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The song called Higway Star, this one

A music video for the Highway Star from Tokyo, August 17, 1972, has been released in anticipation of the Made in Japan remix due out in August.

Shot from the front row by Mr Masafumi Kato, the original handheld cine footage catches all the moments of MKII’s breathtaking performance and has now been rescanned in HDR 4k definition, adding greater resolution and clarity.

The footage has been set to the new audio mix by Richard Digby Smith, taken from the upcoming Made In Japan Super Deluxe boxsets. The original cine reels contained many small gaps as the camera reframes and a large gap over Ritchie’s guitar solo, where the cameraman changes reels, which have been filled with graphics and animation depicting a fast and furious car racing to the Budokan venue.

Directed by: Dan Gibling & Corin Schencks
Production Company: Chiba Film

Produced by: Dan Gibling
Illustrator: Valeriia Proskurina
Animator: Robin Andrews
Visual Technician: Lawrence Wheeler
Edited by: Corin Schencks
Additional Graphics: Ethan Schencks
8mm Footage filmed by: Masafumi Kato

Thanks to: Masaki Tanaka, Matt Clark, Moritz Trapp, Universal Music Group, Warners Music Group

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Posted by Nick on Wednesday, July 9th, 2025, filed under News. You can follow comment on this post through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a comment. Pinging is currently not allowed.

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4 Comments to “The song called Higway Star, this one”:

  1. 1
    Russ 775 says:

    I watched it… twice. Waited for over 50 years for something like this and it did not disappoint me in the least. Not gonna complain about the quality of the film as this (for me) is the equivalent of finding the Holy Grail. Sounds great and clearly shows why Deep Purple are THE Titans of music; not just rock but all genres. Little Ian looks like he’s having the time of his life. It’s a shame Kato-San ran out of film at the beginning of Ritchie’s solo but the animated sequence fits nicely. The segue from and back to the live footage is tastefully done.

    Gonna go and watch it again now…

    July 10th, 2025 at 00:37
  2. 2
    Uwe Hornung says:

    Oh wow, an artifact from a time when Purplus Saurus (or should I say Purpzilla?) roamed and ruled the Earth. I love it in all its druggy blurriness, very cool, well-done!

    So Ritchie already took his Strat to task in the first song of the set!

    July 10th, 2025 at 02:14
  3. 3
    Karin Verndal says:

    Well, well, well 😍

    I. LOVE. IT!

    WOAH 😄

    Have always have Highway Star as a favourite!
    But oh man! It’s even better now 🤩

    July 10th, 2025 at 04:32
  4. 4
    AndreA says:

    If the original album features a song by Osaka, why include the one by Tokyo? Mystery of Faith

    July 10th, 2025 at 05:34

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