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Less is more
Music Radar has a short interview with Glenn Hughes, focusing mainly on his bass gear.
How has your bass rig evolved since your days with Trapeze in the early ’70s?
Well, Trapeze was all Hiwatt amps. And I wasn’t using pedals back then. I started using pedals in Deep Purple.
But for me, it was always Hiwatt. I had those amps right before I joined Purple, because, to me, those amps are the greatest.
John Entwistle [of The Who] turned me onto Hiwatts in 1970. Hearing him play through Hiwatts was the game-changer for me.
So for me it was always about the Hiwatts. And in Purple I used a wah-wah pedal on my bass. That was the only pedal I used.
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Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
There is this pet theory among bassists that Glenn’s audibility on Burn suffered because of exactly his penchant for Hiwatt amps. Those amps were always loud and reliable, but less middish than the Marshalls Roger used with his Rickenbacker (by nature, a Ric emphasizes different mid frequencies than, say, a Fender Precision, a Hiwatt amp exacerbates that effect). If you listen to Burn closely, the bass is there, low frequency-, treble- and presence-wise, but it’s undernourished in the mids which determine audibility.
Glenn might have been impressed with JAE’s use of Hiwatts with The Who, but the latter never had a Jon Lord to battle against for frequency space. Glenn didn’t have that experience from Trapeze, a power trio, either. Roger otoh always knew that he had to share space with Jon’s rumbling organ.
Yeah, Andy Fraser. What can I say, Free as the role model for Mk III, Ritchie had keen ears.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyle6hZLxRc
September 17th, 2025 at 23:14Glenn steps on his wah-wah pedal at 04:38 (and uses it for pretty much all of the rest of the song).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a8KjLhGsPmc
(The footage isn’t original though it’s well matched in places.)
I love the joint note-bending with Tommy at 05:38! 😎
It’s not like Mk IV couldn’t jam.
You can also hear that with Glenn having returned to his beloved P-Bass, lack of midrange frequencies was no issue anymore, Hiwatt amp or not. 😂
September 17th, 2025 at 23:56Really wished he hadn’t use a wah in Purple it was irritating!
September 18th, 2025 at 03:27RB, using wah-wah on bass became a thing in the 70s, Glenn wasn’t the only one, even Macca would do it, Geezer Butler, Bootsy Collins and Larry Graham too to name but a few.
Was it more irritating than Tony Iommi’s overuse of it? Michael Schenker played through one all the time too, but he really didn’t “pump” it, but put it to one setting and leave it at that to work like a treble booster.
Glenn never used it much in songs except in his jammy solo parts. I guess like many things it’s a matter of taste. I’m no great fan of his bass sound today – too distorted for me (strange for someone who used to like Hiwatt amps who prided themselves in the fact that they had so much headroom they really didn’t distort all that much; Roger otoh always complained that his Marshalls were too overdriven and not clean enough!), but distorted/overdriven bass has become a trend in bass playing again which I somehow missed.
Mind you, I’m not too happy about Roger’s ultra-clean hifi’sh sounds today (it’s gotten better under the auspices of Ezrin) with his active circuit Vigier either (too sterile, I miss that Rickenbacker growl), but it’s how he already wanted to sound in the early 70s, but didn’t have the technical means available because no bass rig back then could project such a clean sound at the required volumes.
September 18th, 2025 at 12:14Entwistle didn’t really use Hiwatt for very long. Basically I believe it was Marshall, then Sound City, then Hiwatt from I believe 68-72/73. After he started using Sunn for quite some time. The Who also used Vox Super Beatle amps around 67’68 when they toured America but only because they didn’t have their amps shipped over from England
September 19th, 2025 at 00:28Will you be seeing him on this tour, Uwe?
September 19th, 2025 at 07:28I largely identified Hiwatts with Pete in The Who, JAE was always on a quest for still better – and louder! – amps. At one point he bi-amped with solid state amps for the cleaner lows and sub-lows and valve amps for the overdriven/distorted mids and highs, sort of best of both worlds. Bi-amping was a real trend for a while.
September 19th, 2025 at 08:20Daniel, of course, three’s the charm! I saw him already twice this year, once with the Rock Meets Cheese revue and once with BCC.
Gonna see him in Mannheim soon.
September 19th, 2025 at 11:05Daniel, I was dutifully there. in the ‘ere and now with Glenn, but mostly really in Mannheim, an industrial town not to far away from where I live.
Glenn was still laboring with a cold of which he says “it’s been with me for four weeks now” (at 74 you just don’t cure as quickly), but it was a good show, comparatively few falsetto histrionics, he concentrates on his mid register these days though he can still hit those highs when he needs too like on First Step Of Love or Medusa.
The Capitol, a former 50s large cinema turned rock club, wasn’t sold out, but for a rainy Monday night decently filled.
As a three piece (+ laptop, more of this later …) they really cook, maybe not quite as great as the legendary three piece he had with Doug Aldrich and Pontus Engborg, but close. Doug did that Mel Galley groove even better than Søren who is just a too modern guitarist and more at home with emulating Ritchie than Mel though he is admirably variable and a good foil for Glenn.
Glenn played a mix of songs from his career: Way Back To The Bone(r) (a song about a girl who danced before him seductively at an early Trapeze gig at the Whiskey a Go Go in LA so we learned!), Medusa, You Are The Music plus Coast To Coast performed by Glenn alone on acoustic guitar, a couple of songs from BCC, one from Iommi Hughes, two from Hughes & Thrall (Muscle & Blood being the other one), a handful of solo numbers and a solitary Burn from his DP days (not really a sensible song to play without an organ, they performed as a three piece after all).
