[Updated with tracklist and artwork] The record company has announced that the new single from Now what?! will be Above and Beyond, to be released on October 25 in Europe (28th in UK) as

• 7” purple vinyl (B-side: Space Truckin’ recorded live in Majano, Italy, on July 24, 2013);
• CD single with bonus tracks Things I’ve Never Said (studio), Space Truckin’ and Hush (both live in Rome, Italy, July 22, 2013).

Cover of the single was designed by an unnamed (so far) “young artist from Brighton” who has won the competition.

There wasn’t really a brief as such, just a size and resolution and some information about the song; and researching other Deep Purple album art revealed an eclectic mix at best, with no overall style or direction from which to take influence. So basically, I’ve created something I like, in the style that has been much loved when used for my Broken Parachute album art (see my other deviations).

It’s based synaesthetically on the music itself, the feel of the sound of Deep Purple, and also on the lyrics of the song and the circumstances of its creation (read about that here), which speak of hope carried on the waves of loss.

Or something like that, anyway. It’s purple, and that’s good enough in itself, surely?

Prints of the cover art are available for sale via DeviantArt.

In other news, a tour edition of Now what?! will be released on November 8 29 (Europe) and November 11 December 2 (UK). It will be a double CD, the first disc will contain the “regular studio album” (whatever that means), while the second one will be subtitled The NOW What?! Live Tapes and will contain 70 minutes of live material recorded this summer in Italy, Germany and Sweden — live versions of the three ?! singles, plus selection of other songs. The “three singles” presumably are All the Time in the World, Vincent Price, and either Hell to Pay or Above and Beyond.

Also, according to the record company, the album has sold “in excess of a quarter of a million copies”.

Update: online retailer JPC.de has full tracklist. The first CD will include both It’ll Be Me and First Sign Of Madness. The double album is fairly reasonably priced at €15.

Disc 1 — studio album

1. A Simple Song
2. Weirdistan
3. Out Of Hand
4. Hell To Pay
5. Body Line
6. Above And Beyond
7. Blood From A Stone
8. Uncommon Man
9. Apres Vous
10. All The Time In The World
11. Vincent Price
12. It’ll Be Me
13. First Sign Of Madness

Disc 2 — Live Tapes

updated tracklist

1. Fireball
2. Into The Fire
3. Hard Lovin’ Man
4. Vincent Price
5. Strange Kind Of Woman
6. Body Line
7. Above And Beyond
8. Perfect Strangers
9. All The Time In The World
10. Hush
11. Black Night
12. Smoke On The Water

Thanks to Classic Rock and dirie for the info, and to Lutz for the new release date.

Eagle Rock has posted preview clip from the the upcoming Perfect Strangers Live DVD. The album is out on October 14 on DVD, CD+DVD, audio download and video download.

Thanks to Andrey Gusenkov for the info.

The Trondheim Experiment is a web presentation of a Jon Lord concert in Trondheim, Norway on May 24, 2010, and it can only be described as Jon’s bonanza. The entire show professionally filmed, plus introductory notes from Knut Morten Johansen, behind the scenes footage from rehearsals, Jon’s interview to local TV, and photo gallery — all that is available for your viewing, reading, and listening pleasure absolutely free, with blessings from Jon’s family and management.

Enjoy it at http://trondheimexperiment.com/

Thanks to JonLord.org for the info.

Flying Colors will release Live in Europe on October 14 via Mascot Records. It is a recording of their performance in Tilburg, Netherlands, on September 20, 2012.

Available formats will include:

• 2CD
• 3LP (clear vinyl, limited to 1000 copies)
• Blu-ray
• DVD

Preorders made through Mascot webstore will come with the following bonuses:

• free MP3 download of The Storm (live) with download link in confirmation email
• free poster
• free MP3 downloads of Blue Ocean and Love Is What I’m Waiting For (recorded in Hamburg on September 9, 2012) with download links sent when your order is shipped

The Blu-ray and DVD includes the 45-minute documentary First Flight featuring interviews with the band members, meet & greet footage and candid moments on the road captured backstage, in the dressing rooms, the band bus, and during tour rehearsals. The documentary also features excerpts from songs recorded during the band’s very first show (LA, USA), first show in Europe (Hamburg, Germany) and final show (London, UK) of the tour.

The 3LP pack will be available separately or as a bundle with an exclusive t-shirt.

Track list:

1. Blue Ocean
2. Shoulda Coulda Woulda
3. Love Is What I’m Waiting For
4. Can’t Find A Way
5. The Storm
6. Odyssey
7. Forever In A Daze
8. Hallelujah
9. Better Than Walking Away
10. Kayla
11. Fool In My Heart
12. Spur of the Moment
13. Repentance
14. June
15. All Falls Down
16. Everything Changes
17. Infinite Fire

Mascot records webstore: Europe, rest of the world

Twin sisters Camille and Kennerly Kitt, better knows as the Harp Twins, made their name by playing covers of rock tunes and music from the movies arranged for two harps. And being very easy on the eye doesn’t hurt either. 😉 Their latest instalment is Smoke on the Water:

Frankly, this one leaves me a bit cold. I guess some tunes just don’t translate well onto acoustical harp. Compare it to their take on Iron Maiden’s Fear of the Dark, which IMHO is pretty awesome:

Thanks to Dave Hodgkinson for the info.

