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Gettin’ Tighter

Cover of “Gettin’ Tighter: Deep Purple ‘68 - ‘76″ by Martin Popoff.

Martin Popoff has a new book published — Gettin’ Tighter: Deep Purple ’68 – ’76. According to his press release, the book is 250 pages long and covers “every last recorded track throughout the band’s celebrated albums from the ’60s and ’70s”, “b-sides and key solo career moments” together with “previously never published photos by Rich Galbraith”.

We don’t have a copy (yet), so this is what we’ll have to rely upon.

You can purchase the book directly from Martin’s site.



28 Comments to “Gettin’ Tighter”:

  1. 1
    Bo says:

    Strange, but nice to see a frontpage whick is NOT Gillan or Blackmore. Look forward to see it.

  2. 2
    SEVEN-47 says:

    I agree Bo; I only wish Tommy had gotten well, and recorded a second album with Deep Purple. I really liked the direction they were going!

  3. 3
    Cupcakeocaster says:

    Oh yeah! I know what I’ll get for my thirtheenth
    birthday this year!

  4. 4
    andre sihotang says:

    CTTB is the most honest album Deep Purple ever made. I love Tommy Bolin and he always be the hero for me even his presence in DP didn’t lasting so long.

    The only fault is Bolin and Hughes were lost their way into the heaven of drugs and others; that didn’t get along with the clear air life of Coverdale, Lord, and Paice which dedicated all their life at the time for Deep Purple. Sad to say, but I must admit their live shows (as I read from many reviews) is totally horribly bad and made the way to the split of the band.

    Bolin is a nice guy, he brought the joy to the studio when make CTTB. Gettin’ Tighter, Comin’ Home, and Drifter are wonderful guitar songs, make Blackmore and Morse look different. I still love to hear CTTB again and again. He should at least make a place in the cover of at least one of Deep Purple biography or something else. That’s this particular book has done.

  5. 5
    stefan says:

    Bo & Seven-47!

    I totally agree…..I know many hardliners detest the Bolin era, and try their best to erase it from their memory! I´d just ignore those “Purple Taleban” fundamentalists, and state CTTB as one of the best DP albums ever!It sure would have been interesting if they had done a second album….what might have been?

    Have to add the book to my christmas list.it´ll fit nicely in my DP section rock library!ROCK ON!

  6. 6
    Patrick says:

    coverdale said that the next album would be an all out rocker dident he ?? neway….. CTTB is fuckin great !! i love the album just as good as stormbringer, although i think that the rainbow album is slightly better “prolly cause ima hugh blackmore fan” ….. my dad had the chance to see them in miami but his freind got busted and couldent attend , if he only knew …..:(

  7. 7
    Bobby D says:

    Deep Purple “fans” who dismiss ‘Come Taste the Band’ are really missing the boat. CTTB flew under the radar with mass audiences in 1975, but it always struck a chord with me and my friends (all Purple fans). I saw this line-up perform at Radio City Music Hall on the CTTB tour and they did the Deep Purple name proud.

    CTTB is not as good as ‘Burn,’ but lightyears better than the uneven ‘Stormbringer.’ Tommy Bolin was definitely one of rock’s most gifted guitar players and I always wondered what he would have done musically if he had lived.

    I really enjoy just about anything that DP puts out – from Blackmore to Bolin to Blackmore to Morse, and from Evans to Gillan to Coverdale to Gillan. Didn’t care for the “Joe Lynn Turner Year.” That album sounded like a bad Rainbow record.

    Anyway, unclenched your keesters and give CTTB a fair shot and be amazed at Tommy Bolin’s viruosity.

    ‘Rapture of the Deep’ was very good — can’t wait to hear what’s next!

  8. 8
    AndreA says:

    well said

  9. 9
    AndreA says:

    …SEVEN-47

    Great Bolin

  10. 10
    purplepriest1965 says:

    May I say that, probably being one of the fundamentalists here according to people here who are actually over exaggerating in their pro Morse attitude,

    I really love CTTB

    I never really got to grips with the live outings of this incarnation, though.
    Paicey and Lordy on the other hand were EXCELLENT during that tour.

    Uhmm, were they never?

  11. 11
    Patrick says:

    sorry it wasent miami it was the lakeland civic center feb 6 1976 ….. his buddy was arrested in the parking lot in there car , he said the lakeland FL PD worked him over pretty good . he knew he had to go 4 help b/c they were notorious for police brutality !

    till this day he still regrets not seeing hughes coverdale and bolin

  12. 12
    Mike Eriksson says:

    Just a couple of personal refections.

    1. Martin Popoff is a good writer, I´ve enjoyed his books about Rainbow, Dio, Black Sabbath and Judas Priest a lot. I like his very personal approach, going through the history of these acts album by album, track by track, with plenty of quotes (almost about every single song in fact) from the members of these acts. So a book on Deep Purples first period sounds like a perfect christmas present to oneself this year!

    2. Deep Purple MK4 was great. I know a lot of rock journalists and they all rate CTTB as a rock classic, period. But the band never had a chance to carve out a proper reputation. It simply didn´t last long enough, and they had way to many problems. Still, who can challenge the power on the “Long Beach” 1976 live-CD? I reckon it´s the most powerful live-CD alongside “Made In Japan” in the back catalouge.

    Nice of Martin to put Tommy Bolin on the cover.

    Cheers,

    MIKE

  13. 13
    TruthHurts says:

    Yes live “Russian Foxbat” is an essential listen, as is “Days May Come…The California Rehearsals 1975” recently reissued as a expanded 2-CD. The jams on this CD are awesome, especially “Dance To The Rock’n’Roll” and “Statesboro Blues”. Makes you wonder if there are any other great rehearsal tapes in the vaults!

