play a riff based on one G major chord, and Gillan immediately composed the text.

Ian Gillan and Ritchie Blackmore.

R. Blackmore:
“I was working on a solo for this song before we even started recording it, which I don't usually do. And I wanted to put "a little Mozart" on the chord progression."

John Lord.

True, Lord said that the chord progression was "Bach-like", but that didn't change the essence. Academic classics fit perfectly into rock rhythms, becoming a kind of calling card group style.

Subsequently, this technique became so familiar that some, not without reason, believed that it was "hard rock" that became the refuge of the European academic tradition and helped the classics to maintain their relevance in the modern world.

A couple more great songs from Machine Head:

The song describes real events. In December 1971, the band traveled to the Swiss town of Montreux to record a new album in a mobile studio rented from the Rolling Stones, known as the Rolling Stones Mobile. It was decided to record at the Montreux casino entertainment complex (in the song - "the gambling house"), in which they had already been to concerts. On the eve of the studio session, on Saturday, December 4th, Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention played a concert at the Casino Theater as part of their European tour. This was the last concert in this hall, after which he was supposed to be at the disposal of Deep Purple to record an album. In order to avoid misunderstandings, the group decided not to unload the equipment for the time being, which later turned out to be a happy decision.

FRANK ZAPPA

About an hour into the concert, during a synth solo on King Kong, sparks appeared from behind the suspended bamboo ceiling and then a fire - apparently, one of the audience (who could not be found) fired a flare gun at the roof ("some stupid with a flare gun"). Zappa calmly said “don't panic, we're on fire” (maybe they didn't notice anything and told them themselves), after which the musicians left the stage. Spectators were evacuated in a fairly organized manner, there were no casualties. The song mentions "funky Claude" who "runs in and out" - this is the director of the Montreux Jazz Festival, Claude Nobs, who helped the audience out of the hall. Among the audience were members of Deep Purple. According to Glover's memoirs, the fire was initially so weak that during the evacuation he managed to re-enter the hall, get closer to the empty stage, examine Zappa's equipment with the band, and be impressed by the two newest synthesizers.
The fire burned to the ground the entire multi-storey casino complex, along with the concert hall and The Mothers' equipment (which was insured, but concerts in France and Belgium had to be cancelled). From the Europe Hotel where the Deep Purple members were staying, the musicians watched through the restaurant's large window as the casino was engulfed in flames (helped by the wind blowing from the mountains) and saw a curtain of smoke over Lake Geneva.

The group, which had already rented an expensive studio, had to look around the city for new premises. Nobs soon found The Pavilion Theater for them, located in the city center. Equipment was moved there and work began in the middle of the day on an instrumental track with a new riff prepared by Blackmore, still without lyrics, under the working title "Title". Debugging the equipment and developing arrangements took the rest of the day, and the actual dubs began to be recorded already after midnight. The third double was successful, and they stopped on it. As it turned out, all this time the attendants tried to keep the police squad behind the locked doors, which was called by the neighboring residents because of the noise. It was thanks to the fact that the police were detained that it was possible to finish recording the track.
Since working only during the daytime did not suit the musicians, they had to look for a new hall. There were many requirements for the premises, and its search took 5-6 days. On one of these days of waiting, Glover woke up in a hotel room, uttering the words "smoke on the water" at the moment of awakening. When he later reported these words to Gillan, he said that they sounded like "drug" ("sounds like a drug song"), and, referring themselves exclusively to "drinking" groups, they initially rejected these words.
In the end, already in time trouble, the group rented the entire Grand Hotel, which was on the outskirts and almost empty, and therefore practically unheated in December ("We ended up at the Grand Hotel, / It was empty, cold and bare") , turning her T-shaped hallway on the first floor into a makeshift studio. A carpenter had to be specially hired to build a wooden shield that blocked off the foyer, and to overlay the shield with mattresses from hotel rooms. An industrial heater was rented, which was turned on during breaks several times a day. Cables were run from the studio parked nearby to the hotel. Since the entrance to the foyer was blocked by a shield, the musicians got inside and got out back to the street to the mobile studio through the side corridor and balconies of the adjoining adjacent rooms. The space where they played was lit up with red spotlights to create a creative atmosphere ("With a few red lights and a few old beds / We made a place to sweat..."). The drum parts were recorded separately in the hallway of the hotel, as Ian Paice liked the reverb of the hall between the numbers.
Under such conditions, the entire Machine Head album was recorded. And on the instrumental track, recorded earlier in the "Pavilion", the newly written lyrics with the chorus "Smoke on the Water" were overdubbed.
Of all the songs on the album, the song "Smoke on the Water" was included in concert program 1972 is the latest, it happened at the end of May.

