Total Abandon will be released on vinyl by Back on Black label some time in September this year. So far, we have not been able to obtain any further details on packaging, bonus tracks (if any), etc.

Thanks to Alex Chornyy for the info.

In his recent interview to The Boston Phoenix Lemmy reveals this curious bit of anecdotage:

…Jon Lord was to a large extent responsible for me being in rock and roll. He was in a band called the Artwoods years ago, with Ronnie Wood’s brother Arthur. They were sort of a jazz-blues band, I guess. They played at the place in Wales where I was living, this dingy little boozer, and I was talking to Jon and, like an idiot, he gave me his address in London. So of course I went down there and he wasn’t there, but he was living at Art’s mother’s house where Ronnie Wood, who was in a band called the Birds, was living and they let me crash on the couch. I woke up and I’ve got all the Birds standing around me going, ‘What are you doing on Mom-mom’s couch?,’ all poking me with this terrible cockney rabble.

I never forgot that Jon — a complete stranger, and I’m some kid — gave me his address to come down to London and see him. I often told him thanks for that. I saw him late last year in a hotel in Germany in Cologne. He was over there doing some orchestral stuff, and we talked in the bar for awhile. . . . I’m glad I saw him, since he’s since departed.

Thanks to Blabbermouth for the info.

Steve Morse and Joe Lynn Turner both took part in the Supertramp tribute album Songs Of The Century due for release on August 14 via Cleopatra Records. Steve contributed for The Logical Song (together with the original Yes keyboard player Tony Kaye), while Joe sang on Bloody Well Right. Other guests on the album include Annie Haslam, Rick Wakeman, Chris Squire, John Wetton, Tony Levin, Robby Krieger, Peter Banks, Geoff Downes, and Jordan Rudess. The album was produced by Billy Sherwood.

Thanks to Blabbermouth for the info.

Japanese blog Muse on Muse has two interviews with both Steve and Neal Morse of the Flying Colors project:

Muse On Muse: All of your guitar solos, especially the one on “Kayla”, are very beautiful and match the songs perfectly. Are your solos improvised, or do you make them prior to recording? Please tell us about your approach to guitar solos.

SM: The solos are improvised. I do several at one time, and keep erasing the worst one. When I get one that I like, I listen and fix some parts that could be a little better. Usually, I will keep the ones that accidentally have little melodic sections that surprise me. In the end, I will probably quote something from these solos such as Kayla, since they are melodic. However, thinking back on that one, I intentionally referred back to the intro melody in the solo since I felt it wasn’t brought back enough during the song.

MM: What are your future plans with FLYING COLORS? Do you have plans for another album?

SM: Yes, I’m sure we do. At the moment, we haven’t even done our tour yet, and everybody has busy schedules, so we don’t know when that will be, but we all love the product of this chemistry and want to do more, I’m sure.

Read more in Muse on Muse.

Flying Colors embark on a short tour this September. Check the details in our calendar.

Thanks to BraveWords for the info.

Tommy Bolin Memorial Fund has opened a new official website dedicated to Tommy: tommybolin-official.com. It has much of what one would expect from it (an RSS feed for updates would be nice though) and is well worth a visit.

The Tommy Bolin Memorial Fund is a charitable foundation in memory of Tommy run with active participation of his brother Johnny. They have been involved with all the archive releases of the past few years and also organize the annual Tommy Bolin Festival in Sioux City, Indiana.

While being in Italy, Ian Paice played on July 29 not a particularly widely publicized gig (at least, we didn’t know about it) with a local Pink Floyd tribute band, for a change:

Ian will do a few more appearances in Italy next month: on August 3 in Arba (Pordenone), on 4th in Cercemaggiore (with JLT appearing on the same bill), and on the 24th in Marghera near Venice.

Thanks to Nigel Young and Andrey Gusenkov for the info.

429 Records is preparing a Tommy Bolin box set The Definitive Teaser — a three-CD collection featuring a remastered version of his classic album along with two CDs of outtakes and alternates. The project is produced by Greg Hampton and Johnnie Bolin.

Along with the three-CD Teaser box set, 429 Records will release a five-CD set, The Definitive Teaser Collector’s Edition which will also include the two-CD deluxe version of Great Gypsy Soul — a collection of Bolin songs recorded by a roster of players (including Steve Morse and Glenn Hughes) who signed on to pay tribute to Bolin. Both The Definitive Teaser and Collector’s Edition will be released on July 31.

The Definitive Teaser track listing:

Disc 1

Teaser Remastered

1. The Grind
2. Homeward Strut
3. Dreamer
4. Savannah Woman
5. Teaser
6. People, People
7. Marching Powder
8. Wild Dogs
9. Lotus

Disc 2

Alternates and Outtakes

1. Teaser
2. Flying Fingers
3. Cookoo
4. Wild Dogs
5. Chameleon

Disc 3

1. Crazed Fandango
2. People, People
3. Smooth Fandango
4. Marching Powder
5. Homeward Strut
6. Oriental Sky (Lotus)

Thanks to Blabbermouth for the info.

