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One for the bookworms
Martin Popoff talks to the Now Spinning Magazine podcast host Phil Aston. The occasion is Martin’s new book Seven Decades of Deep Purple, but the conversation went way beyond that.
We discuss:
How Martin rebuilt and expanded his earlier Purple books
The emotional connection he has with the band
Why the Purpendicular–present era may be Purple’s strongest
The “walk in Portugal” that changed everything
How the band’s sound and spirit survived endless lineup changes
Slaves & Masters, Made in Japan, improvisation, album art, Simon McBride and more
What =1 represents — and whether it would be a fitting final chapter
This is one of the most insightful and passionate Deep Purple discussions you’ll ever hear — from two lifelong fans who could happily talk Purple for days.
If you love Deep Purple, this episode is unmissable.
We can attest that all of the above is true.
Thanks to Mike Whiteley for the heads-up.
PS. For the benefit of our Canadian readers, the book is currently on sale at Chapters: $17.99 for the hardcover edition (compared to $86 at Amazon.ca or $110 through martinpopoff.com). For a 640 full colour pages book on your favourite band, it’s a no-brainer. Just throw in a copy of Sensitive To Light: The Rainbow Story into the bag, and get free shipping.
[Update Dec 1]: Metal-Rules.com has a review of the book. The review is somewhat superficial (the reviewer admits to not reading the whole tome through), but the verdict stays the same:
SEVEN DECADES OF DEEP PURPLE is unlikely to be surpassed, not that it is a contest, but as the band and fan-base ages there is a law of diminishing returns, especially considered that while writing this very review, Ian Gillan publicly announced that, at age 80, he is almost blind and ready to retire.
We can probably expect a perhaps one more Deep Purple album, a Farewell World tour and this book may get one last updated chapter a few years down the road as an exclamation point on the career of one of the world’s greatest rock bands. Until then, dive into the deep with this magnificent and well-deserved retrospective of rock royalty.
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
That pricing at Chapters must be a cock-up. Makes no sense. 11 EUR for a 640 page hardcover book with pictures? If something sounds too good to be true it probably is.
I had it ordered on German Amazon, but they cancelled it as non-obtainable (for now).
November 24th, 2025 at 04:47Thank you for mentioning this book 😊
November 24th, 2025 at 04:51This was fun to listen to. There is so much to talk about that I would suggest Phil ask Martin for another round. They both know the topic so well, that it would be educative to most of us. Part two, if I may ask…
November 24th, 2025 at 08:28@1
I have ordered it too Uwe, also from Amazon.de, and my order came through 😊
November 24th, 2025 at 15:08@1 Uwe
I ordered mine from jpc and recieved it thursday Last week.
Lutz
November 24th, 2025 at 16:44I preordered via my local bookstore here in Germany as soon as it was announced and payed about 55 EUR (there must be the bill somewhere…)
But I’m afraid I will not have the time to read it before the Xmas holidays.
For now, I’m busy with listening to “Triangulation”, once is never ever enough! What a masterpiece!
November 24th, 2025 at 17:28The Canadian price is legit. It is a big, early Black Friday saIe. I just ordered the book to be delivered to my local bookstore.
November 25th, 2025 at 05:35Alright dear friends in here 😃
A friend of mine linked this to me:
https://youtu.be/nwPj7hUlgs8
And this is brilliant! I had no idea Dan Baird had made a cover of this beautiful song. (And without a gun to my head I have to say it is completely amazing! I might even like it a bit more than with Purple…)
It is no secret, I LOVE Dan Baird 😃
Here it is, even more delightful in a live version:
https://youtu.be/V7zLhANkR94
So sad he doesn’t tour in Europe anymore 😞
November 25th, 2025 at 18:00I ordered mine directly from Martin Popoff who signed it for me. Received it last week. It’s a beautiful book – lots of text and photos. I consider it the ultimate, comprehensive history of Deep Purple. Uwe, take note…..it is an essential purchase for the true porphyrophile.
November 25th, 2025 at 19:09I meanwhile had a chance to order mine – of course I wouldn’t miss it! I like Martin, opinionated and throwaway in his comments as he sometimes can be.
I agree with his and Phil’s analysis that virtuosity was always a key aspect of DP – going to a Purple show meant and means seeing music executed by people who play(ed) extremely well, at least a notch or two above what their music required. That set them apart from bands like, say, Uriah Heep or Status Quo. And their individual abilities gave them an ease in performing the – let’s face it: not deeply complex or demanding – music in a very elegant and swinging way. Reproducing Purple’s music live was never a challenge to the Purple members, that is why they could improvise so much aroiund it.