TonePrints created by Steve Morse and Roger Glover are now available from TC Electronics. TonePrint technology is essentially a set of presets stored in a computer file that one can upload to the company’s effect boxes via USB to recreate particular sound. Toneprint sounds can be downloaded from TC Electronics’ web site for free, you just need to buy their hardware to use them.

Steve contributed three different TonePrints: his own take on echo (for Flashback Delay and the Flashback X4 Delay), and Beautiful Reverb and Spring for Hall of Fame Reverb pedal.

Steve having too much fun with the gadgets:

Roger’s contribution are both reverb TonePrints or the Hall of Fame pedal: Spare Room inspired by the sound of Jaco Pastorius, and Fun at Home, designed to give users the sound of a big concert hall in home or studio environment.

Roger creating Fun at Home:

Thanks to Noisecreep for the info.

Earlier this month MyGlobalMind magazine spoke to ian Gillan. The interview now appears online.

What has been the biggest lesson that being in the rock and roll business for so long has taught you?

Well one of the most important things, that I enjoy because we love performing live, is the touring and the travelling. I was just talking about different cultures, and the effect that has had. We have been lucky people. I remember absorbing all these things and thinking “my god we don’t do this back home like this..”These people believe in doing it that way and this way. You learn very quickly first of all to try not to offend people by behaving in a crass way. Just because you don’t know about it ,is no excuse. There are a lot of things that are offensive to other people that we take for granted., that is just normal behavior. You learn about the more subtle things too, like humility and respect and those sort of things. Just a quick example, you know what people think about bowing. I have heard people saying I would not bow to any man. I have heard Americans say that and I have heard English people say that. Yet when you understand what bowing means to Japanese people. It’s not a question of subservience, or anything to do with that its all about personal dignity and self respect. The fact that you bow to somebody develops your own sense of humility. I have found that to be an absolutely fantastic quality to develop. If you put humility into your life it takes away so many of the other things, I have been struggling with through meditation and other things. I used to be a pretty wild kid before I got into music, and I realized that I could not continue that way if I wanted to be a musician. My early attempts to break free from my rage and my anger was meditation and that worked to a certain extent. When I saw a lot of these other cultures, I realized what humility could bring to you in terms of equilibrium and balance. It was just a fantastic thing. I would say travel and absorbing other cultures. That is just one in a long list of influences that has affected me over my life. I would say that the travel has been the single most important aspect of rock and roll life.

Read more in MyGlobalMind.

Thanks to BraveWords for the info.

Not to be outdone by boutique labels, Warner will be releasing in the US its own box set, via Rhino records. The 10-CD set is titled The Complete Albums: 1970-1976 and contains all studio albums from In Rock to Come Taste the Band, plus Concerto for Group and Orchestra, Made in Japan and Made in Europe. There is no word on bonus tracks (if any) or the (re)mastering job, which makes us believe it is safe to assume that this is just a repackaging job. The box set is due on October 8.

Thanks to Music Tap and BraveWords for the info.

A couple of vintage interviews with Ian Gillan.

Mike Eriksson has posted in his blog an interview he did with Big Ian during the Born Again tour in August 1983. They talked about dissolution of Gillan band, how he ended up in Black Sabbath, and the then circulating rumours of a Deep Purple reunion:

There were rumours of a Deep Purple reunion this spring…

– Well, I actually went over to America this January to meet with Ritchie Blackmore and Roger Glover for talks about Deep Purple. Jon Lord and Ian Paice were ready to do it. But somebody changed their mind so it fell through. I thought it could happen for a little while. As the situation is today it really can´t happen for the obvious reasons, but you never know.

Read more in the Trinkelbonker.

Official DP Youtube channel posted an interview for German TV done some time during the Naked Thunder tour (sadly, his answers are obscured by German voiceover):

Thanks to Yvonne Osthausen for the info.

P.S. We are being told that for one bizzare reason or another, the latter video is being blocked in Germany. Learn how to deal with such nonsense here.

Karolina Karbownik and Jakub Michalski did an interview with Ian Gillan for the Polish magazine Rock Axxess:

Your last album, Now What?!, is really great, I love it. However, it seems like you were not in a hurry to record new songs.

It’s true. We weren’t in a hurry at all. In fact, we would meet in a bar from time to time and somebody would say, “what about the new album?” And somebody else would say, “well, yeah, maybe next year”. That was the way we looked at it because we were having such a great time on the road and the main thing for us is the live performance. And then we had a meeting with Bob Ezrin, our producer. It was quite fascinating what came out of that. I think we remembered a lot of things we might have forgotten, particularly that Deep Purple is primarily an instrumental band. We make music and put the songs on top. I know that sounds strange but I’ve never done that with anyone before – other writers or other bands. And another thing is, he said: “Don’t worry about the length of the stuff, don’t think about it. Let the ideas develop naturally and do what you do on stage every night.” So that really got us interested and of course we went into the studio with an added bonus of Bob being not only a great music producer, but also a guy that’s been around for a long time, so we respect his wisdom and judgment, and he became almost a sixth member of the band. So yeah, it was a long time but it was worth waiting and we enjoyed it.

The interview appears in Rock Axxess issue 15-16, which you can read online here and here (try the other link if one does not work for you) or download a PDF file (67.3 MB). The Polish version of the interview appears starting on page 6 with English one on page 15.

Thanks to Jakub Michalski for the info.