    I guess we will have wait another 10-20 years for DP MkV with Joe Lynn Turner to get recognition for what they offered just like TB and MkIV were slated up until a few years ago!!

  14. 14
    Rascal says:

    You’ll probably have to wait until hell freezes over for that one………….with any luck!

  15. 15
    Mike Eriksson says:

    As a collector I can´t see why it would be such a crime to release a live-Cd with the Turner lineup. I think the real crime as far as live-releases go was the all sanctioned pile of crap called “Nobody´s Perfect”. The bands reputation skydived after that one. Or MK 2 anyhow. Luckily for us, they redeemed themselves in 1993, but they also did some good shows with Joe Lynn Turner before that.

    Again, as a collector, I want releases from all periods, including the one with Joe Satriani. It´s just history.

    It will all come out eventually. Too much money in it not to.

    Mike

  16. 16
    Rascal says:

    If a collecting obsession has to be fulfilled……….it aint a crime……

    A behavioral disorder maybe…..but no crime.

    On the bright side………..its probably treatable.

  17. 17
    Mike Eriksson says:

    If liking Deep Purple is a sickness, I don´t need no friggin doctor.

    Mike

  18. 18
    Rascal says:

    I guess theirs a big diffrence between a collector of music and a music lover………………

  19. 19
    purplepriest1965 says:

    Even more painful than Nobody s Perfect was that pile of releases all with Steve Morse and most of them sound the same
    BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINNNNNGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGGG!!!!!

    I still think they should release something else

    A 2 or 3 cd disc with live takes from the Lord and Morse era and NOT the old rehassle of Live in Japan Tracks

    We dont need that, never will anything be better than that

  20. 20
    TC says:

    Tommy Bolin was a great guitarist who was taken down by drugs. I was at the show at Radio City in New York in 1976. It was one of the worst shows I’ve ever been at. The guitar player didn’t even make the effort to learn the older songs. He was mocking Smoke on the Water. I remember he was playing the riff with bar chords. It was a sad day, I can not believe that a second album could have ever been made without one or two members going thru rehab. I know everyone likes to dream of what could have been, but I was at the show and it was awful. I’m sure Paice, Lord and Coverdale were all embarassed by those shows. That said, I did enjoy Come Taste the Band. It’s not one of my favorite DP albums but I enjoyed it. Tommy was brilliant when he was sober but he wasn’t sober nearly enough and certainly not while he was on stage.

  21. 21
    Mike Eriksson says:

    Here´s a positive review of this book,
    http://www.bravewords.com/hardwares/1001390

    …and here´s the MySpace page of the photographer that took the Bolinshot on the cover,
    http://profile.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=user.viewprofile&friendid=139299388

    Mike

  22. 22
    Nero says:

    Ow,… a book covering the entire DP era with Tommy on the cover.

    Wow,… brilliant, daring,… less than obvious but a perfect choice. Tommy was not 100% Purple. In fact,.. Purple was to small for this fellow. Now hold your horses,.. I do NOT state that he’s better,… that’s not my point.

    It’s funny because his solo album “Teaser” has so much more historical value than the imho really good but slightly less than brilliant “Come taste…”

    In fact,.. while the other Purple members became better working as a equal member in a group,… Tommy got worse,… and was huge when he was a natural leader (dunno if he saw that like that himself) of his own (less popular) bands,…

    So,.. he’s perhaps not that most representative of Deep Purple,.. but i’m filled with joy that he’s on the cover.

  23. 23
    SEVEN-47 says:

    Nero; Have you heard Tommy Bolin’s work with The James Gang? He recorded two albums with them, “Bang” and “Miami”. If you’re a Bolin fan, I’m sure you would enjoy them. 🙂

  24. 24
    Martin Popoff says:

    Hey guys – I’m definitely one of those huge Morse-era records fans, so it’s going to be a joy writing the second half of this. Hope you dig it – it’s sorta new territory for me, ‘cos I really try not to write books on bands where there are a lot of books out on the band already. So my enthusiasm was a little low, knowing a lot of this is old stories. Still, I’ve interviewed the guys maybe 30 times (25? 40?) so there is a fair bit of unseen footage. Martin

  25. 25
    SEVEN-47 says:

    VERY COOL!

  26. 26
    Bill The Wizard Pierce says:

    Hey Martin, it’s time for you to do a David Coverdale biography, his time with DP, as well as his history forming Whitesnake, with all it’s chapters, and twists & turns. I would love that!!! BP

  27. 27
    Martin Popoff says:

    I’ve toyed with a Whitesnake biog, but he’s really damn hard to get interviewin’. I’ve had a couple over the years, but man, couldn’t get him for the new album. Anyway, I’m doing Ready An’ Willing in the Ye Olde Metal concept when I get up to those years. Would like to chat with Bernie again. Anyway, I’ll be back on getting the second half of Purple done in Jan. Right now, I’ve got a five week gig working on the authorized Rush movie off-site. But will be back at ‘er in the new year.
    Martin

  28. 28
    Nick Simmons says:

    THRILLED to see Tommy on the cover of this book, and love the title! I was/am/will always be a huge Purple fan, and I adore Blackmore. That said, when they hired Bolin, they hired a genius,a versatile genius, somebody way beyond the rest of the band. While the Tommy period was fraught with darker influences and inconsistent performance, DP was lucky to hook up with – however tenuously – to a truly innovative, legendary, shooting star.

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