Two new video fragments of the early Purple in full flight have surfaced on YouTube. Shot at the Essen Grugahalle in Germany on October 11, 1969. It was the Internationales Essener Pop And Blues Festival and other acts on the bill included Pink Floyd, Tangerine Dream, Nice, and Hardin/York. We hope more of this footage exists somewhere and that one day we’ll be able to see all of it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OM8T4TgVHaY
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tAiJ3LRN7oU

Thanks to niceclips2 for posting the video and to Andrey Gusenkov for bringing it to your attention.

Classic Rock Magazine has a new interview with Ian Gillan focusing on his Ian Gillan Band years:

Why the jazz-rock-fusion direction?

I don’t know exactly, it was all a bit chaotic. To start off with we didn’t really have any direction at all, because nobody knew what they were doing.

Of course, my hero Johnny Gustafson was in the Ian Gillan Band. I didn’t know him as a bass player at first; I just admired his incredible voice. He was in the Big Three and The Merseybeats; he was a bloody awesome singer. We also had Ray Fenwick on guitar and Mark Nauseous [Nauseef], the drummer.

The only problem with that was that they were all Weather Report fans. That’s where the jazz came from.

I listened to Clear Air… the other day when I knew I was going to do this interview and it’s an interesting album. The music’s quite mental and there are no boundaries at all, because no one really bothered to set them.

But my Christ, there’s not one backbeat from beginning to end on the entire record.

Read more in Classic Rock.

Thanks to Andrey Gusenkov for the info.

Eddie Hardin:

JON LORD – THE GENTLEMAN OF MUSIC

My first encounter with Jon, well, I must have been 16! He was playing with THE ARTWOODS and I was rehearsing in a room nearby; I was immediately struck by the growling sound of his Hammond. I tried my best to be inconspicuous, though Jon spotted me in the shadows and asked me to leave.

Little did I know that in future years I would go on to tour with DEEP PURPLE when HARDIN & YORK were at their peak and DEEP PURPLE were playing the Albert Hall. I went on to work with Jon on several of my own projects, WIZARDS CONVENTION, THE BUTTERFLY BALL, WIND IN THE WILLOWS.

Personally I remember him with great affection and during one of our meetings at The Speakeasy in London he flattered me by saying, “There are only three Hammond players and they are Keith Emerson, myself and yourself”!

He will be greatly missed, not only as a friend but as a fine musician. All my sincerest condolences go to his family.

My thoughts will always be with you, Jon, and maybe one day we will meet again.

Don Airey:

England has just lost one of it’s finest. With happy memories of all your kind words and actions towards Mike and Myself over the last few years, and the monumental musical example you set over the last 40. RIP

Nick Simper:

During the last few years, the music business has lost some of its most seminal players, people who inspired me and many others. We said goodbye to my three favourite guitarists, the three “Micks” as I called them, namely Mick Keane, Mick Green, and Mickey King. We also lost Tony Dangerfield, Neil Christian, Jet Harris and the man who played a big part in our lives, Jim Marshall.

This week another name has been added to the list, as we learned of the death of Jon Lord.

I first met Jon, very briefly, late one night at the famous Shepherds Bush pie stall, one of the few places where food (of a kind) could be obtained during the early hours. It was the summer of 1966, and we were both, in those days, at the top of our game. I was playing with one of rock’s biggest names, Johnny Kidd & the Pirates, whilst Jon was with the Artwoods, one of the country’s top R & B groups. Neither of us spoke, just exchanging nods, as Kidd spoke animatedly with the Artwood’s drummer, an old friend. Little did we know that in less than two years we would be best friends, climbing the U.S. charts together, and creating a supergroup that would still be working nearly half a century later!

Fate was to throw us together in late ’67, working with the chart-topping group the Flowerpot Men, and it was Jon who talked me into leaving this money-spinning outfit to create a new band. Together with Ritchie Blackmore, and briefly, Bobby Woodman, we sowed the seeds that became Deep Purple. Jon and I hit it off from the first day that we worked together, and for the next two years we lived together, firstly at my parents’ home, then at Deeves Hall, and finally sharing a room at the Deep Purple house in Acton, West London. On tour we always roomed together, and life was one big round of fun! He called me his best friend, and I thought of him as the brother that I never had.

Sadly, as is well documented, none of this was to last! During the next forty years we both moved in different directions, but strangely, in the last couple of years, whilst our paths did not cross, they came very close to doing so. During my recent trips to Europe with Nasty Habits, we played where Jon had been very recently, or was due to perform very soon. Several times I came across his contemporaries who would pass on “greetings from Jon”. It seemed only a matter of time before we met up again on the same bill, or in the same town. Finally it looked on the cards as we were both appearing on the same weekend at a festival at St. Veit in Austria. Sadly, Jon cancelled his appearance, and it was then that I learned of the seriousness of his illness. During our show I asked the audience to join us in sending good vibes to Jon for a speedy recovery, and the resulting roar from the crowd said it all!
Since that gig, last September, we all constantly enquired after Jon’s health, hoping for a happy outcome, but sadly it was not to be. However, his music will live on, a fitting memorial to a great musician, and the memories of those exciting, pioneering days will remain with me forever. Rest in peace Jon.