Smoke on the Water("Smoke on the Water") is a song by the rock band Deep Purple, recorded in December 1971 and first released on the album machine head in March 1972. It was released as a single only in 1973; the second side of the single was occupied by her live version from the album Made in Japan.

History of creation

The song describes real events. In December 1971, the band traveled to the Swiss town of Montreux to record a new album in a mobile studio rented from the Rolling Stones, known as the Rolling Stones Mobile. It was decided to record in the entertainment complex of the Montreux casino (in the song - "the gambling house"), in which they had already been to concerts. On the eve of the studio session, on Saturday, December 4th, Frank Zappa and The Mothers of Invention played a concert at the Casino Theater as part of their European tour. This was the last concert in this hall, after which he was supposed to be at the disposal of Deep Purple to record an album. In order to avoid misunderstandings, the group decided not to unload the equipment for the time being, which later turned out to be a happy decision.

About an hour into the concert, during a synth solo on King Kong, sparks appeared from behind the suspended bamboo ceiling and then a fire - apparently, one of the audience (who could not be found) fired a flare gun at the roof ("some stupid with a flare gun"). Zappa calmly said “don't panic, we're on fire” (maybe they didn't notice anything and told them themselves), after which the musicians left the stage. Spectators were evacuated in a fairly organized manner, there were no casualties. The song mentions "funky Claude" who "ran in and out" - this is the director of the Montreux Jazz Festival Claude Nobs, who helped the audience out of the hall. Among the audience were members of Deep Purple. According to Glover's memoirs, the fire was initially so weak that during the evacuation he managed to re-enter the hall during the evacuation, get closer to the empty stage, examine Zappa's equipment with the band, and be impressed by the two newest synthesizers.

The fire burned to the ground the entire multi-storey casino complex, along with the concert hall and The Mothers' equipment (which was insured, but concerts in France and Belgium had to be cancelled). From the Europe Hotel where the members of Deep Purple were staying, the musicians watched through the restaurant's large window as the casino was engulfed in flames (helped by the wind blowing from the mountains) and saw a curtain of smoke over Lake Geneva.

The group, which had already rented an expensive studio, had to look around the city for new premises. Nobs soon found The Pavilion Theater for them, located in the city center. The equipment was moved there and work began in the middle of the day on an instrumental track with a new riff prepared by Blackmore, still without lyrics, under the working title "Title # 1". Debugging the equipment and developing arrangements took the rest of the day, and the actual dubs began to be recorded already after midnight. The third double was successful, and they stopped on it. As it turned out, all this time the attendants tried to keep the police squad behind the locked doors, which was called by the neighboring residents because of the noise. It was thanks to the fact that the police were detained that it was possible to finish recording the track.

Since working only during the daytime did not suit the musicians, they had to look for a new hall. There were many requirements for the premises, and its search took 5-6 days. On one of these days of waiting, Glover woke up in a hotel room, uttering the words at the moment of awakening smoke on the water. When he later reported these words to Gillan, he said that they sounded like "drug" ("sounds like a drug song"), and, referring themselves exclusively to "drinking" groups, they initially rejected these words.

Gillan performed the song with Black Sabbath during their Born Again Tour 1983 (English)Russian in 1983-1984. In 2011, a recording of the song, made during one of the concerts, was released on a reissued CD. Born Again.

Under the name "Smoke on the Water" in 1994 Shrapnel Records released a tribute to Deep Purple, which featured vocalists Joe Lynn Turner, Glenn Hughes and Jeff Scott Soto, as well as a group of guitarists (Yngwie Malmsteen, Winnie Moore, Don Dokken, Paul Gilbert, Tony McAlpin, Dean Castronovo) and keyboards (Jens Johansson and the same Tony McAlpin) virtuosos. The song itself is the seventh track on this album.

Numerous later cover versions of the song are known, including from Iron Maiden, Yngwie Malmsteen, Dream Theater, Sepultura, (Joe Satriani, John Petrucci and Steve Way "Live In Tokyo", 2005), Jon Bon Jovi with Bruce Springsteen, Soulfly, Six Feet Under, Vains of Jenna, Santana, Brian May, Buranovskiye Babushki. The song has been reworked into country, thrash metal, black metal, and power metal folk songs among others.

