Ritchie Blackmore and Candice Night have appeared on April 14, 2026, on SiriusXM’s show Ozzy’s Boneyard. The interview is available to SiriusXM subscribers only (apparently there’s a free trial, if you’re inclined), but BraveWords has a quote from Ritchie about late Jon Lord:
I said to Jon Lord of Deep Purple, when we got together, it was Jon and I that got together. We were the first two to put it together, and then I got Ian Paice, blah, blah, blah. I remember saying to Jon, ‘who the hell are you?’ and Jon said, ‘well, I’m the keyboard player,’ and I said, ‘well, then play something,’ and as soon as he started playing, I felt honoured to play with him. He is like the typical gentleman. He should have been in those films… he is like a George Sanders of the rock and roll world. Whenever you ask him, ‘Jon, how are you doing?’ he’d go, ‘absolutely wonderful!’ I would be at the other… ya know… people would say to me, ‘how are you doing?’ and I would say, ‘I’m in various stages of deterioration,’ so Jon and I clicked. He got it. A wonderful man to go out to dinner with until he had more than 3 martinis, and then we would be talking about other subjects. I wrote the song ‘Carry On Jon’ about Jon, and I couldn’t even play it on stage. It brought tears to my eyes…
Some time ago (posted March 5, 2026) Steve Morse spoke to a gentleman called Jordi Pinyol. Steve talks about his writing process, work ethics, reminisces about rubbing shoulders with the likes of Pat Metheny and Narada Michael Walden, surfing with Jaco Pastorius, and how being in Kansas was different from being in Deep Purple. Continue Reading »
Ritchie Blackmore does a livestream on his 81st birthday. Continue Reading »
While being in Japan, Don Airey sat down to chat with Roppongi Rocks. Caveat: the host seemed to be more interested in Don’s stints with Ozzy and everybody else rather than Deep Purple. Continue Reading »
More details have surfaced on the William Shatner’s upcoming “metal” album, and it sounds like Blackmore will not be appearing on it after all. AntiMusic reports:
Cleopatra Records shared a new update on William Shatner’s forthcoming metal album and revealed that the Star Trek icon reached out to Deep Purple legend Ritchie Blackmore to record a guitar solo for the song “The Grim Reaper”, which Blackmore felt that he could not improve on the solo that has already been recorded by Marcus Nand.
The label shared these details: When you’re looking for a great guitar solo, you need a great guitarist to play it. That’s what William Shatner thought as he was playing through the early material that he has already gathered for his upcoming Metal album, and that’s exactly what he did.
Shatner was listening back to “The Grim Reaper,” a new song that he cowrote with guitarist Marcus Nand, and while he was personally happy with the performance, he also sent their demo to the Rainbow/Deep Purple legend to ask what he thought, and what he might do different. Ritchie got back to him directly. “”The guitar solo on what you sent is very good. I don’t feel I can add anything to change or improve it.”
Thanks to AntiMusic for the info.
After a year-long hiatus of 2025, Deep Purple have started their massive world tour on April 11 at the place that helped them to get propelled into the superstardom — Tokyo Budokan. Continue Reading »
Deep Purple are about to start this year’s massive tour. The first dates are in Japan, where they met with the positively giddy Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi (who is a huge fan and plays drums herself). Continue Reading »
A Deep Purple vinyl release is joining the roster for the 2026 Record Store Day. It is a reissue of The Infinite B-Sides And Bonus Songs on vinyl with different artwork. Continue Reading »
Here’s a bit of the trainspotting boogaloo. The property known as the Horizons in Stowe, Vermont, has been renovated into a posh second home and was a subject of an extended exposé in the Stowe Magazine, issue Winter-Spring 2025/2026. For all your interior decorating tips of the historic venue, kindly proceed to the online version starting on page 208.
Thanks to George M. for the heads-up.
In the last couple of weeks Ritchie Blackmore’s official YT channel has posted several short clips of Jon Lord reminiscing about Deep Purple’s selected albums and tracks. Most (all?) of these had been available before in one form or another. Here they are as a playlist, albeit in reverse chronological order — starting with Stormbringer and going back in time from there. Continue Reading »
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