As regards DP and the Blues, yes the band has a Blues core, but it’s different to the one of Led Zep. Led Zep with songs like Whole Lotta Love, Black Dog or In My Time Of Dying is very much a descendant of the primal original Mississippi Delta Blues, the sparseness & folkiness of it all, the sometimes weird tunings and only limited harmony, the acoustic components, only occasionally would they with something like Boggie With Stu venture into Chicago Blues territory. DP with songs like Wring That Neck, Demon’s Eye, Lazy, Place in Line, Mistreated (though that has touches of Delta in the main riff), Comin’ Home, Mitzi Dupree or Don’t Make Me Happy OTOH, are from the school of the later Chicago Blues, the often used shuffle rhythms, the swing akin to Jazz, the ear-pleasingness of the music in general, their larger and fuller sound. A lot of Led Zep’s music is rather sparse and stripped down, they had to rely on Page’s unquestionable production skills to make it sound large and majestic (and live that sometimes didn’t work) – DP sounds large and full if you just put all five of them in a garage and let them plug in, no production frills necessary. That is also why DP albums for a large part of their career were not so much “produced” as they were “engineered” – and Martin Birch was a great engineer. Purple have really only had two producers in their long career: Derek Lawrence and Bob Ezrin, all others were producing engineers, Roger included, he had learned his trade from Martin Birch (and added a bit more pop gloss).
November 26th, 2025 at 00:49Thank you for sharing – we could have talked for hours! Phil
November 26th, 2025 at 09:06@ 10- but Uwe, Deep Purple have four instruments in a live setting, Led Zeppelin three. Any three piece rock band will always sound sparser than a four piece. That gnarly Hammond of Jon Lord’s is the difference when comparing to a three piece. Always there, filling the void, for want of a different expression. Look at Hendrix’s studio records compared to his live sound. Same with Cream although they didn’t embellish their studio albums as much. Look at Rory Gallagher and he had a much fuller sound with a keyboard player. We have been here before, it is best to have a keyboard player, in most rock bands to my ears. Zeppelin did well with JPJ augmenting between bass guitar and keyboards, but it can leave a noticeable ‘hole’ in the overall sound at times. Rush from the 1980’s onwards used samplers, triggers etc to embellish their three piece live sound. That is the only way to get a three piece rock band to sound fuller in certain aspects. When Geddy was on the keys, their sound was sparser too. Geddy back on the bass, Rush were much punchier and harder sounding. Looks at ELP, no electric guitar, well most of the time, Greg Lake wasn’t a rock guitarist per se. They always had a hollower sound most of the time in a live setting. No riffing guitar to fill it out or even dominate the music at times. Rock guitar and rock keyboards finding common ground eh? I notice a much more virtuoso style in bands like, Purple, Yes, Genesis, King Crimson, Gentle Giant, Focus etc than most of the three piece bands. That extra ‘classical’ and ‘jazz’ element perhaps, most of the time. The rock blues music many do doesn’t have that to it, so it is a little less ‘dazzling’, if that is the word to use. Different composition and style. That doesn’t necessarily mean it isn’t good, just not as adventurous most of the time. Cheers.
November 26th, 2025 at 11:03Mr Bezos (I affectionally call him by his first name Jeff), the romantically inclined husband of his lovely and more recent wife Láuren Sanchez, has a small book- and CD-store just around the corner from where I live and I placed an order there. He’s always very quick.
I have lots of books by Martin P, we’ve exchanged emails and have had lively music discussions (he’s a Judas Priest diehard too). He focuses on the people making music and does that well. I sometimes miss more of a musical analysis in his works though, but Martin doesn’t hear music like that, he’s more interested in the whole and how it makes him feel and not how the individual components came about. (I’m of course aware that most people are more interested in that than dissecting the music.) That is not a criticism, just a statement from me on how he ticks. I get more of that musical analysis from, say, Pete Pardo.
I do have his previous books on DP, Rainbow, UFO, BÖC, Sabbath etc. He recently brought out a Judas priest album-by-album, track-by-track analysis pf Priest’s complete works which saw the format of him discussing the albums and tracks with two (interchanging from album to album) musicians from the metal genre who were Priest fans too:
https://martinpopoff.com/html/judas-priest-album-by-album
That was for me an extremely pleasurable and enlightening read, but I’ll admit that I might have sectarian interests there.
