"Lazy" is a song by

Deep Purple Deep Purple are an English rock band formed in London in 1968. They are considered to be among the pioneers of heavy metal music, heavy metal and modern hard rock, although their musical style has varied throughout their career. Originally for ...

from their 1972 album ''

Machine Head A machine head (also referred to as a tuning machine, tuner, or gear head) is a geared apparatus for tuning stringed musical instruments by adjusting string tension. Machine heads are used on mandolins, guitars, double basses, and others, and ...

''. A live performance of the song can be found on the album '' Made in Japan'', released later the same year. The song starts out as an instrumental,

keyboardist A keyboardist or keyboard player is a musician who plays keyboard instruments. Until the early 1960s musicians who played keyboards were generally classified as either pianists or organists. Since the mid-1960s, a plethora of new musical instru ...

Jon Lord John Douglas "Jon" Lord (9 June 194116 July 2012) was an English keyboardist and composer. In 1968, Lord co-founded the hard rock band Deep Purple. Lord performed on most of the band's most popular songs; he and drummer Ian Paice were the only ...

plays an overdriven

Hammond organ The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert, first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding #Drawbars, drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, sound was created ...

intro, followed by the main riff and with the solo swapping between him and

guitarist A guitarist (or a guitar player) is a person who plays the guitar. Guitarists may play a variety of guitar family instruments such as classical guitars, acoustic guitars, electric guitars, and bass guitars. Some guitarists accompany themselve ...

Ritchie Blackmore Richard Hugh Blackmore (born 14 April 1945) is an English lead guitarist. He was a founding member and the guitarist of Deep Purple, one of the pioneering bands of hard rock. After leaving Deep Purple in 1975, Blackmore formed the band Rainbow ...

Vocalist Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define singi ...

Ian Gillan Ian Gillan (born 19 August 1945) is an English singer who is best known as the lead singer and lyricist for the rock band Deep Purple. He is known for his powerful and wide-ranging singing voice. Initially influenced by Elvis Presley, Gillan ...

comes in with the vocals later in the song. He also uses

harmonica The harmonica, also known as a French harp or mouth organ, is a free reed wind instrument used worldwide in many musical genres, notably in blues, American folk music, classical music, jazz, country, and rock. The many types of harmonica incl ...

both on the studio version and live. At over 7 minutes long, it is the longest track on the album, and live versions were often extended past 10 minutes. The live version on '' Made in Japan'' features a theme from

Hugo Alfvén Hugo Emil Alfvén (; 1 May 18728 May 1960) was a Swedish composer, conductor, violinist, and painter. Alfvén was one of Sweden's principal composers. His "Swedish Rhapsody”, written when he was 31, is still one of the best-known pieces of Sw ...

's "Swedish Rhapsody #1", played by Ritchie Blackmore as a part of his solo. Additionally, Jon Lord includes the riff from the

C Jam Blues "C Jam Blues" is a jazz standard composed in 1942 by Duke Ellington. One of his most famous pieces, it has been performed by countless other musicians, such as Dave Grusin, Django Reinhardt, Oscar Peterson, and Charles Mingus. Background As th ...

in the intro. Ritchie Blackmore would sometimes include the main riff from "Lazy" in live performances of the song " Man on the Silver Mountain" by

Rainbow A rainbow is an optical phenomenon caused by refraction, internal reflection and dispersion of light in water droplets resulting in a continuous spectrum of light appearing in the sky. The rainbow takes the form of a multicoloured circular ...

. Gillan defined the song as

rhythm and blues Rhythm and blues, frequently abbreviated as R&B or R'n'B, is a genre of popular music that originated within African American communities in the 1940s. The term was originally used by record companies to describe recordings marketed predomina ...

. Later live performances after the band's reunion in 1984 tended to be much shorter, cutting out the intro and one of the verses. However, more recent performances with

Steve Morse Steve J. Morse (born July 28, 1954) is an American guitarist and songwriter. A seven-time Grammy nominee, he is best known as the founder of the Dixie Dregs and as the longest serving guitarist for Deep Purple. Morse also enjoyed a successful ...

have gone back to the original arrangement. Other live versions can be found on ''

Deep Purple in Concert ''Deep Purple in Concert'' is a live album by the English hard rock band Deep Purple, recorded by the BBC for their "In Concert" live series in 1970 and 1972. First released in 1980 in the UK, with the current US edition being made available in ...

'', '' Nobody's Perfect'' and on videos like '' Live in Concert 72/73'' and '' Total Abandon: Australia '99''. Readers of ''

Guitar World ''Guitar World'' is a monthly music magazine for guitarists and fans of guitar-based music and trends. The magazine has been published since July 1980. ''Guitar World'', the best-selling guitar magazine in the United States, contains original a ...

'' voted "Lazy" the 74th greatest guitar solo of all time. Sections of this song were often used in Australia on the Channel 9 Wide World of Sports program when cutting to an ad and used in Indonesia for opening song program Warna on the

Trans7 PT Duta Visual Nusantara Tivi Tujuh (previously PT Duta Visual Nusantara), operating as Trans7 or TRANS7 in all caps (stylized TRɅNS, 7, pronounced ''Trans Tujuh'' in Indonesian, formerly known as TV7) is an Indonesian free-to-air television b ...

. Jesse Gress, writing for ''

Guitar Player ''Guitar Player'' was an American magazine for guitarists, founded in 1967 in San Jose, California San Jose, officially the City of San José ( ; ), is a cultural, commercial, and political center within Silicon Valley and the San Francis ...

'' magazine, noted that

's "bluesy head to 'Lazy' (from

's ''

'') fondly paraphrases Slowhand’s lapton'sBluesbreaker-era showcase ' Steppin' Out' right down to the same style of third-position swing-sixteenth G blues riffing".

Personnel

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guitars The guitar is a stringed musical instrument that is usually fretted (with Fretless guitar, some exceptions) and typically has six or Twelve-string guitar, twelve strings. It is usually held flat against the player's body and played by strumming ...

–

vocals Singing is the art of creating music with the voice. It is the oldest form of musical expression, and the human voice can be considered the first musical instrument. The definition of singing varies across sources. Some sources define sing ...

Roger Glover Roger David Glover (born 30 November 1945) is a Welsh bassist, songwriter, and record producer. He is best known as a member of the hard rock bands Deep Purple and Rainbow. As a member of Deep Purple, Glover was inducted into the Rock and Roll ...

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bass Bass or Basses may refer to: Fish * Bass (fish), various saltwater and freshwater species Wood * Bass or basswood, the wood of the tilia americana tree Music * Bass (sound), describing low-frequency sound or one of several instruments in th ...

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organ Organ and organs may refer to: Biology * Organ (biology), a group of tissues organized to serve a common function * Organ system, a collection of organs that function together to carry out specific functions within the body. Musical instruments ...

Ian Paice Ian Anderson Paice (born 29 June 1948) is an English musician who is the drummer and last remaining original member of the rock band Deep Purple. He remains the only member of Deep Purple who has served in every line-up since the band's incep ...

–

drums The drum is a member of the percussion instrument, percussion group of musical instruments. In the Hornbostel–Sachs classification system, it is a membranophones, membranophone. Drums consist of at least one Acoustic membrane, membrane, c ...

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Lazy (Deep Purple Song) Deep Purple songs 1972 songs Songs written by Ritchie Blackmore Songs written by Ian Gillan Songs written by Roger Glover Songs written by Jon Lord Songs written by Ian Paice