Writing
The song has rather controversial writing history. Though it is officially credited to Rod Evans, Jon Lord and Ritchie Blackmore, according to Jerry Bloom's authorized biography of Ritchie Blackmore it was written by a guy called Bill Parkinson and named "Lost Soul". The song was conceived as a drum solo for Carlo Little (Rolling Stones' original drummer), who like Blackmore had played with The Savages, the backing band for Screaming Lord Sutch. Simper said Blackmore learned the melody "note for note" from Little. Bill Parkinson was lead guitarist with the Savages Jul-Sep 1966, while Blackmore had played with Sutch May-Oct 1962, Feb-May 1965 and Dec 1966-Apr 1967, so their paths had clearly crossed. As this song, along with "Hush," pushed the fledgeling band sky high, it wasn't surprising that word about it got back to Parkinson. Not happy with regard "to what he saw as the rip-off" of "Lost Soul," Parkinson turned up on Simper's doorstep to complain. He threatened court action to Simper, who at that time already left Deep Purple but agreed with some reluctance to testify for him. "But," Simper said, "...I never saw Bill again. Apparently they paid him off with about £600."
Read more about this topic: Mandrake Root
Famous quotes containing the word writing:
“As I am writing my thought, it sometimes escapes me; but this makes me remember my weakness, which I constantly forget. This is as instructive to me as my forgotten thought; for I strive only to know my nothingness.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)
“For it is not the bare words but the scope of the writer that gives the true light, by which any writing is to be interpreted; and they that insist upon single texts, without considering the main design, can derive no thing from them clearly.”
—Thomas Hobbes (1579–1688)
“I have spent so long erecting partitions around the part of me that writes—learning how to close the door on it when ordinary life intervenes, how to close the door on ordinary life when it’s time to start writing again—that I’m not sure I could fit the two parts of me back together now.”
—Anne Tyler (b. 1941)