Write a review on the article "Smoke on the Water"

Links

• (English) Roger Glover. Machine Head Remembered… Machine Head Anniversary Booklet, EMI, 1997
• Seva Novgorodtsev's programs about Deep Purple

Notes

An excerpt characterizing Smoke on the Water

Princess Mary, sitting in the drawing room and listening to these talk and gossip of the old people, did not understand anything from what she heard; she only thought about whether all the guests noticed her father's hostile attitude towards her. She didn't even notice special attention and the courtesies that Drubetskoy, who had been in their house for the third time, had shown her throughout that dinner.
Princess Mary with an absent-minded, questioning look turned to Pierre, who, the last of the guests, with a hat in his hand and with a smile on his face, approached her after the prince had left, and they were left alone in the living room.
- Can I sit still? - he said, with his thick body falling into an armchair near Princess Marya.
“Oh yes,” she said. "Didn't you notice anything?" said her look.
Pierre was in a pleasant state of mind after dinner. He looked ahead of him and smiled softly.
- You've known this for a long time. young man, princess? - he said.
- What?
- Drubetskoy?
No, recently...
- What do you like about him?
- Yes, he is a pleasant young man ... Why are you asking me this? - said Princess Mary, continuing to think about her morning conversation with her father.
- Because I made an observation - a young man usually comes from St. Petersburg to Moscow on vacation only with the aim of marrying a rich bride.
You have made this observation! - said Princess Mary.
“Yes,” Pierre continued with a smile, “and this young man now keeps himself in such a way that where there are rich brides, there he is.” I read it like a book. He is now undecided whom he should attack: you or Mademoiselle Julie Karagin. Il est tres assidu aupres d "elle. [He is very attentive to her.]
Does he visit them?
- Very often. And you know new style care? - Pierre said with a cheerful smile, apparently being in that cheerful spirit of good-natured mockery, for which he so often reproached himself in his diary.
“No,” said Princess Mary.
- Now, to please the Moscow girls - il faut etre melancolique. Et il est tres melancolique aupres de m lle Karagin, [one must be melancholy. And he is very melancholy with m elle Karagin,] - said Pierre.
– Vrayment? [Right?] - said Princess Mary, looking into Pierre's kind face and not ceasing to think about her grief. “It would be easier for me,” she thought, if I decided to believe to someone everything that I feel. And I would like to tell Pierre everything. He is so kind and noble. It would be easier for me. He would give me advice!”
- Would you marry him? Pierre asked.
“Ah, my God, Count, there are such moments when I would go for anyone,” Princess Mary suddenly said, unexpectedly for herself, with tears in her voice. “Ah, how hard it is to love a loved one and feel that ... nothing (she continued in a trembling voice) you can do for him except grief, when you know that you cannot change this. Then one thing - to leave, but where should I go? ...
- What are you, what is the matter with you, princess?
But the princess, without finishing, began to cry.
“I don't know what's wrong with me today. Don't listen to me, forget what I told you.
All Pierre's gaiety vanished. He anxiously questioned the princess, asked her to express everything, to confide her grief to him; but she only repeated that she asked him to forget what she said, that she did not remember what she said, and that she had no grief, except for what he knows - grief that the marriage of Prince Andrei threatened to quarrel her father with son.
Have you heard about the Rostovs? she asked to change the conversation. “I was told they would be coming soon. I also wait for Andre every day. I would like them to meet here.
How does he look at the matter now? asked Pierre, by which he meant the old prince. Princess Mary shook her head.
– But what to do? The year is only a few months away. And it can't be. I would only wish to spare my brother the first few minutes. I wish they would come sooner. I hope to get along with her. You have known them for a long time, - said Princess Marya, - tell me, hand on heart, all true truth who is this girl and how do you find her? But the whole truth; because, you understand, Andrei risks so much by doing this against the will of his father that I would like to know ...
An obscure instinct told Pierre that in these reservations and repeated requests to tell the whole truth, Princess Mary's hostility towards her future daughter-in-law was expressed, that she wanted Pierre not to approve of Prince Andrei's choice; but Pierre said what he felt rather than thought.
"I don't know how to answer your question," he said, blushing, not knowing why. “I definitely don’t know what kind of girl this is; I can't analyze it at all. She is charming. And why, I do not know: that's all that can be said about her. - Princess Mary sighed and the expression on her face said: "Yes, I expected this and was afraid."
- Is she smart? asked Princess Mary. Pierre considered.
“I think not,” he said, “but yes. She does not deign to be smart ... No, she is charming, and nothing more. Princess Mary again shook her head disapprovingly.
“Oh, I so desire to love her!” Tell her that if you see her before me.
“I heard that they will be in the next few days,” said Pierre.
Princess Marya told Pierre her plan of how, as soon as the Rostovs arrived, she would get close to her future daughter-in-law and try to accustom the old prince to her.