Almost two hours including the encore. Chosen got a fair splashing with four songs or so, Glenn was pleased to tell us that for the first ten days after release it is so far his bestselling solo album – maybe the Italians will want to extend, allora?
I give ZZ Top a hard time because of their ubiquitous backing tracks, so I can’t remain silent now: On some songs from Chosen and the BCC back catalog, one of Glenn’s stage techs discreetly triggered prerecorded keyboard tracks from his laptop standing in the left hand corner of the stage and listening attentively for his cues. That is the price you pay if you tour as a trio, but record music with a keyboarder on your newest album. It was just keyboards, no triggered vocals or extra guitar and percussion tracks like ZZ Top, but still I’m no great fan of this (increasingly popular) practice. Either play that stuff stripped down or bring a keyboarder along and if it means having him on stage for just a few songs. Burn as a trio is also not the greatest idea but w’ve had that already.
You don’t believe me? Then show me the clavinet player here! 🤗
https://youtu.be/St_SSLEwDl0
I know, most people don’t notice that stuff live and thus don’t care, but I do. 😑
September 23rd, 2025 at 01:02Thanks for the review, Uwe. As long as the vocals are not piped in, I have no problem with a computer prompted clavinet 🙂 After all, it’s an integral part of Stay Free.
September 23rd, 2025 at 08:17How many were in attendance do you think?
September 23rd, 2025 at 08:25I’m bad at this, Capitol has a capacity of 1.200 (I’ve never witnessed it nearly that full) over ground floor and balcony, balcony only had sparse attendance, ground floor 2/3 to 3/4 perhaps?
September 23rd, 2025 at 12:56Thanks Uwe, I could not really put my finger on it but there were sounds clearly not produced by the three elder gentlemen on stage. No doubt.
September 23rd, 2025 at 21:19Glenn’s playing and singing is 100% live of course, there is lots of variation from night to night.
I just consider triggered extra tracks to augment a band or in this case a three-piece naff and lame, but my views might be old-fashioned and puristic. Had Søren or Glenn produced the clavinet sound via their stringed instrument’s signals
– such effects exist in this day and age, both for guitar and bass:
https://youtu.be/fEKZ0NcLquE –
I wouldn’t have said a word, but rather pulled my hat for clever use of a nifty effect. Having a stage tech do it is perhaps not that far removed from that, but I still don’t like it. It doesn’t turn Glenn and his men into a K-Pop outfit though! 🤣 They played well and energized in Mannheim.
September 24th, 2025 at 13:56Great show last night in Pratteln with Glenn in a better mood than in Neuruppin. Larger venue too. Impressive to play lead bass and sing with minimal backup the way he does for 2 hours without leaving the stage. Very little falsetto screaming compared to the Purple show = good. Less is more. I think he’s ready for the next step of his career now though. One that would suit his voice even better. Namely, an acoustic tour with Coverdale. Three stools with Aldrich in the middle. Would go down a storm. In the absence of this, a more realistic proposition, GH and Soren in theaters performing a career retrospective of his own, similar to last night but acoustically with little, but some Purple. His acoustic version of Coast to Coast was mesmerizing and it was cool to see him improvise and a relief to hear his voice on its own, not having to fight the noise of a thunderous rock band. The storytelling would be no problem for him, since he does it already.
Not a sold out show last night but a solid turnout. Audience of the listening kind but that is to be expected given the deep cuts nature of the set. Burn felt obligatory as the closing track so I am glad he kept DP to a minimum even though the two audience shoutouts were for YKOM and GT. It felt as if the show was well received on the whole with the energy level high throughout.
Strongest part of the show: the trio of Can’t Stop the Flood, First Step of Love and You Kill Me, which really packed a punch with Glenn clearly into it. Otherwise, he was most at home vocally in the Trapeze songs including Coast to Coast. When they played You are the Music… it was hard to know if it was 1972 or 2025. That groove comes so naturally to him. I would have scrapped One Last Soul (BCC) but Grace from Fused worked well and he had no problems singing it.
Last night was all about the music. Not even an intro tape, they just came walking out. Glenn the last one to leave the stage after having introduced the band. “I’m sorry, I gotta go, I feel tired”. No wonder after such a strong performance. Hopefully he will be able to keep going.
September 25th, 2025 at 07:02So happy you liked it too, Daniel!
Glenn is criminally underrated as regards his sheer musicality. That tends to be obscured by the screaming falsetto, the flamboyant bass playing, the wild tales, the cocaine debauchery, his California gnashers and strange hairdos. But a song like Coast To Coast
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pFUllxDjGJ0,
which he wrote when he was around 20 in the early 70s, hardly features a conventional chord in it and the way he lays his vocal melody over the jazzy harmonies is about as un-pop or -rock as it gets. Ballads like Soldier Of Fortune or Temple Of The King, beautiful as they both are, are compostionally kids’ stuff in comparison and steeped in convention. Of course, that also makes them more accessible to most listeners, but I sure wish people would sometimes perk their ears a bit more and be receptive for the complexities in Glenn’s music. I find that “Oh, his music doesn’t sound anything like Blackmore would write, so it has no redeeming qualities!“-stance frustrating.
You show me another song that in the early 70s era sounded remotely like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eg-AbxgSw40
Credit where credit’s due.
PS: And Coast To Coast wasn’t the only song he wrote in that vein either as a young twen:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Svqr_1HEKIY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qpdX05t9JYo
In it’s genre-defying harmonic structure this stuff is up there with some of the music David Bowie would do (several years later!) who also always defied convention.
September 25th, 2025 at 13:38I think this makes a strong case for an acoustic tour 🙂
https://x.com/ctcfanzine/status/1971119115038490683
September 26th, 2025 at 06:07