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We’ll raise a glass, maybe two
Ritchie Blackmore and Candice Night were inducted into the Long Island Music And Entertainment Hall Of Fame, with the ceremony that took place on May 13, 2025. It was a low-key affair with minimal glitz and glamour. Nevertheless, Ritchie decided not to show up, for one reason or another. Here is a video. A couple of congratulatory speeches, Candice performs a few tracks from her new solo album and a Blackmore’s Night staple Dandelion Wine, their daughter Autumn Esmeralda makes an appearance. Caveat: the whole thing is rather sugary sweet, so if that’s not exactly your cup of tea, you might want to abstain from watching it and complaining.
“Missing Blackmore” consolation prize — Blackmore’s Night performing Temple of the King (dedicated to Ronnie James Dio) in Phoenixville, PA, on April 24, 2025:
Thanks to Rob Teller Photography and wayne wellens for the videos, and to Blabbermouth for the heads-up.
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
good on you Ritchie, a no show is a good show at that sort of pretence. Cheers.
May 18th, 2025 at 22:16Why complain, it’s a family affair, sort of like a school play. I have no issues with it. And these are obviously live performances, which in this day and age is commendable.
Autumn has all grown! Time for the debutante ball, young lady, you know how your parents adore an era where all marriages were prearranged and entered into only to strengthen (rock) nobility ties …
Whether I would personally want to be caught in medieval cosplay garb on Long Island of all places is another matter. I make it a habit to not dress as Cowboys & Injuns on German streets either. 🙄
Man, I wish Ritchie @o1:23 would have just kept playing …
https://youtu.be/qCoUmMDiEhs
that would have been a set highlight!
PS: Ritchie called off his appearance at the LIM&EHoF induction at the last minute when they told him he wouldn’t be allowed to smash his lute! 🫢
May 18th, 2025 at 23:52Not showing up for his induction – that’s vintage Ritchie for you. Don’t we all love him for things like this?
May 19th, 2025 at 07:52If Edith received an award like that and I chose to not go … I fear my freedom of self-expression would be severely impacted by marital stress, just sayin’. 🙄😁
Tasmanian cheers of “no show is a good show at that sort of pretense” seem to be fueled by youthful vigor for “raising hell” and “showing them where it’s at!”, but perhaps a bit short-sighted considering what kind of messages are transmitted if
– your partner goes to such an event, but you consider it beneath you,
– you live for decades in a more rural community that bestows an honor like that upon you, combines it with a really low-key and less than pretentious celebration at which you as the famous Brit rock star in semi-retirement cannot be arsed to appear (while Joan Jett had apparently no issues with being there when she was inducted, unworried about how this would look with her “cool rock chick with a Les Paul Junior” + LGBTQ street credibility).
I know, the Ritchie altar boys here will jump at the opportunity of depicting this as yet another show of the free spirit of a great maverick artist and auteur, uninhibited by the concerns of lesser mortals about how this all might go down with other people. I mean it would have been really terrible for his charismatic reputation had he joined his wife, picked up an acoustic guitar for a song or two, quipped something into a microphone like “I’m only here because my wife said it was important and I better go!”, and maybe have Autumn and Rory hear on their next school day from their classmates: “I heard your dad was really cool and funny at that event.” Let’s not taint the compelling mystique of a man who at 80 still chooses to act like a 14-year-old, he’s Ritchie after all! Youth is fleeting, but you can preserve immaturity forever …
To answer your question, Georgivs, no, I find it neither entertaining nor lovable, arrogant and callous more like. It would have hurt him fuck all to join her.
May 19th, 2025 at 10:07@ 2 – “Ritchie called off his appearance at the LIM&EHoF induction at the last minute when they told him he wouldn’t be allowed to smash his lute! 🫢” And Ritchie obeyed? Half a century later and time does mellow people doesn’t it. He would have never obeyed back in the day. Cheers.
May 19th, 2025 at 11:51Ritchie happy for candice to get very nice award for music for achievement.
May 19th, 2025 at 11:55Well I don’t think not attending this ceremony of sorts is cool. But it’s not arrogant either.
May 19th, 2025 at 12:47Anyone – especially at his age – has the right to spend their time on earth, limited as it is, the way the want to. In the company they want to. The older I get the less I want to tolerate people wasting my time by boring the hell out of me.
@4 See, Uwe, I’m a cat guy. I’m used to being next to cats. They have a reputation for being nasty and selfish and ignoring people. At the same time they are the epitome of coolness, excel at whatever they do and are fast gunslingers. We cat people love them for this combination of the dark and the light. Ritchie is like that so it’s natural for me to accept his shenanigans lightly.
