This is a clip from the (in)famous performance of Lucille in Sydney on Dec 13 1984 when the late George Harrison came on stage to jam with Purple. Continue Reading »

Here are Mk.3 interviews from May 1974 also known among collectors as the Leeds Polytechnic Project. Parts 1-5 contain interviews with the band (including Ritchie Blackmore!) in the dressing room. Parts 6-8 include fragments of live Space Truckin’. Continue Reading »

The Classic Albums: Machine Head documentary will enter rotation on the VH1 Classic cable channel in North America starting Tuesday, May 8. Check the listings for complete schedule.

Thanks to Jim Collins for the info.

Thin Lizzy… Nuff said… Styx, excellent band but misunderstood by most.

I thought Purple looked a bit tired at first, but they soon found the groove. Gillan was usually entertaining, but I was dissapointed by the lack of Rapture material. It seemed like a fan’s choice of set.

The Battle Rages On was good and Smoke was worth it just for Tommy Shaw’s contribution. When A Blind Man Cries was as smooth as it was. The rest mainly hard rock standards. This wasn’t a patch on the Astoria gig that kicked off the Rapture tour.

I still believe the best thing that’s happened to Purple was Steve Morse, the whole band have fun and want to entertain. Let’s face it, that’s why we forked out £32-00 for a ticket.

I’ve been going to Purple shows since the Coverdale/Bolin line up and I guess it wont be the last.

Steve Underwood, Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk

A great time was had at Brighton on Sunday night. All three bands were superb with the best being of course Deep Purple!

They and the sound were so good that it (almost) didn’t matter that they played for only 90 minutes. I say almost because although having three name bands on the bill made it feel like a mini indoors rock festival, the name on the tickets that I bought last June(!) said Deep Purple.

As others have said we got 105 minutes of Lizzy and Styx but only 90 minutes of the band we came to see. Who makes these stupid decisions and why? Do the band have any say in it at all? I think we should be told. Surely one support band is enough!

Steve Smith

This was a show I was particularly looking forward to, not just because it was Purple, but because it was Thin Lizzy as well.

It was my 7th Purple gig, the last one being in Bristol in 2002 – and that particular show has been amazing. Could they better it?

THIN LIZZY – Brilliant. Played for 40 minutes. Good sound, all the old hits. No new songs. Started with Jailbreak, also did Suicide, Emerald, The Cowboy Song, Don’t Believe a Word, Cold Sweat, Are you Ready, Waiting for an Alibi, and of course The Boys are Back in Town.

John Sykes (guitarist) kept pointing to the ceiling as if Phil Lynott was watching from above… Scott Gorham still there too. Drummer is Tommy Aldridge, ex-Whitesnake & Black Oak Arkansas.

I thought they were an ideal opening band, especially as they were always one of my favourites anyway. Not the same, of course, without Phil Lynott (how could it be?), but still good to watch.

STYX – I knew nothing about them at all, but I have to admit they were very good. Played for one hour including an encore. A revolving keyboard was something novel!

DEEP PURPLE – Played for exactly 90 minutes, including two encores. Should perhaps have been three, (no Speed King) but they finished bang on 11pm and I would imagine that Cardiff Arena has a time limit for these events. To be honest, I had expected a little more from Purple time wise, seeing as we had 1hr 50 minutes back in Bristol in 2002.

Set list in order:
Pictures of Home (what an opener!)
Things I Never Said
Into The Fire
Strange Kind of Woman
Rapture of the Deep
Fireball
Well Dressed Guitar
Lazy (absolutely superb version!)
When a Blind Man Cries
Space Truckin’
Highway Star
Smoke on the Water

Encores:
Hush (excellent version)
Black Night

I had read somewhere that they were going to do the entire Machine Head album on this tour, but that clearly didn’t happen. I had hoped to hear Perfect Strangers too, but for some reason, they dropped it.

Sound-wise, there was far too much bass in the first few songs, it sounded as if Roger Glover was playing a pneumatic drill and I could barely hear Steve Morse above it, but the sound mix did improve later on. Steve’s guitar prowess is second to none. It is hard to believe that he has now been in the band longer than Ritchie!

The band all seemed to enjoy themselves – plenty of laughter and messing about on stage. You wouldn’t think most of these guys were 60-odd, especially Ian Gillan who looks much younger! Ian Paice’s one handed drum roll has to be seen to be believed too. Don Airey is well settled in the band now and he is the ideal replacement for Mr Lord.

