VWMusic has a fresh interview with Ian Gillan. And it is definitely worth spending your time to go through.

Andrew:
The current lineup of the band is one of the most consistent and creative intonations in Deep Purple’s long history. What is it about this group of players that’s kept things so solid?

Ian:
Well, I hate to say it, but it’s the band’s foundation. It’s in the ethos of the band. Now, I don’t listen to a lot of the young bands, but I’ve had a lot of conversations with young musicians who say they were influenced by Black Sabbath, Zeppelin, Deep Purple, and the like. To that, I always say, “Well, what else? What other influences do you have aside from that?” They always look at me, and say, “What do you mean, what else? Other influences? We’re a hard rock band, so we’re influenced by hard rock.” And I tell them that we were influenced by Chopin, Beethoven, Howlin’ Wolf, Aretha Franklin, Billie Holiday, Lonnie Donegan, folk music, big band, swing, and Buddy Rich. I say that and watch their faces shift, and they go, “Well, what’s that got to do with hard rock?” … “Well, that’s the roots of Deep Purple, which is why we can sway in the wind as we do.”

Ian also mentioned that the band has a writing session booked for March 2023.

Read more in VWMusic.

Thanks to Mike Whiteley for the info.

Guitar Player has an interesting interview of two monsters of the said instrument — Steve Morse and John Petrucci — talking to each other. And it’s quite a bit of a mutual admiration society.

“How does anybody play guitar like that?” Dream Theater guitarist and main man John Petrucci says, recalling his reaction when he first heard the music of Steve Morse. “It was the wildest, most incredible stuff I had ever heard. There are moments that you can pinpoint and say they were truly life-changing, and for me, hearing Steve Morse play guitar was one of them.”

It was the mid ’80s and Petrucci was a metal-crazed high schooler and budding guitarist big on Metallica, Iron Maiden, and Ozzy Osbourne. “I spent most of my free time practicing, and I thought I was getting pretty good,” he says. “I could play a lot of the stuff by my heroes pretty well.”

One day, a friend’s older brother gave Petrucci a mixtape of tracks by the Dixie Dregs, a band the young guitar player had vaguely heard of, along with a sage piece of advice: “You have to listen to Steve Morse.”

Petrucci didn’t know what to expect when he loaded the tape in his deck. The first song that came up was “The Bash,” an exuberant, revved-up and rocking country jam on which Morse charges out of the gate like a bucking bronco, blitzing across the fretboard and spinning wild chicken-picking licks all over the neck while keeping pace with Allen Sloan’s hyper-giddy violin lines.

“It totally blew my mind,” Petrucci says. “I couldn’t understand how anybody could play like that. I wasn’t very familiar with bluegrass, but Steve mixed it with rock in such an exciting way. His technique and phrasing hooked me immediately.”

Continue reading in the Guitar Player.

Legendary engineer and producer Ken Scott, who has worked with The Beatles, David Bowie, Mahavishnu Orchestra, Jeff Beck, Pink Floyd, etc, etc, was interviewed on the Rockonteurs podcast. He was asked about the guitar players he has worked with, and this is what he had to say:

Steve Morse, as far as I’m concerned, is the best guitarist I’ve ever worked with. He could cover every style and he knew what was needed. Jeff Beck is great, but Jeff has a certain style which he is brilliant at, whereas Steve, he covers all styles, from classical, acoustic – there’s one track on one of the albums called ‘Little Kids’ which is him and just solo violin, which is brilliant.

He has perfect pitch. I did two albums with him and for the next couple of albums after that, I was having major tuning problems with the band. My sense of pitch had become so much closer to perfect pitch that when they were slightly out, it became painful.

Ken produced Dixe Dregs’ second album What If and the half&half live/studio followup Night of the Living Dregs.

Thanks to Guitar World for the quotes.

Tonight’s (June 25) Whitesnake show at the Rock Imperium Festival in Cartagena, Spain has been cancelled due to reasons, ahem, not quite adequately explained:

Dear Whitesnake Fans,

Please know we are doing everything in our power to bring you the best high energy and exciting shows we possibly can. We always strive to deliver 100%, as Whitesnake fans always deserve that much, and never anything less.

Our desire is to complete our European tour with the same passion in which we started it!

