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![[face]](/hs-pics/portraits/faces/gillan2.jpg)
Anything but heavy
The Mercury News carries a pretty scathing review of the band’s performance from September 5, 2026, at the Shoreline Amphitheatre in Mountain View, California.
Deep Purple really had no business following Kansas and, not surprisingly, its headlining set felt quite anticlimactic. Even though it appeared (at least on paper) to have the most impressive lineup of the day — with three members dating back to the classic early-’70s “Mark II” lineup of Deep Purple — the band limped through its 16-song setlist.
Two of those players — bassist Roger Glover and drummer Ian Paice (the sole original member remaining in the band) — formed a solid enough rhythm section. But Ian Gillan wasn’t able to hold up his end of the bargain, with his shrill, nasal and highly battered vocals barely resembling those iconic multi-octave lines uttered on “Machine Head,” “Made in Japan” and other hard-rock/proto-metal ’70s offerings.
Read more (if you wish) in The Mercury News.
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