Agreed to disagree
In this interview conducted for the 30th anniversary of Deepest Purple, Jon Lord talks about tensions within the band that led to demise of Mark 2 in 1973:
![[hand]](/hs-pics/portraits/hands/gillan1.jpg)
![[face]](/hs-pics/portraits/faces/gillan2.jpg)
In this interview conducted for the 30th anniversary of Deepest Purple, Jon Lord talks about tensions within the band that led to demise of Mark 2 in 1973:
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
Another wonderful snippet of Jon Lord’s history of Purple, excellent.
October 9th, 2012 at 05:42We’ve seen this with SO many bands and artists over the years. They BURN out & break up on the cusp of Global Fame. Imagine if they had stayed together…. No ‘BURN’, No Coverdale,No Hughes, Would Tommy Bolin have survived? No Whitesnake, Maybe No ‘Rainbow’ to the degree it became. No ’84 reunion… it may have been at later date….. Ah fate you unpredictable vixen, you…..Cest la Vie!
October 9th, 2012 at 11:08– Where did you get this clip.
I have the video, but don´t temember this clip.
October 9th, 2012 at 13:43I could listen Jon talk for hours on end and never tire of it.
October 9th, 2012 at 18:49Jon was a fine story teller. Apart from many interviews I listened to over the years, I really liked the way he entertained his audiences, being charming, witty and funny. Check out the DVD “Live At The Basement” and you know what I mean. And I guess that’s only one of many reasons why people miss him so much.
October 9th, 2012 at 22:52Brilliant stuff, as suggested by Randy, the late great J.L. you can never get enough of the legend, i remember buying the 30th Anniversary edition of Deep Purple’s, Deepest Purple, at that time i guess i wasn’t a fan of best of’s cd’s, but this edition is amazing and to see Jon discuss each track in itself
October 10th, 2012 at 02:05was to me like gold.
Dr. Lord makes light of the fact that had Gillan stayed on, the group would have ridden that crest enjoyed by Burn–but with Gillan at the microphone.
I do believe that much of Burn would have taken place had the band remained intact. The “Burn” riff was most likely fermenting in Blackmore’s mind (it is a Gershwin-based phrase), as likely was “Mistreated”–under a different title. A real shame the band was unable to mend their differences as Deep Purple was capable of eclipsing the likes of Sabbath and Zeppelin in the public eye in terms of both concert attendance and record sales. As it was, the band would have its moments–but things were never the same again.
What if the likes of Ronnie Dio and Craig Gruber (or some other bassist) had joined instead of Coverdale and Hughes? I could see bluesy songs such as “Lay Down, Stay Down” as being similar to Elf songs in certain respects, along with the “darker” sound of “Burn” and “Sail Away”being suited to Dio. Fodder for armchair quarterbacking perhaps, but interesting to contemplate nonetheless. Blackmore definitely had a direction for the band–but a direction that ultimately did not go his way. Hence his departure.
In my opinion, a year off for solo projects would have been disastrous for Purple in that a successful Blackmore record would have seen his resignation anyway. Everyone was yearning for a change, and keeping Mark II together may not have been in the cards. The subsequent experimentation of Gillan in the Ian Gillan Band wasn’t congruous to anything Blackmore may have had in mind.
Let me throw this at you: Given the state of music in the mid- to late Seventies, and the direction Blackmore would ultimately take, I could envision a version of Deep Purple going the route of a supercharged pop-style band, but with a technical virtuosity that is lacking in most bands of that genre. This is a sound that Purple eventually would make–but with Joe Lynn Turner out front. This approach could have brought DP alongside the likes of Foreigner and Styx and massive airplay. The climate was ripe at that time–but it was not to be.
On the other hand, Purple also missed the boat on the New Wave of British Heavy Metal–and Rainbow was ahead of its time and already had gone the more commercial route by that time (beating the power-ballad movement by a couple of years).
For Deep Purple, the timing was always a little off.
October 10th, 2012 at 03:35Gillan did what he had to do, I suppose, way back in 73, but I have to agree with Jon Lord, really, really bad timing. Now Coverdale and Hughes took all the fame and dollars that Mk 2 worked so hard for….
October 10th, 2012 at 19:42Ian Gillan did what he had to do, I suppose, way back in 73, but I have to agree with Jon Lord that it was a very, very bad timing…Now Coverdale and Hughes took all the fame and dollars that Mk 2 worked so hard for…..
October 10th, 2012 at 19:47Ian Gillan did what he needed to do, but I have to agree with Jon Lord that he´s timing was really, really bad… after all their (Mk 2) hard work, Coverdale and Hughes took all the fame and dollars that the Mk2 worked so hard for…
October 10th, 2012 at 20:53Great to see this clip and hear Jon’s explanation of things. I seem to recall Ian Paice also saying something about a 6-month break (or longer) might have done the trick for the Mk 2 line-up, but we’ll never know. Wonderful clip though and like Randy in the previous message, I could listen to Jon for ages and would loved to have had a chat with him!
October 11th, 2012 at 21:15I always felt the Coverdale/Hughes era was never “proper” Purple. Seen a number of interviews with RB/DC etc, and it is clear to me that 1973 breakup (think it is 73´)was not only IG quitting, but RB wanting him out for partying too much etc etc.
October 12th, 2012 at 10:35Huge respect for Coverdale, but more for his endeavorus of Whitesnake.
Was this clip on The Come Taste The Band (I forgot the actual name)celebration DVD?
Great to see and read things with Lord.
October 12th, 2012 at 15:12And what a loss……..he is no longer with us : (
Part of me never truly got over the Gillan and Glover departures, because I was just getting to know the band, they instantly became a powerful impact for me, and then it suddenly changed. I remember first seeing the Burn album cover as a kid with the candle wax images, and something didn’t look right. I looked for Gillan and couldn’t find him. Then I see David Coverdale’s name, and I could not believe it. I didn’t understand it.
Looking back, it does seem like a wasted opportunity to claim supremecy in rock. Although I’ve loved Purple ever since and found the reunion an incredible gift, I wish the classic lineup had stayed together longer and let the glory days play out like it could have/should have.
It seems obvious now that a break would have been the right thing to do. I’m not really sure if that was how it was done back then. It feels more like an album then tour, then another album, then tour, and so on. I travel for work on occasion, and it gets old quickly. I can’t imagine what it was like constantly touring, and the exhaustion that goes with it. It seems a shame they could not or would not stand up for themselves and say it’s time to slow down. All hindsight though.
Regardless, the body of work speaks for itself. Greatest hard rock band ever.
October 22nd, 2012 at 00:00Think about how great it was to see Purple again during Tbe Perfect Strangers Tour they were at their best again. Gigantic Tour and Top Ten album so I guess the wait was worth it. The only sad part was we only got one Gillan Sabbath LP and Tour. That was Ian Gillan at his peak what a tour that was.
October 25th, 2012 at 06:30Your not wrong there purrfect stranger @ 15 – The reunion tour in ’84 kicked off in Oz & I went twice in Sydney, they were fresh, pumped & getting on together! One of the gigs had George Harrison jamming with them on ‘Lucille’ for an encore, magic night indeed!
October 26th, 2012 at 22:14The ‘Born Again’ Sabbath album is so intense, I have always liked it, woeful production though & that is a real shame! If you were lucky enough to witness that line up in action, good luck to you!