We knew embarking on this tour could present many new obstacles and potential issues, which had been unknown to us on previous tours. Please know we are doing everything in our power to work through these unprecedented challenges. We are a close-knit band, we love each other, and we love you. We appreciate you, and as always we thank you for your support!

We sincerely apologize to our Spanish fans for unavoidably having to cancel tonight’s show.

This cancellation comes on the heels of a string of dates which their guitar player Reb Beach had to sit out, being “under the weather“:

Tonight @Whitesnake rocked @PrahaEU – Prague, Czech Republic along with our friends @europetheband ! A little last minute stress as Reb Beach was under the weather and I had to cover his solos. But, we gave you our best Prague!! The show must go on! #Whitesnake #TheFarewellTour pic.twitter.com/LQK7Rp470d

— Joel Hoekstra (@joelhoekstra13) June 14, 2022

We have no idea if these two events are connected in any way.

Whitesnake is in the middle of the twice postponed due to the pandemic European leg of the Farewell Tour.

Update: The performance was apparently cancelled due to “severe health problems” suffered by drummer Tommy Aldridge. Message from the festival organizers reads:

Just when we had all the backline and stage preparations from WHITESNAKE ready for their show today, their booking agent informed us of the sad news that Tommy Aldridge is having severe health problems today, so we regret to announce the cancellation of their show at Rock Imperium Festival. We are really sorry for any inconveniences caused, we are devastated and can only wish Tommy a quick recovery.

Update #2: The plot thickens. An unverified twitter account @tadrums purported to be from Tommy Aldridge himself vehemently denied the news of him being unwell:

This is patently untrue. I don’t know how it ever saw the light of day.

— Tommy Aldridge (@tadrums) June 25, 2022

Update #3 (June 28): The shows in Milan on June 28 and Vienna on June 30 are cancelled as well due to DC’s “infection of the sinus & trachea”. Zagreb on July 2 is under the question has been cancelled as well.

Update #4 (July 2): The rest of the European tour has been cancelled:

July 1

It is with the deepest sadness that I must announce that due to continuing health challenges, doctor’s orders, and our concern for everyone’s health and safety, Whitesnake is unable to continue its European Farewell Tour.

I extend my sincere apologies to All of Whitesnake’s Amazing Fans who have been looking forward to the remaining scheduled shows of this tour, All of our Amazing, Fabulous Snakes & tour personnel who have been working so hard to put on these shows, and All of the promoters and other professionals who have helped set up the tour…

I Appreciate & Love You All!!!

David Coverdale

Thanks to Blabbermouth for the info.

Our contributor Tobias Janaschke went to see the band on June 23, 2022, at the Stadtpark in Hamburg, and has sent in this photo report.

Local broadcaster NDR has a short video report from the gig, which does not require much knowledge of German. Of the setlist news, No need to shout is making live appearances. The clip below is from Graspop festival on June 19:

Thanks to Tobias for the pictures and to Ozymandias Preacher for the video.

David Coverdale was a guest on the June 23 issue of the Rock and Roll High School podcast, hosted by Atlantic Records A&R boss Pete Ganbarg. It was recorded some time before the start of the current tour. It’s a lengthy affair at 1 hour and 24 minutes, so we’ve skimmed through it for your convenience.

• 0:02:05 studio, wildfires, tax exile, the farewell tour;
• 0:05:10 early influences;
• 0:09:30 first band;
• 0:11:45 art school, big city of Middlesbrough;
• 0:15:00 joining Purple;
• 0:22:20 California Jam;
• 0:27:42 Mistreated;
• 0:30:40 extraordinary musicianship within DP;
• 0:32:22 Ritchie laying down the law;
• 0:34:08 Tommy Bolin;
• 0:37:25 last call from Jon, reconnecting with Ritchie, the Purple Album;
• 0:42:15 Coverdale/Page;
• 0:49:55 forming Whitesnake, Trouble, Jon and Paicey joining, Ready an’ Willing;
• 0:55:27 Fool for Your Loving, Don’t Break my Heart Again;
• 0:59:15 Saints and Sinners, song remakes;
• 1:02:26 Slide it in, stadiums and arenas, John Sykes;
• 1:09:00 1987, MTV;
• 1:13:42 Slip of the Tongue, turning blonde, making videos;
• 1:19:58 50 years in music, social media;
• 1:22:23 conclusion.

