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Steve the mechanic

Steve Morse sat down to chat with American Music Supply at the 2026 NAMM convention.

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A song about castles and crossbows

Meanwhile, Classic Rock reviews another family box set — Rainbow’s The Temple Of The King 1975-76: The tour rehearsal material, for all its historical value, is ruined by too much bass and distortion. But across six live discs – with just a little overlap with the band’s 1977 album On Stage – there is much […]

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Everything in one place

Get Ready to Rock reviews the upcoming Ian Gillan Band box set Down The Road: The Complete Ian Gillan Band Story, now due out apparently at the end of March. Another wonderful package, two fold out card cases with a 7” booklet that is well annotated. Bonus artwork includes both UK and Japanese editions of […]

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An owl meeting a bumblebee in mid-flight

Guitar Player has an undated interview with Ritchie Blackmore, where he discusses searching for the perfect guitar tone back in the day. “It’s interesting to note that Jim Marshall didn’t know much about amplifiers,” Ritchie Blackmore says. “And yet he knew how to design something that caught on like crazy. This is a similar situation […]

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To help you cross in transition

Guitar World posts Steve Morse’s tutorial on wide intervals. Steve has kindly agreed to this unique tutorial on big intervals, a core component of his trademark style. He defines big intervals as anything larger than using adjacent notes, such as playing a linear scale (eg root, second, third). Typically, big intervals involve skipping strings, and […]

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There in middle of the circle it lies

Rainbow The Temple of The King 1975 – 1976 box set is about to be released on March 6, 2026, and Youtube channel Classic Album Review offers an unboxing video. You won’t learn much new from it that we have not covered before, but if you’d like a peek inside the box, here it is.

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Rather they bought it than stole

Jon Lord promoting his then new album Beyond the Notes on a German TV morning show. This happened on September 23, 2004.

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Rather thrown by the magnitude

Ritchie Blackmore has been awarded a Lifetime Achievement award by the organization called National GUITAR Museum. Executive director of the museum (and former Guitar magazine editor-in-chief) HP Newquist says: Most people know Ritchie from being the driving creative force behind two of the defining hard rock bands of all time—Deep Purple and Rainbow. But before […]

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Beam us up, Scotty

The latest album from William Shatner has been announced, and it is promised to be “a heavy metal extravaganza powered a veritable army of metal stars – each one personally selected and hand-picked by Shatner”. Said stars include Ritchie Blackmore, Zakk Wylde, Edgar Froese (Tangerine Dream), Wayne Kramer (MC5), and Henry Rollins (Black Flag, The […]

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A yodel for 17 strings and 2 sticks

Check out Steve Morse, John Petrucci, Dave LaRue, and Mike Portnoy jamming on a cover of Focus classic Hocus Pocus. This was recorded during the last John Petrucci’s Guitar Universe event, that took place in Las Vegas on August 7-10, 2025.

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