According to the students of the London Tech Music School, Smoke on the Water riff is still the greatest of all times:

1. Smoke On The Water – Deep Purple (1973)
2. Smells Like Teen Spirit – Nirvana (1991)
3. Walk This Way – Aerosmith (1975)
4. Purple Haze – Jimi Hendrix (1967)
5. Sweet Child O Mine – Guns N Roses (1987)
6. Paradise City – Guns N Roses (1987)
7. Ace Of Spades – Motorhead (1980)
8. Enter Sandman – Metallica (1991)
9. Under The Bridge – Red Hot Chilli Peppers (1992)
10. Welcome To The Jungle – Guns N Roses (1987)
11. Run To The Hills – Iron Maiden (1982)
12. Walk – Pantera (1992)
13. Johnny Be Goode – Chuck Berry (1958)
14. Back In Black – AC/DC (1980)
15. Immigrant Song – Led Zeppelin (1970)
16. Wake Up – Rage Against The Machine (1992)
17. Highway to Hell – AC/DC (1979)
18. My Generation – The Who (1965)
19. 7 Nation Army – The White Stripes (2003)
20. Born To Be Wild – Steppenwolf (1968)
21. Give It Away – Red Hot Chilli Peppers (1991)
22. Paranoid – Black Sabbath (1970)
23. Voodoo Chile (Slight Return) – Jimi Hendrix (1967)
24. Eye Of The Tiger – Survivor (1982)
25. Money For Nothing – Dire Straits (1984)

Thanks to Reuters and George Kikonishvili for the info.

In his recent interview to Vintage Rock, Glenn Hughes commented on the California Jam (among many other curious things past and present):

I know the California Jam was one of your first gigs with Purple in the States. What else do you remember about that day?

Just another day at the office to me, I don’t know. The day before, I spent with Tony Iommi and Ozzy doing lines and drinking beer. We were up all night and Sabbath played before us at Cal Jam. I remember flying in on the helicopter with Coverdale, looking down at the audience, and Sabbath were on stage. We flew in there and… I don’t mean to make this sound grandiose, but I knew that show was going to be a great Glenn Hughes moment. I just felt like I was born to play at events like this. I was 22-years-old. I just felt, “You know — I feel real good today. And I’m gonna go out there and I’m gonna give a go.” And you know, I think it was a really good statement and testament.

Read the whole interview here.

Thanks to Daniel Bengtsson for the info.

Link to the review of John Lord’s concerto with the APO.

Here’s a very decent quality video of this rarely performed track from early in the Purpendicular tour. March 23, 1996, Brussels, Belgium:
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Joe Lynn Turner with Brazen Abbot and Whitesnake are to appear at the Magic Circle Festival in Germany this summer. It’s a heavy metal festival that will take place on July 9-12 in Bad Arolsen. The exact schedule is not announced yet, so we will post these appearance in our tour dates as soon as this is finalized.

Don Branker, the co-producer and stage announcer for 1974 California Jam and 1978 California Jam II, was a guest on the March 15, 2008 edition of WPMD.org’s “Rock 50” radio show with Mike Stark. According to Mike, Don told “some great stories about both events including Deep Purple’s trashing of a television camera and a backstage story about Aerosmith that brings ‘rock ‘n roll arrogance’ to a new level.”
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This was my fifth DP show and by far the greatest. The set list was fantastic, the whole band was fantastic, and the crowd got crazy.

I will never forget the moment that Ian asked Steve to keep playing Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming – you guys gave us a gift!

The whole band was on fire, Steve, Airey, Glover and Paice with great solos, and Mr. Ian Gillan singing a lot, with a great voice. For me he is the best singer in the world, with 62 years old and singing like that! Nobody stops the Silver Voice and Deep Purple!