May 19th, 2025 at 21:12It’s been said that since Ritchie liked working with Candice more than Doogie White, that that’s one of the reasons they’re together. Am I the only one who’s seen Doogie doing this song/medley at the RJD tribute show? It seems that a bad knee wasn’t the only issue.
May 19th, 2025 at 21:20Boo hoo, sob sob, weep weep, moan and groan etc etc Uwe. Get the red carpet out, it is so special. It is a load of bollocks and you know that very well. Lets all pretend shall we. Ritchie is true to himself and anyone else should be too. Why should someone attend something they don’t want to or need to ?????????????????. All these so called award ceremonies are pretentious gala snobbery and pompous ass glitz rubbish. Remember the old line ‘it’s only the glitter and shine that gets through’. Oh and also an Australian band and a song called Credit Cards; ‘half the world with credit cards, the other half left to starve’. All these awards ceremonies are what went on eons ago and unfortunately are now out of control it seems, a bit like the plague. Let’s pretend we are really important people, while we leave the dogs at the door. “Ashes and diamond, foe and friend, were all equal in the end’. Good ole Roger sang that back in 1983. I have no problem with people being praised and acknowledged that actually do something for an earthly cause, charity and true philanthropy etc (and not just for a tax dodge). People who are entertainers are just that, they are artists and that should be all it is. ‘Not, look at me everybody, I am famous, etc etc. My early morning coffee just went down rather well. Be a good day. Cheers.
May 19th, 2025 at 22:38@7
“The older I get the less I want to tolerate people wasting my time by boring the hell out of me.”
May 20th, 2025 at 04:31– somehow Max, I hear a praise from you to us in here… ☺️😉
He shoulda went (unless ill) support your wife and daughter for goodness sake!
May 20th, 2025 at 11:04Why attend some quicky forgotten sub-par jaboree to get a slap on the back from a ‘nobody’?
Its nothing to do with ‘cool’ or ‘arrogant’ – he probably just couldnt be arsed.
May 20th, 2025 at 11:38“All these so called award ceremonies are pretentious gala snobbery and pompous ass glitz rubbish. Remember the old line ‘it’s only the glitter and shine that gets through’. “
Are we talking about the same event, you coffee-gulping Tassie curmudgeon?! 🤣 What Nick posted (and Rob and Wayne photographed/filmed for posterity) reminded me more of a “cow of the month”-award in a rural community, a high school drama class celebration or a coffee & cake break at a neighborhood garage sale for the benefit of the local animal shelter. Pretentious? Gala? Snobbery? Pompous? Glitz? You make it sound like Ritchie valiantly snubbed the Met Gala or the Oscars when all he did was show disrespect to what was largely a communal affair set up by people who would have been chuffed had he shown his scrawny butt there for 10 minutes. Don’t declare him an anti-glitz celeb counterculture warrior just yet, your Ritchie ‘Che’ Blackmore, that fearless fencing fighter for true values. 😑
Did you check your caffeine levels this morning, dear?
Let’s put it this way, had the same thing happened in some small Algarve town and Karin’s honeysuckle received an invite, I would have betted my Judas Priest collection that he would have graciously shown up. G-R-A-C-I-O-U-S, look it up!
Rudeness doesn’t get better with age.
May 20th, 2025 at 11:43@14
“Let’s put it this way, had the same thing happened in some small Algarve town and Karin’s honeysuckle received an invite, I would have betted my Judas Priest collection that he would have graciously shown up. G-R-A-C-I-O-U-S, look it up!”
– Huh??
May 20th, 2025 at 13:16I heard my name mentioned but I don’t get why…..
Karin, you read me like a book! 🙂
Just look at Uwe’s reply to the rest of us above … now if that ain’t entertaining I don’t know what is!
And as a wise man stated a man should have a hobby anyway, and alll things Purple is one of mine so I won’t get bored. Especially not given the amount of highly enjoyable content here.
And before you – or anybody else – asks me to add “a woman” to the wisdom shared above I dare to ask why it seem to be mostly men that have hobbys. Think about it. Spending hours and hours in
the garage
the basement
with a collection of stamps/records/beer mugs/you name it
in football stadiums
with a miniature train set
or whatever.
Why is it always men?
May 20th, 2025 at 14:50@16
“Karin, you read me like a book! 🙂”
– well yes I do! But now I just need to find out what kind of book we’re talking about…. A crime story? A romantic novel? A biography? A dictionary? A family saga? Or maybe a rockumentary? (Purple of course!)