DC is an extraordinary jovial narrator, so we highly recommend you to find time to listen through the whole thing.

Listen below or through one of these providers:

Thanks to BraveWords for the info.

Louder Sound has a feature on Stormbringer written by Geoff Barton. It actually may or may not be a reprint of something that previously appeared on one of the Classic Rock magazines — it sounds vaguely familiar, but we are not sure.

Inspired and fired up by the injection of fresh blood and the success of Burn, Deep Purple undertook a short tour of Europe in December 1973, kicking off in Copenhagen, playing a set that featured virtually the whole of the album, four months prior to its release.

It was risky enough to unveil a new band – David Coverdale and Glenn Hughes had replaced Ian Gillan and Roger Glover – but to play almost all new material seemed suicidal. Fortunately the gamble paid off and over the next year Purple achieved new heights of success. The work of the previous two line-ups was beginning to pay off.

“With Burn we cleaned up,” said Coverdale. “You could hear a collective sigh from the management, because they were concerned about the changes, which is understandable.”

Elated by Purple’s newfound success, the management put the band to work and the inevitable arduous tours followed.

Continue reading in Louder Sound.

Thanks to Gary Poronovich for the info.

A new book by Jerry Bloom is slated to be published by Wymer this September. It is called Jon Lord – A Visual Biography and will come in “regular” (ISBN 978-1-915246-12-7, MSRP £59.99) and “collector’s” (ISBN 978-1-915246-16-5, MSRP £79.99) editions. Both are advertised as hardback A4 (210 x 297 mm) at 224 pages.

The collector’s edition also promises that the 250 limited edition copies will include 16 pages of A4 format transcript of an interview conducted by the author with Jon in in November 2007. Plus — presumably if you pre-order in timely manner — you will also get your name in the book on a dedicated fan page.

The publisher blurb as follows:

Jon Lord will forever be immortalised as a musical pioneer. His attitude towards his art form, “It’s all music” ensured that he embraced his joint passions for rock ‘n’ roll and orchestral music, along with other genres, throughout his career.

Having initially found his feet in sixties r‘n’b group The Artwoods, the formation of Deep Purple with co-conspirator Ritchie Blackmore escalated Jon to huge success with one of the biggest bands of the seventies, and again in the mid-eighties when the band reformed. In between, several years spent in Whitesnake added to his portfolio.

Outside of his commitment in both these rock bands, Lord produced many albums under his own name, fusing his various musical interests, producing some sublime work in the process.

Eventually deciding that his desire as a composer required more time and commitment than his day job with Deep Purple would afford, he eventually left the band he had helped to create, in 2002.

For the next decade, Jon engrossed himself in his composing, producing monumental works such as Durham Concerto that became a firm favourite on Classic FM radio, and Boom Of The Tingling Strings, a four movement piano concerto.

All aspects of Jon’s long and illustrious career are plotted throughout this book, accompanied by numerous photos, many previously unpublished that help to emphasise the incredibly colourful career of this extraordinarily talented musician.

Both editions are expected to be published on September 23, 2022.

Edel/earMUSIC will be re-releasing several titles from the band’s back catalogue later this year.

A new edition of Bombay Calling — an early Mk.Morse live recording from 1995 — is due on August 26, 2022. It will be released as 2CD+DVD digipack and 3LP+DVD. Caveat: according to the tracklists posted by an online retailer, for the reasons unknown both CD and vinyl are missing the opening track Fireball, and the CD version is also missing Maybe I’m a Leo. DVD tracklist contains complete show in both cases.

Two recordings previously available through The Soundboard Series box will be released on October 10, 2022. The first one is the Hong Kong show from March 20, 2001. It will be available on 2CD and 3LP on marble vinyl.

The second release appears to be a compilation of the two Tokyo shows from March 24 and 25, 2001. Both were released on the Soundboard Series in their entirety. It will be available as 2CD and “Flag of Japan” coloured vinyl 3LP package. Both of the Tokyo shows featured performances of Concerto for Group and Orchestra with Paul Mann conducting a local orchestra, and Ronnie James Dio as a guest vocalist.

Couple reaction type videos on this slow news day.

Classical composer Doug was so impressed by Child in Time that he digs right into the whole of Machine Head. Here is side 1 Continue Reading »