Marrying a rich bride in St. Petersburg did not work out for Boris and he came to Moscow for the same purpose. In Moscow, Boris was in indecision between the two richest brides - Julie and Princess Mary. Although Princess Mary, despite her ugliness, seemed to him more attractive than Julie, for some reason he was embarrassed to look after Bolkonskaya. On her last meeting with her, on the old prince's name day, to all his attempts to talk to her about feelings, she answered him inappropriately and obviously did not listen to him.
Julie, on the contrary, although in a special way, peculiar to her alone, but willingly accepted his courtship.
Julie was 27 years old. After the death of her brothers, she became very rich. She was now completely ugly; but I thought that she was not only just as good, but much more attractive than she had been before. She was supported in this delusion by the fact that, firstly, she became a very rich bride, and, secondly, that the older she became, the safer she was for men, the freer it was for men to treat her and, without assuming any obligations, enjoy her dinners, evenings and lively society, gathering with her. A man who ten years ago would have been afraid to go every day to the house where there was a 17-year-old young lady, so as not to compromise her and not to tie himself up, now went to her boldly every day and treated her not as a young lady, but as a a friend who has no gender.
The Karagins' house was the most pleasant and hospitable house in Moscow that winter. In addition to parties and dinners, every day a large company gathered at the Karagins, especially men who had dinner at 12 o'clock in the morning and stayed up until 3 o'clock. There was no ball, festivities, theater that Julie would miss. Her toilets were always the most fashionable. But, despite this, Julie seemed disappointed in everything, told everyone that she did not believe in friendship, or in love, or in any joys of life, and expected peace only there. She adopted the tone of a girl who has suffered great disappointment, a girl who seems to have lost a loved one or was cruelly deceived by him. Although nothing like this happened to her, they looked at her as such, and she herself even believed that she had suffered a lot in life. This melancholy, which did not prevent her from having fun, did not prevent the young people who visited her from having a good time. Each guest, coming to them, gave his debt to the melancholy mood of the hostess and then engaged in secular conversations, and dances, and mental games, and burime tournaments, which were in vogue with the Karagins. Only some young people, including Boris, went deeper into Julie's melancholy mood, and with these young people she had longer and more solitary conversations about the futility of everything worldly, and to them she opened her albums covered with sad images, sayings and poems.
Julie was especially affectionate towards Boris: she regretted his early disappointment in life, offered him those consolations of friendship that she could offer, having suffered so much in her life herself, and opened her album to him. Boris drew two trees for her in an album and wrote: Arbres rustiques, vos sombres rameaux secouent sur moi les tenebres et la melancolie. [Rural trees, your dark boughs shake off gloom and melancholy on me.]

Almost every rock music lover who decides to master the guitar learns the famous riff from Smoke on the Water as one of the first tunes. It sounds spectacular, but at the same time is so technically simple that Ritchie Blackmore is said to be embarrassed to present the composed melody to his colleagues, considering it too primitive for a musician of his level.

History of creation and meaning of Smoke on the Water

The song's lyrics talk about a fire witnessed by the members of Deep Purple in the Swiss city of Montreux. They came there to work on a new album in a mobile studio rented from. For these purposes, a room was rented in a local casino.

On December 4, 1971, Frank Zappa gave a concert in the theater of this gambling establishment. After that, the hall was to be taken over by Deep Purple. But fate decreed otherwise. During Zappa's speech, a fire broke out in the room, the cause of which is said to be a rocket launcher shot into the ceiling. It all ended with the fact that the entertainment complex was completely destroyed by fire to the ground.

Musicians from Deep Purple watched what was happening from the window of the Europe Hotel, which is located on the opposite shore of Lake Geneva. So smoke over the water, after which it was named new song, creeping over its smooth surface.