Well I don’t know 🤷🏼♀️
“Especially not given the amount of highly enjoyable content here.
– I agree wholeheartedly 😍
But then you say this:
“Why is it always men?” (Having hobbies that is)
– ohhhh sweetheart, let me tell you why this is: (are you ready?)
Because women are busy:
Cleaning after you men
Washing your clothes
Feeding your children
Washing the car
Vacuuming the car
Cleaning the windows
Cooking dinner
Cooking breakfast
Making your lunch (unless you work in a place where the lunch is incl!)
Pampering ourselves so we are found likeable in your eyes (and this is a rather time consuming task the older we get 😄)
Reading newspapers (so we are intelligent partners for you, and you actually wanna talk to us)
Taking tango lessons
Preparing vacations
Working outside the home (or in my case, working in my home, nevertheless it’s still quite stressful 😉)
Keeping the garden neat
Walking the dog
Feeding the dog/cat/canary
Getting rid of the moles in the lawn
Watering the plants inside the house
Grocery shopping
Vacuuming the house
Cleaning the floors
Squeezing lemons in the morning for your health benefits
Making sourdough for your favorite bread
Cleaning the showers after you have been bathing (and everything is a mess ☺️)
Ironing the bed linens
Making appointments with the dentist for you
Making appointments with the chimney sweeper
Removing the bird that fell down the chimney (and no, letting the cat do the job is not an option I’ve been told)
Cleaning after the little bird who was in terror when it finally came out of the fireplace, and I promise you there is soot everywhere!
Phew – and now I think I’m done!
So tell me, dear Max, where should a woman like myself find any time to any kind of hobby 😄 (yes! I truly expect an answer…)
May 20th, 2025 at 16:49Back to the music, please!
May 20th, 2025 at 18:19@18
Svante, it was Uwe that started it all!
Don’t oppress me 😄😄
https://youtu.be/Dgp9MPLEAqA?si=8MGJ_5Xc3TKJQBES
May 20th, 2025 at 18:49“Because women are busy:
Cleaning after you men …
(an abundance of other pleasant and fulfilling pastimes painstakingly compiled by out lead contributeress Karin the First follow)
… Cleaning the showers after you have been bathing (and everything is a mess ☺️)
etc etc etc”
Yes, Karin, all that and yet, given all these opportunities at self-expression, you wimmin still nag! 😇
But gratitude is a fleeting commodity in this world.
__________________________________________________________________
Back to the music, yes, as Svante has intrepidly guided us, I just posted this on the Status Quo Board, they’re celebrating there with the release of the Status Quo Live!-8 CD set
https://media1.jpc.de/image/w3200/front/0/0740155743437.jpg
(all three nights from the Glasgow Apollo in 1976, this is to a Quo Nut what the release of the source material for MIJ in the 90ies was to us):
“It’s been a while, my chord-challenged little brothers, but as I sit here at my fish pond listening to the 8-CD extravaganza the good people of Burning Shed have sent to me (I normally order stuff like Be-Bop Deluxe or Gentle Giant from them, they are probably desperately wondering what’s wrong with me now 😀 ), I was benevolently thinking of you (as I often do): Are you happy now? That the second-best overdub-free live hard rock album ever (sorry possums, DP’s Made In Japan cannot be toppled!) has now finally been released in and augmented to full glory? I imagine it to be as pivotal a moment for you as when in the 90ies the three nights from Osaka (2x) and Tokyo (1x) were released as “Live In Japan” for Purple fans. Enjoy. I’ll chip in after I’ve listened to it some more and more comprehensively. Currently, the remaster of the original live album already sounds impressive – not so much as if you were in the audience, but as if you were standing on stage with them.
PS: Alan’s bass playing drives tears to my eyes. He gives new meaning to the word organic. What a loss.