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Karin, I have to say, Dan Baird’s studio version of Hush (the live version is a bit too druggy for my taste) is a cracker and – save for Jon Lord’s missing organ solo – creams the 1968 DP version into the ground. It sounds a bit like I imagine Hush would have sounded had Mk III or Mk IV tackled that song live which they really should have.
November 26th, 2025 at 17:10@ #8 Karin, Dan Baird’s former band the Georgia Satellites also made a nice cover of Joe South’s “Games People Play” which was rather my favourite song from their third LP. So the idea to cover another Joe South song was not too far I think.
November 26th, 2025 at 17:51I saw them on this tour playing in my hometown Stuttgart – and it was by far the loudest concert I had ever attended! Louder than 30 times Purple or Gary Moore (who came close but at least after 10 days my ears came back to normal again. More or less. The Satellites really left some damage).
IIRC, Dan Baird is suffering from cancer nowadays.
Herr MacGregor, I’m not arguing, a five-piece with a keyboarder will always have an edge live over a four-piece without one. I personally prefer to play in keyboard line-ups too which on an amateur level is a pain in the ass because keyboard players who can improvise a solo off the cuff are extremely rare in the non-professional scene, at least in Germany.
So Led Zep were live at an inbuilt disadvantage, yes. But I think that is the way Jimmy Page also consciously wanted it – he doesn’t like playing with constant keyboards, much less with a constant dominant keyboarder like Jon. Jon Lord once said in one of his later interviews that he was eternally grateful to Ritchie for “leaving me so much room in DP to do my thing, he’s a very accomodating player“. And it’s true, Ritchie, for all his volume eccentrics and ego antics, never cluttered things up with too many overdubs and doubletracking in the studio, he’s a sparse, even minimalist rhythm guitarist. Even the verses of SOTW are carried by what Jon plays with lots of flourish and variation, not Ritchie’s simplistic and even monotone single note octave punctuations (even Roger plays more in the SOTW verses than Ritchie). But Jimmy Page is the exact opposite, he’s a creator of sonic landscapes with his multiple guitar tracks on nearly every Zeppelin song, he creates auras and for that he needs an utmost amount of room and space which is why Zeppelin were sonically Page + Bonham, with JPJ (a great musician, make no mistake) getting to fill in on bass or keyboards whatever room the other two have left him once they were done. Page must have rightly felt that any omnipresent keyboarder would have only limited him in and inhibited him from putting on all these guitar and other stringed instruments layers to construct atmosphere. Page is a landscape painter while Ritchie does portraits if you will.
That said, DP’s music was always more dense (yet as regards the individual instruments: also much more compartmentalized) than Page’s sonic creations. In DP everyone played a higher amount of notes than in LZ. That is why DP chugs like an engine or clockwork while Zep’s music is more like an aurora borealis, beautiful and impressive, but also amorphous and more susceptible to unpleasant surprises live where the sonic environment is not under control like in a studio.
November 26th, 2025 at 18:28Uwe @1:
Cock up or not, but they’ve honoured the price and the book arrived today. This might be a publisher initiated promotion, as the similar format Popoff’s book on Dio is currently also heavily discounted on amazon.ca:
https://www.amazon.ca/Dio-Scriptures-Complete-Unofficial-Chronicle/dp/0764369407/
November 26th, 2025 at 22:38Jimmy Page and his substances didn’t help Zeppelin in a live setting , especially when things got going. The same of course with Hendrix and others who performed under a certain heavy influence at times, Pete Townshend included. I agree with the landscape and portraits scene. John Paul Jones was a perfect foil for Page in that aspect. Many of Zep’s favourite songs for me have him being more prominent in the composition. Don’t get me wrong, I like a sparser sound at times too, just like I enjoy a more complex fuller sound with more instruments. It depends on the mood again and who the artist may be at the time. A three piece rock band leaves the musicians nowhere to hide, one way to look at it. However I also enjoy solo outings from singer songwriters, it is the rawest you can get in many ways. The Who back in their early days is another good example in a live setting. Strictly a three piece instrument wise, resisting the ‘influence’ of having a keyboard player on stage with them. They did sound better to me with one, although at times I do enjoy the raw three piece power of The Who. Entwistle more than made up for it back in those days. Townshend and Page are very good rhythm players and arrangers, unlike Ritchie who couldn’t be damned. But as you said, Ritchie knew Jon was always there. Cheers.
