British newspaper The Telegraph interviewed Ian Gillan on an unusual topic — money:

ARE YOU GOOD WITH MONEY OR IRRESPONSIBLE?
I’m completely irresponsible, I’m afraid. I’m ignorant about money as a commodity – I have never really understood it. Years ago I decided to delegate running everything to my management because I’m only home three months every year and the rest of the time on tour. I need people paying my bills while I’m away or I’d come back to find everything cut off.

NOW THAT YOU ARE BETTER OFF ARE YOU HAPPIER?
I don’t think happiness comes with money but if you are hungry you can’t be as happy as if you aren’t hungry. I think there’s something about having a purpose in life and a sense of belonging that is more important than money for any human being. And helping other people – my daughter opened a restaurant recently and I gave her a few grand for that, which was very fulfilling.

Read the whole thing.

Thanks to Danny Nichols for the info.

Ian Gillan’s message to the fans recorded in his hotel room after the last gig in São Paulo. Kinda puts things into perspective, doesn’t it?
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Russian web site DrumSpeech.com has posted more footage of Paicey’s drum clinic in Moscow from February 7.

Thanks to bloodsucker from the deep-purple.ru forum for the info.

Deep Purple’s Made In Japan concerts were filmed. At least in part.

Seven reels of silent 8mm footage filmed at Deep Purple’s famous August 1972 Japanese concerts have been found. Rumours of such film have persisted for years, and now their existence has been verified.

Audio recordings of these three concerts formed the basis of the Made In Japan album released in 1973 and the Live In Japan 3CD released in 1993.
 
The good news is that a 90 second portion of Highway Star from the silent film has been synced to audio and will be included on the upcoming History, Hits & Highlights 2DVD released on June 1 2009. The Highway Star is hoping to show stills from the footage shortly.
 
The bad news is that the rest of the 26 minute film is made up of many short excerpts from different songs, and for that reason will not make it onto the History, Hits & Highlights DVD. Later, it is hoped that a Made In Japan documentary DVD featuring the full film can be put together and styled after the Classic Albums series.
 
Further details on History, Hits & Highlights confirm that the DVD set will include complete versions of the surviving footage from Pop Deux, Paris 1970; Southbank, London 1970; Black Night, Top Of The Pops 1970 and Speed King from the Vicky Leandros Show 1970.

The DVD will also include some of the material from Doing Their Thing 1970 and Tokyo 1976 – but not all. The latter was previously released as Rises Over Japan. It is hoped that all five surviving tracks from this show can be included with the remastered Come Taste The Band planned for 2010.

Footage from Hamburg 1970 was found­ too short to use in any way.

Further sources of 1970s film of Deep Purple are currently being chased, and the producers ask that you come forward via The Highway Star if you have knowledge of further film clips of Deep Purple 1968-76 that would be suitable for ínclusion on the History, Hits & Highlights DVD.

What can I say about a Purple concert? Well, it’s always a great experience, a great show, and a fantastic performance.

They started with Highway Star, and played a lot of classic songs like Strange Kind Of Woman, Perfect Strangers and Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming from the Steve Morse era. The set list was very similar to the past 3 concerts, I loved the songs, but I think they could play something different, like they did putting Into the Fire and Mary Long in the set list years ago.

It was incredible to see a lot of families and children singing and going crazy with the Purple experience. Thanks a lot for the great show, and we hope you back soon with new songs!

Now the set list:

Highway Star
Things I Never Said
Into The Fire
Strange Kind Of Woman
Rapture Of The Deep
Mary Long
Contact Lost
Well Dressed Guitar
Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming
The Battle Rages On
Wring That Neck
Don Airey Solo
Perfect Strangers
Space Truckin’
Smoke On The Water

Encore:

Hush with Ian Paice Solo
Roger Glover Intro
Black Night

This deserves promotion to a separate post. Some historical TV footage have appeared on YouTube.

Montreux, April 1971, live and interview:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ctG-EpxzYOQ

More Montreux ’71 and some Mk1 live in Bern, 1968:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0jOFp6ck0I

Thanks to TRambo55 for the upload and to ormandy for pointing it out.

I want to share my experience at Deep Purple gig last night at Via Funchal, São Paulo.

This is the 4th live Purple concert I attend. The first was at Ginasio do Ibirapuera 1992 (if I’m not wrong) Joe Lynn Turner era and the last three at The Rapture At The Deep Tour. Tom Brasil (november 2006), Credicard Hall (february 2008) and yesterday at Via Funchal.

Photos by Carolina M.A.

This is the first time I can take my 14 old daughter to see the Purple live. There are a lot of families with teenagers and even children as well. And the kids reactions after the show usually are: “Uow!!! This guys are really great!”

The setlist is like expected, very similar to the ones at Argentina and last three years. I really would like to hear some more Morse era songs, but we can’t blame the band. Every time they started a old classic the crowd went nuts.

The Battle Rages On get a new arrangement with very heavy keyboards by Airey. Gillans voice was in great shape, but we cant say the same about his lungs. He cough a lot and even missed some phrases here and there, but give his blood on the stage and the band share the usually fun to play with public.

Since the gig at rain in Cosquin, Argentina, Gillan is suffering with a cough and I think the extreme heat here – were the hottest days in many years, even we natives are suffering – don’t help too much.

Anyway a really great show like only Deep Purple can do!

Setlist

Highway Star
Things I Never Said
Into The Fire
Strange Kind Of Woman
Rapture Of The Deep
Mary Long
Contact Lost
Well Dressed Guitar
Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming
The Battle Rages On
Wring That Neck
Airey Solo
Perfect Strangers
Space Truckin’
Smoke On The Water

Encore:
Hush
Black Night

Photos by Carlos Coca.

Steve Morse was a special guest at the 35th anniversary gala for Kansas that took place on February 7 in Topeka, KS. Classic Rock Revisited has a full account of the evening:

Former Kansas guitarist, and current Deep Purple axe-slinger, Steve Morse, joined his former group onstage performing the blazing “Musicatto” from 1986’s Power album. Morse stuck around for the emotional rendition of two songs, performed intertwined with each other, from the band’s underappreciated In the Spirit of Things album. “Ghosts” and “Rainmaker,” both penned by vocalist/keyboardist Steve Walsh, Steve Morse and legendary producer Bob Ezrin, were one of the highlights of the evening. Walsh sang his heart out on the song and the emotional refrain of ‘Rainmaker’ filled the arena with energy.

At the end of the song, Morse waved to the crowd and left the stage…

And later in the show:

Williams and Livgren played the intro to “Dust in the Wind.” The surprise of the evening came during the violin solo. Tonight, the Kansas faithful were treated to a duet on the violin between David Ragsdale and Steve Morse. Morse, looking much less confident with a small piece of wood and a bow than he does with an electric guitar, played standing next to the accomplished Ragsdale.

Thanks to Lukasz Slowinski for the info.

Over The Rainbow have finished their trek across the Eastern Europe and I must admit that although the band still has a long way to go in terms of mutual understanding on stage, the progress from the first shows is nothing short of staggering.
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Back in early February, Ian Paice flew to Moscow to do a drum clinic. A TV crew was present at the event and the footage have appeared on Russian national TV. Recording of this was recently uploaded to YouTube:
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