They had to record the album in another room. The corridor of the Grand Hotel, fully rented for this purpose, acted as an impromptu studio. But we are more interested in the history of the Smoke on the Water song itself.

One morning a couple of days after the fire, Roger Glover, who was lying in bed and still not really awake, came up with the phrase “smoke on the water”. He described it this way:

I was alone in bed... at that mystical time between deep sleep and waking up when I heard own voice pronouncing these words aloud. I woke up and asked myself if I really said them, and decided that I did. I thought about it a lot and realized that this could be a potential title for a song.

A little later, he told Ian Gillan about this, but in a conversation they came to the conclusion that such a phrase is more suitable for some kind of drug addict song, and therefore decided to refuse it. However, the idea of ​​a song describing that fire did not leave them, and over time they realized that Smoke on the Water would be the best name for it.

The lyrics of the song not only talk about the sad incident, but also generally describe the band's stay in Switzerland. Almost every line is based on real events and their participants. For example, "Cool Claude" is the head of the jazz festival in Montreux, who helped to get people out of the burning hall.

The same guitar riff Ritchie Blackmore composed during improvisations, which he often arranged with drummer Ian Paice. It is widely speculated that he borrowed it from the song Marie Moite by the Brazilian singer Astrud Gilberto, recorded in 1966.

Release and achievements

Members Deep bands Purple did not believe in the success of Smoke on the Water and did not release it as a single until the release of Machine Head (early 1972), on which it was included. But a year later, the single was still released and performed well on the charts in different countries.

Check out the music video for Smoke on the Water - Deep Purple.

Over time, Smoke on the Water has become the most recognizable composition of Deep Purple, which was placed by Rolling Stone magazine on the 434th line of the 500 list. greatest songs of all times.

In an interview with Metal Hammer, Roger Glover described her as follows:

I think Smoke on the Water is the most important song Purple has ever had. It is constantly required to be performed, but this is not best song for live concerts. It's a good song, but it's a bit tiresome to play. The excitement comes from the audience.

It is difficult to list all the cover versions of Smoke on the Water, because many bands and performers covered it. Among them Iron Maiden, Metallica, Sepultura, Bon Jovi, Carlos Santana and others.

• Once, on television, Ricci Blackmore joked that the famous riff from the song was the introduction of Beethoven's Fifth Symphony played backwards, adding that he owed the composer a lot of money.
• On the shores of Lake Geneva in Montreux, a statue was erected with the name of the band and song, as well as the notes of the guitar riff.
• In 2008 among students music schools London conducted a survey to identify the most famous guitar riff. The first place was taken by the melody from Smoke on the Water.
• In 2010, while performing near Samara as part of the Rock Over the Volga festival, Deep Purple performed the song, changing the words of the chorus to “Smoke on the Volga”.

Lyrics

We all came out to Montreux on the Lake Geneva shoreline
To make records with a mobile - We didn't have much time
Frank Zappa & the Mothers were at the best place around
But some stupid with a flare gun burned the place to the ground

smoke on the water
A fire in the sky
smoke on the water

They burned down the gambling house — It died with an awful sound
Funky Claude was running in and out, pulling kids out of the ground
When it all was over, we had to find another place
Swiss time was running out - It seemed that we would lose the race

We ended up at the Grand Hotel - It was empty, cold and bare
But with the Rolling Truck Stones Thing just outside making our music there
With a few red lights an’ a few old beds, we made a place to sweat
No matter what we get out of this, I know… I know we'll never forget

Translation of the songSmoke on the Water - Deep Purple

We all came to Montreux on the shores of Lake Geneva,
To record songs on a mobile studio. We had little time
Frank Zappa & the Mothers played in the best room
But some jerk with a flare gun burned the hall to the ground

Smoke on the water.
fire in the sky
Smoke on the water

They burned down the gambling house. It collapsed with a terrible crash
Cool Claude was running back and forth, pulling people out of the hall
When it was over we had to look for another place
Our time in Switzerland was coming to an end. It seemed like we couldn't do anything.

Finally we ended up at the Grand Hotel. It was empty and cold.
But by launching The Rolling Stones mobile studio to play music,
Turning on a few red lights and installing a couple of old beds, we set up a place to work in the sweat of our brows.
It doesn't matter how we got off the ground, I know... I know we'll never forget it

Song quote

… since then, I have always listened to my random thoughts.