The audience consisted of all age groups and not just us wrinkly rockers. Loads of youngsters there. Great show all round, given the three bands in question. Here’s to the next time, Purple!

As an after thought Bristol badly needs an Arena like Cardiff, but plans for ours seems to have gone all quiet lately. They’ve even taken all the adverts down for it above the railway bridge just up from Temple Meads station where the land was cleared three years ago in readiness for the Arena. Makes you wonder now if it will ever happen at all…

Dave Smale of Bristol (aged 52)

Thin Lizzy were good but couldn’t seem to get the crowd going. Are they the tribute
band some have suggested? With Sykes and Gorham having been in Lizzy and written many of the songs, I don’t think so.

Styx grew on me. Aurally they were excellent, a real surprise. Visually they out-Darknessed the Darkness with more cheese than cheddar, but hey, rock is supposed to be fun. I lightened up and enjoyed them.

I read the signs in the foyer, DP on at 9:30, strict curfew at 11:00. At 9:20 I headed for the stage front, got a good place and then along with everyone else got told to sit down. Back to row F then.

The lights dropped and no one went for the stage, only a few even stood. I excused myself along my row, walked down the aisle and straight to the front as a few more brave souls did likewise. Leant on the barrier right in front of Steve Morse.

In this location you get a load of Steve’s amps and the rest is slightly buried. But the atmosphere! Superb, and we could see every smile, and in Big Ian’s case, grimace. At one point as he finished a scream during Fireball he turned to Steve and said “that hurt!”

Set list was as previous shows. They were watching the time and cut Steve’s medley short, a bit of doodling, a bit of Sweet Child of Mine and then in to the Well Dressed Guitar.

They were on superb form, obviously having a great time themselves.

As they came out for the encore Big Ian was running around talking to the others about how to play it due to the impending curfew. They agreed Roger wouldn’t solo, something Ian went back to check part way through Hush. Ditto Little Ian.

Back to that bit about rock being fun. I’ve been going to gigs for over 25 years now and still can’t understand why, as three quarters of the audience did, you would sit down at a gig like this.

Here’s looking forward to the next time, catch them while you can, they ain’t getting any younger.

Brian Hensley

So, you finally got rid of all those bulky VHS tapes and replaced them with DVDs and thought the new format is here to stay for the next 20 years, right? Wrong. HD (High Definition) DVD is knocking at your back door.

On June 26 Rhino/Eagle Vision is releasing Deep Purple, Yes and Santana performances at the Montreux festival in HD DVD (Claude Nobs’ investment in all the fancy equipment must be paying off). Title of the Purple release is “They All Came Down to Montreux – Live at Montreux” and apparently it will contain the same content as the regular DVD scheduled for release on June 4:

• complete performance at the 40th Montreux Jazz Festival on July 15 2006
• performance at the Rapture Of The Deep release party at Hard Rock Cafe in London from October 2005
• band interviews

However, on HD DVD all this content will be presented in high definition (1080i) resolution.

Thanks to High-Def Digest for the info.

Tommy Shaw of Styx guested on Smoke on the Water at the Wembley Arena and posted his impressions on styxworld.com:

Before I knew it, I was heading for the stage again to sit in with Deep Purple. It was sweet to see all our people watching from the wings. I waited for the last notes of “Highway Star” and climbed the stairs to where Jimmy was waiting with guitar in hand. The rest was somewhat surreal. Steve and I traded some riffs back and forth, and soon we were in this zone which I had not anticipated. Steve Morse was so accommodating and open, it was not a duel, but more of a conversation, picking up on themes, repeating, elaborating, and letting it lead to the next one. I had to keep reminding myself that I was on the stage. It was a real treat. Soon we were playing the classic guitar intro to “Smoke On The Water.” Traveling back 35 years to when I first heard that song in my hometown of Montgomery, Alabama, to standing on stage between Steve Morse and Ian Gillan, I couldn’t stop myself from being a fan. But there was still playing to do, and when the chorus came around, Steve nudged Ian to have me sing the harmony with him. Since there’s only one vocal mic on their stage, we sang it on his mic together. I could hear him singing acoustically and could tell our voices blended well together, but then again, I’d been singing that part with him in my car for 35 years. Legendary bassist Roger Glover, who obviously has sold his soul so that he can remain eternally young, joined in and Steve, myself and he became the three man wall of guitars on stage left. It could not have been more fun and soon it was over and I was shaking their hands and walking back down the stairs to all the crew, band mates and family members who were smiling ear to ear. Another one for the “I’ll never forget this night” file.

Thanks to Daniel Bengtsson for the info.

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