An article for Far Out Magazine revisits Deep Purple's 1974 album Stormbringer, arguing that its unusually funk-infused sound was the key factor that pushed guitarist Ritchie Blackmore to leave the band. Unlike the classic rock sound of albums such as Deep Purple in Rock or its predecessor Burn, Stormbringer leaned heavily on bass, soul and groove, largely because Blackmore was distracted by a difficult divorce and left creative control to bandmates including new members Glenn Hughes and David Coverdale.

With Blackmore disengaged during recording, the rest of the line-up, formed around Ian Paice and Jon Lord's enduring core, steered the record towards a style he disliked and felt marginalised by. Bassist Glenn Hughes recalled that Blackmore contributed few songs to the album and was likely already contemplating his departure partway through recording, something the rest of the band was unaware of at the time. Stormbringer is presented as the turning point that ended Blackmore's tenure with Deep Purple, despite the band's history of successfully embracing stylistic shifts, such as the harder rock direction inspired by Mountain's "Mississippi Queen" that shaped In Rock.