PPS: Even the band’s mistakes and inaccuracies (I hear nowadays more than back then) have undeniable charm, très lovely! 👌👍”
May 20th, 2025 at 20:29@ 14 – Listen, Learn, Read on………..Uwe clearly doesn’t remember or he does NOT take note at all of peoples previous comments. I have clearly stated my attitude towards any of these ceremonial pompous gala related events before, NOT just this one. This one had you waiting with baited breathe, simply because if Ritchie did attend, you would have shredded him because he didn’t attend the bigger event, the one you mentioned at Cleveland when this was first mentioned here at THS. In your case Uwe, Ritchie was on a hiding to nothing. My caffeine levels are always good and I was on my way into town to pickup Jon Lord’s Sarabande cd yesterday after commenting in regards to this story, a relaxed good mood I was in all day. It is a load of bollocks from where I stand and many others think the same. Many artists think that too, we know of a few comments and also non appearances over the years. Time ladies and gentleman. Cheers.
https://ultimateclassicrock.com/rock-hall-of-fame-rock-star-complaints/
https://www.loudersound.com/news/deep-purple-gillan-has-no-respect-for-rock-hall
https://metalinvader.net/en/ian-gillan-rock-and-roll-hall-of-fame-its-no-big-deal/
May 20th, 2025 at 22:46I’d sure like to answer this in detail, Karin. But we have to obey the rules, don’t we. Svante made that perfectly clear. A man not only of good taste but of general wisdom I tend to believe.
Have you listened to Sea Glass and would you recommend it?
May 21st, 2025 at 05:42This ‘Hall Of Fame’ thing they have going on – do they have one for each state, town, street?
Maybe RB ‘G-R-A-C-I-O-U-S-L-Y’ declined the offer coz he couldnt be arsed.
Candice still has quite a voice and certainly came dressed for the part considering the list of chores busy women have. Maybe RB wears the pinny.
‘Temple of The king’ belongs to RJD – nobody else can do it justice
May 21st, 2025 at 07:47https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/films/features/oscars-actors-bradley-cooper-oscar-issac-b2506546.html
May 21st, 2025 at 08:33@20
Uwe, do you know what you really ought to fall down on your knees and thank your Heavenly Father for???
– that most women are born with a VERY good sense of humour
🤣🤣🤣
May 21st, 2025 at 08:43@22
You are of course right Max, we do need to obey the admin guys!
But, if you really wanna put your money where your mouth is, then find my email address, it’s quite easy actually, and then I really will look forward to all your detailed answers! 😉
Sea Glass?!
Well I have tried, but there is too much sugar upon sugar, so for my health’s sake (you know diabetes-wise…) I stopped and put on BS and Hotline, listen to that for some times, and then my own sugar levels were normal again…
But that’s just my opinion! I guess Uwe worship her 🤭
May 21st, 2025 at 08:49@ 19 – ‘We can’t even blame the Romans’, he he he. Well done Karin and I have not watched that for a very long time, excellent. However can we blame Uwe for that or anything else. Too right we can, he he he. Cheers.
May 21st, 2025 at 09:19@ 7…Max, Get off of my lawn 🤣, i agree max!
May 21st, 2025 at 11:31On music: Max, as a “worshipper of Candice” (now that Karin has found me out!), I can contribute: Sea Glass is not a rock album nor does it claim to be. It has a diaristic and even melancholic approach, but the lyrics aren’t really sugary, they’re emotive and befit where she is in life as a middle-aged woman and mother of two teenagers, it’s a “Brigitte” (the German women’s magazine) record if you know what I mean. The music is sparse and not overdone + nowhere is it cheesy, banal or cringeworthy like BN’s brand of nonsense escapism into an archaic era is. It’s the type of album you can listen to while on your way to a funeral as background to some introspection and you’ll feel a bit better after you’ve heard it all. If Sea Glass is “sugary”, then so are quite a f ew of Jon Lord’s solo works, let’s settle for “pastoral” instead.
On wimmin and such: Yes Karin, they generally actually have an extremely good sense of humor even if they can’t tell jokes (mostly). They also tend to be a lot less full of themselves than men.
On apples and oranges and why there seems to be no difference between the two on Tassie island: Yeah, right, so Ritchie has really shown it to those glitzy corporate creeps on Long Island where they can stick their celeb-drenched extravaganza by scorning them! What a fearless fighter against record industry backslapping he’s always been, I really had forgotten all about how he ardently sticks to his principles.
https://img.sparknews.funkemedien.de/228304041/228304041_1580475381_v16_9_1200.jpeg
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/ba/Deep_Purple_1974.jpg
https://i.pinimg.com/736x/cb/ea/f1/cbeaf1777169661b9def05fa008af198.jpg
https://media.gettyimages.com/id/593326601/photo/rainbow-presented-gold-disc-for-difficult-to-cure-tokyo-august-1981.jpg?s=612×612&w=gi&k=20&c=KcjPZtPemE5be2LJ9112spVAb0SgUM_b4o18feM5EWY=
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQAyff5WlxYyJm-OdcKD4eLzA8mXFwkQ9U76g&usqp=CAU
When it suits him of course, but aren’t we all sinners?