Now the set list my friends:

Pictures of Home
Things I Never Said
Into the Fire
Strange Kind of Woman
Rapture of the Deep
Mary Long
Kiss Tomorrow Goodbye
Contact Lost
Steve Morse Solo
Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming
Steve Morse Riff Parade
The Well Dressed Guitar
The Battle Rages On
Lazy
Don Airey Solo
Perfect Strangers
Space Truckin’
Steve Morse and Glover Jam
Highway Star
Smoke on the Water

Encore:

Hush with Ian Paice Solo
Roger Glover Intro
Black Night

Steven Rosen who was a music reporter back in the 70s writes about his encounter with Ritchie Blackmore in November 1974:

Amidst all of the commotion, Ritchie was standing with one leg propped up on a small practice amp. He was running through what must have been his pre-show routine, oblivious to the commotion around him. When one of the crew asked him something, he continued playing for another few seconds and then raised his head. Without uttering a word, he simply stared at the source of the question and shot him a look that withered. He then lowered his head and continued practicing.

At that moment, I was brought over and introduced to him. Several minutes passed while he continued with his finger exercises, and I actually think he had forgotten I was there. I broke the silence by telling him Creem magazine had flown me out and he muttered something that sounded like an insult. We began. He slipped in and out of this strange English double-talk, but for the most part he remained relatively polite.

Read more and listen to the interview here.

Thanks to GarpJarp for the info.

Ian Paice and Glenn Hughes took part in the ChildLine Rocks charity mini-fest at the indigO₂ in London. This was the first time since March 15th, 1976 that they have appeared together on the same stage. More Black Than Purple reports:

With Thunder’s Luke Morley doing a solid job on guitar they cranked out ‘Mistreated’ and Hughes took the chance to show off his vocal talents with a lengthy improvised closing to the song that had many in the audience aghast by his immense range. Glenn’s keyboard player Anders Olinder kicked off the second number, a somewhat surprising ‘Might Just Take Your Life’ with Danny Bowes sharing the vocals and working well alongside Glenn.

Read more on the MBTP site.

Update (March 16th): Also check out Luke Morley’s diary (Luke is the guitar player in Thunder). Rehearsals on March 11th:

Ian Paice arrives @ 12pm and begins to set his own kit up which is not what I expected! I’d met Ian before albeit quite briefly, when we’ve worked with Deep Purple and he’s a really genuine and funny guy. He explains that 26 hours earlier he’d left Venezuela where Purple had just finished a South American tour. He’s obviously a bit spaced out so we ply him with strong coffee. It’s really good of him to have volunteered to do the gig and he doesn’t stop cracking jokes all day. Nice man!

Glenn Hughes arrives @ 1pm. He hasn’t played with Ian for 30-odd years and it’s 34 years since I saw them playing together in Deep Purple at Lewisham Odeon on the tour to promote ‘Burn’…….. weird!

We run through ‘Mistreated’ and Glenn finishes the song with an ad-libbed vocal work out as only he can! He sings so high that most of the dogs in London SE1 must have been very confused for a while. We then take on ‘Might Just Take Your Life’ and Danny assumes the David Coverdale role. It all goes so well that we only need to run the two songs once. Very strange how I get to be Pete Townshend and Ritchie Blackmore in the same 24 hours!!

Thunder will be supporting Whitesnake and Def Leppard on the upcoming UK dates in June and July.

What night! A legend closing the South America 2008 Tour.

9.30 p.m.: Gillan, Glover, Paice, Morse & Airey. Sold Out, Sound good (7.5/10) and Purple 10/10!

First time in my country, I travelled 400 miles but, this night was something like a dream turns reality! The set list was very similar to Brasil, Argentina, Ecuador …. A big surprise: Don Airey´s keyboard solo including “Alma Llanera”.

Long Live Deep Purple .. Thanks Mr. Gillan, Glover, Paice, Morse, Airey

Set List:
1)Pictures of home
2)Things I´ll never said
3)Into the fire
4)Strange kind of woman
5)Rapture of the deep
6)Mary long
7)Kiss and say goodbye
8)Steve Morse´s solo (including Little wing, Back in black, Sweet home Alabama, Sweet child of mine)
9)Well dressed guitar
10)The battle rages on
11)Lazy
12)Don Ayrey´s solo (includin Alma Llanera)
13)Perfect strangers
14)Space trucking
15)Highway star
16)Contact lost-Smoke on the water

Encore:
17)Hush (introduction: Green Onions)
18)Drums solo
19)Bass/drums- Bass solo
20)Black Night

The concert ends at 11:23 p.m.

I´m flying in a Purple dream