The music of this album is mostly original and a combination of progressive rock, hard rock and psychedelic rock, but with a harder edge and with the guitar parts in more evidence than in the past. This was due both to the growth of guitarist Ritchie Blackmore as a songwriter and to the conflicts within the band over the fusion of classical music and rock proposed by keyboard player Jon Lord and amply implemented in the band's previous releases.
The band started their second US tour in April 1969 with little support from their almost-bankrupt American label and without an album to promote, because of a delay in the manufacturing of the new LP. During the tour, Deep Purple showed a remarkable progress as performers and a musical direction more oriented towards a heavier and louder sound than before. Doubts about compatibility of vocalist Rod Evans with the hard rock music that other band members wanted to pursue brought about the decision of searching for a substitute, which was found in Ian Gillan of the band Episode Six. Gillan formed a songwriting duo with Episode Six's bassist Roger Glover, who was also invited to join Deep Purple and replaced Nick Simper. The band's new line-up, identified as Mark II, debuted live in London on 10 July 1969.
Commercially, this album was the least successful of the three albums released by the band's Mark I line-up and was ignored by critics upon its release. Modern reviews are generally positive and remark the variety of styles within the album and the boldness of the song arrangements.
In late 1968, Deep Purple had embarked on a successful first US tour to promote their second album, The Book of Taliesyn, and returned home on 3 January 1969. The band was considered an underground act in the United Kingdom, but word of their success in America had influenced their reputation at home, as they gradually rose in popularity and request. However, their releases had yet to make an impact in the UK, where their second single "Kentucky Woman" had not charted and was retired after six weeks, after having peaked at No. 38 in the United States and No. 21 in Canada.
Deep Purple's American label Tetragrammaton Records pressured the band to make a single to match the success of their hit "Hush", and the band had tried to satisfy that request while still in the US for the last dates of their tour; they recorded some covers in a New York studio in December 1968, without worthwhile results. The musicians had come up with much more complex original material for their second album and making a song that would easily fit the three-minute range was apparently becoming difficult.
A few days after their US tour, Deep Purple settled in with their usual producer Derek Lawrence at De Lane Lea Studios in Kingsway, London, already used for The Book of Taliesyn sessions, to compose and record new songs and solve the new single problem. The song "Emmaretta", named after the musical Hair cast member Emmaretta Marks whom singer Rod Evans had met in the US, was composed for that purpose and recorded on 7 January 1969, after four takes. The heavier and more experimental song "The Bird Has Flown" was arranged and recorded later on the same day and was chosen as the B-side for the US release. The instrumental "Wring That Neck" from their previous album was the B-side of the British edition of "Emmaretta", which was issued in February 1969 and promoted by Deep Purple in their first full UK tour. This was the first time that a Deep Purple release appeared in the UK before the US. The tour started in Birmingham on 6 February with a concert broadcast by BBC Radio 1, and went on as a series of one-nighters in clubs and colleges across the country during February and March. Deep Purple's greater visibility and their declared interest in the British public induced local music magazines to print a few articles on them, but after keyboard player and spokesperson Jon Lord's statements compared their earnings in the US to those in the UK, typical headlines were "Purple won't starve for an ideal" and "They lose £2350 a night working in Britain".
Tetragrammaton issued the album in a stark gatefold sleeve, wrapped around with a segmented illustration from Hieronymus Bosch's painting The Garden of Earthly Delights. The label ran into difficulty over the use of the Museo del Prado-owned painting, which was incorrectly perceived in the US as being anti-religious, featuring immoral scenes, and was thus rejected or poorly stocked by many record shops. The original painting is in colour although it appeared on the LP in monochrome due to a printing error for the original layout and the band opted to keep it that way. Another section of the same Bosch painting (in colour) had previously been used as an album cover two years before by Pearls Before Swine on their debut One Nation Underground.
Back in England in early June, the decision taken had to be kept secret until the promotional tour for the British release of The Book of Talyesin was completed. Meanwhile, the search for a new singer to replace Evans began and Blackmore asked for help in this task from his old acquaintance Mick Underwood, at the time drummer of the British rock band Episode Six. Underwood recommended Episode Six singer Ian Gillan, whom Blackmore and Lord contacted at a London gig. Gillan, who did not see a future in his then current band, was enthusiastic about joining Deep Purple and involved bassist Roger Glover, with whom he formed a songwriting duo. According to Simper, his replacement with Glover was initially not planned and was due to the creative togetherness of the two Episode Six members. Gillan convinced the reluctant Glover to audition for Deep Purple and the two soon found themselves torn between the new band, which gladly welcomed both of them, and obligations with Episode Six for the completion of a UK tour. Evans, Simper and Episode Six's management were kept unaware of these events and of the fact that the new line-up was already active in writing and rehearsing new songs. In between gigs all over the country, Deep Purple had rehearsed the song "Hallelujah" with Evans and Simper to be released as a new single, but it was recorded in secret on 7 June by the fresh Mark II line-up at De Lane Studios instead, with Glover still acting as a session musician. The final show of the Mark I line-up was in Cardiff on 4 July 1969, and the Mark II debuted live at The Speakeasy Club in London on 10 July. The final show played by Gillan and Glover with Episode Six was in Little Bardfield on 26 July 1969. The single "Hallelujah" was released in late July in the US and the UK and featured an edited version of "April" as B-side, the final original appearance on vinyl of the Mark I formation.
After his dismissal, Evans left for the US with his wife and resurfaced in 1971 as lead singer in the American prog rock band Captain Beyond. Simper sued Deep Purple's management for breaking his contract and the dispute was settled economically out of court. He later formed the rock band Warhorse.
The music of the album Deep Purple was played only during the tours of 1969 and never performed again by other line-ups, though Simper played songs from the first three Deep Purple albums with the tribute band Nasty Habits in Europe in 2010.
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