And had he gone, my reaction wouldn’t have been one of ridicule, but one of appreciation for (i) listening to his wife, (ii) showing a Robin Hood approach in his social life by shunning the Cleveland event and showing up in Stony Brook, you know me.
May 21st, 2025 at 12:44@27
Well MacGregor, I simply adore Monty Python 🥰😍
Watching Eric Idle as this guy who desperately wants to be a woman, ‘you can call me Loretta’ – it’s simply 1.class 😄
I’m the very proud owner of all their material on dvd!
Unfortunately René can’t see the fun in them, so it’s not very often I pamper myself with their brilliant and creative humour!
(But I sneak to watch goodies at YT!)
I’m in such awe of them because they were the first who did comedy the way they did: genius and crazy whirled together with great charms 😍
I do believe I also have all the films they have made.
And ‘Life of Brian’ – awwww man it’s a gem amongst gem! (‘Brian is not the Messiah, he is just a very naughty boy’ 😂) and who can forget the song at the end of the movie: ‘Always look at the bright side of life’ (sometimes easier said than done, I know! (Please Svante, I am mentioning music…😉)
But also the Marx Brothers are amongst my favorits! They were completely geniuses in all their craziness 😂
Maybe you have seen this before:
https://youtu.be/pPHjJnFqs-s?si=_5nWFInO-YA9aqNX
May 21st, 2025 at 14:45Groucho being his usual insulting self! 😄
@29
“Yes Karin, they generally actually have an extremely good sense of humor even if they can’t tell jokes (mostly).”
– and that Uwe, is why we have this great sense of humour so we don’t strangle you in your sleep (ups, too sinister?)
“They also tend to be a lot less full of themselves than men.”
– well, that all depends on what’s for dinner! 😉
Do you by chance know this one:
https://youtu.be/VKh6R5qsZpk?si=YxhUUKdDEA-fAc0D
I seem to remember some collaboration between Jeff and Marc Bolan, but I can’t find anything about it.
May 21st, 2025 at 14:54You have claimed, and rightfully, that you are the master of all the search machines in the world, so can you tell me if it’s true?
Legend has it, liebe Karin, that Jeff Lynne played on this punky little T. Rex goody here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaRMIFpouoU
And that Marc then returned the favor on this here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7uSYzl8rxp0
It sounds like it could be true. Mind you, there were claims for decades of Marc Bolan having played the rhythm guitar on the studio version of this here too, but that has meanwhile been debunked:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bpuf6AmQH4M
Though Tina would have certainly been his type given that he picked likewise talented Gloria Jones as his wife …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73IhpmXPQvw
I know, I know, and you all thought it was a Soft Cell original. It wasn’t.
May 21st, 2025 at 22:05Shock, gasp, horror – Candice turns all feminist against the dragons of patriarchy!!!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x7xvI0r5kBA
Where will it end? 😑
May 22nd, 2025 at 00:34@32
Thank you Uwe 👍🏼👍🏼👍🏼
I have always loved Ma-Ma-Ma Belle, several reasons: Jeff is actually playing the guitar!
What have bugged me ever since the first days with the Move/ELO was all the synthesisers, you never know if you heard the real instruments, or if Richard Tandy were going berserk on the keyboards! But in the beginning, especially around ‘On the Third Day’, they were for real!
(And now I have a pretty good idea that you will say that you always can hear if it is the real instruments or the synths! Well, ok, but I don’t 😝)
Thanks for the links 😃
Marc Bolan – by the way a true illiterate if anyone ever was – was said to have lend Jeff his guitar, I guess for ‘Showdown’.
“but that has meanwhile been debunked:”
– arrrh too bad!
What a power woman Tina was!
Btw: she is also the long life secret dream of René’s! Can’t really say I blame him 😂
‘Tainted love’ – the one song I actually like with Marylin Manson…
Yes I thought Soft Cell were the godfathers of ‘Tainted Love’! Well, live and learn 😃
May 22nd, 2025 at 13:24A new interview with Candice is live now across the platforms we talk about the 30th anniversary of Candice involvement in writing and performing on Rainbow’s Stranger in us All back in 95 , and up to date with her new album “Sea Glass” and we get the details of whats happening with the new Blackmores Night album 4 tracks already done and Richie has completed another track in the last few days, so we get updates on that and how Richie is at present ..https://youtu.be/83F8Vbd6RWM
May 23rd, 2025 at 16:46