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Hats, socks, and rock’n’roll

If you felt that you don’t own enough copies of Made in Japan or appropriately branded socks, your prayers have been answered. There will be another super deluxe reissue of the iconic live album, this time remixed by Steven Wilson (original stereo album and Dolby Atmos) and Richard Digby Smith (the 3 shows). It will […]

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Shadow of the blues

Another book on the horizon, and it is a Whitesnake story by Martin Popoff, being published by Wymer. In Walking in the Shadow of the Blues: The Whitesnake Story, the first ever full biography of the band, top music writer Martin Popoff tells the tale of rock legend David Coverdale, from his Deep Purple roots […]

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Alive and creative in São Paulo

Deep Purple have headlined this past weekend the Best of Blues and Rock festival in São Paulo, Brazil. This marked their first public performance since November 10, 2024. The hiatus, previously explained in an interview by Ian Paice, stems from the intention to take the live performances easy this year, playing “a day here, three […]

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That all-so-important heart and soul

Blues Rock Review (somewhat belatedly) reviews Simon McBride’s Recordings 2020 – 2025 that came out a few months ago. While hype around this collection of personal tracks (a original material and covers) has been very much hush hush (Deep Purple pun intended), it’s an exciting and intriguing glimpse into McBride’s accomplished, passionate, and versatile guitar […]

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Trimming the self-indulgence

Classic Rock magazine reviews Gillan’s Future Shock for their Album of the Week Club. Fondly regarded in their day, mainly because of their proximity to the classic Mk II Deep Purple sound, it wasn’t until the release of Future Shock in 1981 that Gillan really came into their own. Preceded by the success of singles […]

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Good times, bad times

Steve Morse took part in a jam that happened in Annapolis, MD, on May 31, 2025. The occasion was the release of a novel Punk Force by Steve’s friend Ward Carroll. Ward is a retired navy F-14 Tomcat pilot, an author of books about life in an F-14 squadron (Punk series), a military commentator, and […]

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The bad news, and the good ones

CBC profiles Bob Ezrin with a lengthy interview, published on the occasion of him receiving a Governor General’s Lifetime Artistic Achievement Award today, June 14, 2025. Music-wise, the interview focuses on just the two “genre-defining” albums from his vast portfolio — Pink Floyd The Wall and Kiss Destroyer. He also mentions that he just got […]

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Life in the fast lane

A pretty comprehensive documentary on the life of Cozy Powell, who weaved in and out of the Purple family much of his career, and had played with… Perhaps it would be easier to list whom he hadn’t played with. It is lovingly put together from archival footage, contemporary and posthumous interviews with the people who […]

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Next best thing to Quincy

There was quite a bit of talk on these pages recently about the production of Rapture of the Deep, and the role of Michael Bradford in particular. Here is an extended interview with him from a couple of years ago, where he talks about working with Deep Purple, among many other things. The interview doesn’t […]

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Glenn’s tribute to Sly

An acclaimed pioneer of psychedelia, funk, soul, and racial integration in music, Sly Stone (real name Sylvester Stewart) of the Sly and the Family Stone fame has passed away at the age of 82. Louder Sound quotes Glenn Hughes in their obituary: The big turning point for me was when I first went over to […]

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Good day to be alive

Black Country Communion is on tour in Europe, and on June 7, 2025, they have performed at the Sweden Rock Festival, and Glenn Hughes was interviewed backstage by the Sweden Rock TV podcast.

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With his room cleaning kit

A bit of family history here. Cozy Powell’s interview from 1979, where he talks about Rainbow, their new album, and the arrival of Bonnet and Glover into the band. Interesting to note, that neither Cozy nor the interviewer have any qualms describing the music he’s playing (and yeas, that includes Down to Earth) as heavy […]

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A little problem with miniature bread

In a recent interview the ex-Queensrÿche frontman Geoff Tate told this mildly amusing anecdote how he witnessed David Coverdale’s contribution to the Spinal Tap lore: Well, my ‘Spinal Tap’ moment would be the scene in the movie where — I can’t remember the characters’ names, but the guy’s complaining about backstage in his dressing room […]

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Rapture remix

[Updated June 9] Edel is preparing to release a remixed version of Rapture of the Deep for the 20th anniversary of the album. The new mix was done under Roger Glover’s supervision, and mastered at Hamburg’s renowned Chameleon Studios.

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Of flesh, blood and bone

Another week, another classic Gillan video. Trouble from Rock Goes To College, February 23, 1981.

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The beauty of simplicity

Smoke on the Water was featured and dissected on the recent episode of BBC Radio 4 show Add to playlist that was on the air on May 30, 2025. The premise of the show is to introduce several pieces of music and find links between them. Composer Gavin Higgins and soprano Claire Booth take us […]

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Very, very scholarly

There’s a new book on Deep Purple being published, and this time it is a scholarly tome in the Studies in Popular Music series, published by Equinox Publishing. It is called after the last classic Mark II album Who Do We Think They Are? and was edited by Dr. Andy R. Brown (which implies that […]

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Chosen

Glenn Hughes’ new album Chosen is set for release on September 5, 2025, via Frontiers Records. Songwriting is deeply personal to me, and I generally write and record when I have something to say. It’s been nine years since I recorded my last solo album, “Resonate”. While there have been recordings and collaborations with other […]

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Really not a band man

BraveWords have published the second part of their interview with Glenn Hughes. For whatever reason, there’s considerable overlap of content with the first part, so if you get a sense of déjà vu reading it, you’re not alone. BraveWords: Okay. So picture you applying for a new job, just fictitiously, and you have a resume. […]

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Steve’s go-to ideas

Guitar Player magazine publishes an online tutorial from Steve Morse My 5 go-to ideas for playing and writing. In this exclusive video lesson, Steve showcases five conceptual and technical approaches that he employs when improvising or arranging guitar parts. These include melodic arpeggios, 16th-note patterns, sextuplet-based picking, melody with ostinato bass and rhythmic variations. To […]

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