They were forced out of their rooms by the fire, but memories of the smoke billowing out across Lac Leman, or Lake Geneva, gave them a song title.īefore long, Ritchie Blackmore’s classic guitar riff was being copied, it seemed, by every cover band and guitar-playing teenager. The band was nearly 90 minutes into the show, cranking through “King Kong,” when someone in the crowd fired a flare gun at the wooden roof, which instantly caught fire.įrank Zappa and the Mothers were at the best place around,īut some stupid with a flare gun burned the place to the ground.Īs the blaze spread, Montreux Jazz Festival organizer Claude Nobs joined firefighters to race in and out of the venue, dragging concert-goers to safety.įunky Claude was running in and out, yeah,ĭeep Purple was in Montreux with a sound truck rented from the Rolling Stones to lay down some tracks.

4, 1971, Frank Zappa and the Mothers of Invention were playing a gig at the Montreux casino. They needed one more song, so they put together Smoke On The Water using Gillan’s lyric and the riff guitarist Ritchie Blackmore came up with.The lakeside Swiss town of Montreux was in the news this week as the host of nuclear talks between Iran and six world powers.īut for rockers of a certain age, Montreux will always be best known for its rich musical history - including the roaring casino fire that inspired the English rock band Deep Purple’s classic “Smoke on the Water.” The band was relocated to the Grand Hotel in Montreux, where they recorded the album using the Rolling Stones’ mobile studio. This image gave bass player Roger Glover the idea for a song title: “Smoke On The Water,” and Ian Gillan wrote the lyric about their saga recording the Machine Head album. The band was going to start recording their Machine Head album there right after a Frank Zappa concert, but someone fired a flare gun at the ceiling during Zappa’s show, which set the place on fire.ĭeep Purple watched the blaze from a nearby restaurant, and when the fire died down, a layer of smoke had covered Lake Geneva, which the casino overlooked. This song took inspiration from a fire in the Casino at Montreux, Switzerland in 1971. BONUS CLIPS BELOW – Deep Purple perform Smoke on the Water live in Sydney and the story behind the song

Deep purple smoke on the water may 1973