David Coverdale spoke to Rock Guitar Daily and revealed that he’s still in touch with Glenn Hughes and Bernie Marsden:

Glenn….Oh bless his heart. And it’s mutual – we are the original unrighteous brothers! We speak most every day.

It reminds me of the transition we made from Saints & Sinners into Slide It In – with Slide It In I wanted to electrify Whitesnake more. I was talking to Bernie Marsden yesterday, and we were just chatting about different bits and pieces – and I can honestly say, and it’s no disrespect to my former colleagues, I felt that I’d read all the books that were in that series.

He even apparently managed to patch things up with His Blackness:

I’m reaching out – Ritchie Blackmore and I are communicating in the most positive way – and I truly appreciate that.

But not Micky Moody:

…I put Whitesnake on hold at the end of 1981, and Micky didn’t even bother coming to the meeting we had. He had a more important engagement – a darts match at the local pub.

Then, a couple of months later, I get a call from him saying, ‘Look, I’ve seen the error of my ways, can I come back?’ and I said, ‘Absolutely!’

Because, I had literally – I was starting a sold out UK tour in three weeks, and I didn’t have a band! I had Cozy – and that was it!

So, he came back in, but he really wasn’t invested or engaged in the writing process for the Slide It In album, as you can see on the writing credits. Then, when we were doing the actual album, you could see that he wasn’t having a good time. When his manager called me, and shared the same information, I said, ‘Well, you guys do what you want, I’m moving forward with this. And that was the end.

In fact, Tony, recently I reached out to Micky Moody through his manager – to shake his hand, but he feels there’s still too much water under the bridge, and presumably he would rather not shake my hand.

Read more in Rock Guitar Daily.

Thanks to Classic Rock for the info.

David Coverdale & Co. have posted a video trailer for their upcoming live album Made in Japan:
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Part 1 of Roger Glover’s diaries covering recording of the new album have been published online. The published portion covers June 24 to July 25, 2012, with hints of more to come.

24 June Sunday
Nashville. Our first day in the Soundcheck rehearsal studio. The setup is similar to Werne, so it’s fairly comfortable and quite spacious. After a jam to warm up, we start going through the list of songs. IG, who wasn’t in Werne, needs to hear all the latest ideas. We discuss the keys that each song is in and we occasionally try tuned-down guitars. Bob Ezrin stops by to welcome us to Nashville. He is a ball of energy and very enthusiastic.

Read more at deeppurple-nowwhat.com.

Thanks to Andrey Gusenkov for the info.

In a recent interview to PremierGuitar Joe Bonamassa says that his involvement with the Black Country Communion is over:

As far as I’m concerned, my involvement is pretty much done, and I’ll tell you why: Originally, I did it for the same reasons I did the stuff with Beth Hart and Rock Candy Funk Party—it was an excuse to play a different kind of music that I don’t get to play normally.

The first two records were a blast—the band is fantastic when the Ritalin kicks in, the ADD goes away, and everyone’s focused. It’s a devastatingly good rock band of the early-1970s type, and Glenn is a fantastic singer—just one of the best ever. So I did it and did a nine-week tour in 2011 that really, by the end of it, wasn’t fun for me. It wasn’t because I didn’t like the cats in the band, but it was just too much—too much involved in getting people from place to place and getting the band onstage. Everybody seemed to be very tense, and it made my crew very tense, and it’s not the way I like to tour. I run a family—I have 21 people who go on the road with me all the time, and if you asked them who was the cause of the least of their problems, they would say me. Unless there was no Diet Coke—then it’s a huge [expletive] problem, and either I’m going to the supermarket or somebody else is [laughs].

But it just wasn’t fun for me anymore. All the stuff that Glenn says in the media, essentially pinning it on me—that I was the reason for the band’s lack of touring and the band’s lack of future. It became rapidly not fun at all. It would be dishonest of me to get onstage and pretend like I’m having fun to please the band. I’m just not the guitar player for that band, but unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be any out-of-work guitar players in L.A. that they can get. There are so many guys that can fill that role and I would be the first guy to queue up and buy a ticket. So that’s my story with it. I’m happily not involved anymore, but I’m happy with the legacy that I left with that band and happy with the records we made. It was a great three years for me.

Thanks to Nigel Young for the heads up

For all those who have missed the song on the radio, Deep Purple’s record label has posted All The Time in The World. Bear in mind that this is the radio edit, i.e. version of the song intentionally made to sound as much commercial as possible by shortening the solos, instrumental breaks, and/or altering the mix.
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In case you can’t wait until Monday, audio snippets of the new Deep Purple single have been posted of a French site qobuz.com (click on ‘ecouter’ to listen).

Thanks to Martin and everybody else who reported this.

And our series “toys that sort of looks like DP related musicians” continues. We give to you, Playmobil Joe Lynn Turner!

Thanks to Doug Macbeath.

We who know the band in and out can discuss whether the band is better or worse since the last time we saw them. We can also complain that regular people only want to hear SOTW. From time to time we also complain about clueless reviewers. Well, here’s a guy, a reviewer even, who says he knew two DP songs before he went to the show but still was blown away by them. That is cool.

Journey and Deep Purple in Perth.

Update (Mar 10): the band’s PR people tweeted this update about radio play of the new single elsewhere:

Listen out for “All the time in the world” hits radio Monday BBC2 at 7pm uk time and Virgin Radio (rocket song, every 2 hrs for a week)

Deep-Purple.ru reports that Moscow radio Rock FM will be broadcasting two tracks off Now What?! — Hell To Pay and All The Time In The World — on Monday, March 11. The songs will be on the air at 15:15 MSK and repeated at 18:15 MSK. Rock FM broadcasts locally on 95.2 FM and online (apparently worldwide) at www.rockfm.ru (click on the white ► ‘play’ button next to the station logo).

The same day a video teaser for All The Time In The World will be released on the official Deep Purple Youtube channel. Both tracks will be released as a single on March 29.

Thanks to Andrey Gusenkov and Dima Zykov for the info.

When Abandon was released, the American record company at the time, CMC International, had some idea of radio promotion for the disc. A couple of singles were released and they also produced a bunch of interview clips. The interviews were made like short sound bites you could edit together with appropriate questions from your own DJ, making it sound like your little station got an exclusive interview with the band. Also, allowing the band to spend time on more relevant things than answering the same questions a million times. They are clever, those PR people!

I forgot I had this interview on disc but the other day I found it sitting next to my Abandon CD on the Purple shelf in the basement. As we are getting closer to the release of another Deep Purple CD, I thought it would be interesting to hear how a DP album was promoted 15 years ago. I added some photos from the US tour 1998 and uploaded the thing to YouTube. Enjoy!

PS. As I was looking for photos to use, I found a report we did as some of us behind THS followed the band on that US tour in ’98. It might be because I was involved, but I very much enjoyed being taken back to that great tour. Have a look yourself. You might at least enjoy the pictures!