November 26th, 2025 at 23:38Nick, that was a steal in the truest sense of the word! I’m happy for you Canucks, nature always compensates, in this case for your close proximity to the cultural wilderness beyond your southern border – one nation, under Canada … 😂
November 27th, 2025 at 00:06@14
“Dan Baird is suffering from cancer nowadays”
November 27th, 2025 at 15:59– WHAT? oh noo 🥺 and he has just gotten married 😓
@13
Too druggy 🤣
Well, I have to tell you that the only drug the good Mr Dan Baird is consuming is skimmed milk (or as I call it: wannabe-milk)
Just listening to the Hush-version where Ian is singing, and yeah, it is the best! Dan Baird is the next best ☺️
I really like Dan’s voice, because he sounds so real, so authentic.
When he was a young man he had a very polished voice, but the older he gets, the more substance it has (I believe it’s because of the skimmed milk…)
Why didn’t Mark III and IV tackle Hush?
November 27th, 2025 at 16:12@14
“Georgia Satellites also made a nice cover of Joe South’s “Games People Play”“
November 27th, 2025 at 16:13– yeah, a friend linked it to me. It’s a very fascinating song 😊
“Why didn’t Mark III and IV tackle Hush?”
That is a good question and your answer is as good as mine. Rather than failing to do a decent cover of Highway Star, they should have dusted off that Mk I song penned by an outside writer – along with SOTW DPs greatest US airplay hit. The song really cried for DCs and GHs dual lead vocals, the funkified Paice/Hughes rhythm section. After all, Mk III had no qualms playing Don Nix’ Going Down as an encore and Mk IV interpolated Buddy Holly’s Not Fade Away into Highway Star which incidentally gives you quite an impression how Hush could have sounded too, @04:06 …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sb9A6RMgrlI
Hush and Not Fade Away are not entirely dissimilar as songs.
November 27th, 2025 at 20:32@22
“That is a good question and your answer is as good as mine.”
– well my guess is that it wasn’t rock’n’roll to them. But when Ian made it, this one:
https://youtu.be/u1kZ9zYr7kk
Everyone in the free world could hear how that song was supposed to sound 😍
“The song really cried for DCs and GHs dual lead vocals,”
November 28th, 2025 at 06:56– so wrong Uwe!
Thank you for the link, and even though I have come to appreciate DC’s vocal a lot more than in the beginning, Highway Star sounds so wrong….
‘Not fade away’ however is adorable 🥰
My guess would be they considered Hush – and anything Mark I – as out of time. That’s so sixties, man! It took the band 20 years to reconsider it. None of them played it in the meantime as far as I know. Even if it had been a hit.
November 28th, 2025 at 08:40Of course it was very 60s and it still is. And in the mid 70s the 60s were not long enough ago to be seen under a nostalgic light yet. But as an encore, slightly tongue in cheek, Mk III or IV could have done Hush which also has soul/gospel influences and a lively rhythm. But in 1974, DP wanted to be identified with Burn and in 1975 with CTTB – and not some poppy novelty hit from 1968.
Still, I would have liked to have heard it. Just like I would love to hear Glenn do this today …
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rflfRyT1TyY
I know it’s cheesy as hell with that MOR string arrangement, but that song is a guilty pleasure of mine! 😎 I love the way a young Glenn emotes the “Walks Away-ay-ay!”
November 28th, 2025 at 19:43Looking back to see how long ago they (MKII) last performed Hush live in concert and I came across the Montreux 1969 gig. I didn’t realise that they performed Kentucky Woman with Mark II. The encore. I probably should get out a little more, many DP fans here are probably well aware of this. Cheers.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LOVCnilA-dU&t=1s
November 28th, 2025 at 22:29I should add that I meant it was the last time of the initial MKII band performingHush, that late 60’s era, from my take on it. For some reason I did think that they may have performed it in 1973, but I couldn’t find anything in regard to that. Twenty years (or near enough) as Max says until that aborted ‘new’ studio recording and the subsequent reintroduction of the song to the set list. Interesting that allegedly Ian Gillan wasn’t initially comfortable with re recording it from what I read online, stating that Rod Evans was the only singer he wanted to hear singing that. I agree, although Ian did pass the pub test at times performing it live. I hear Karin in the background, somewhere, lurking………….Cheers.
Roger Glover’s take on it along with Ian Paice from 1988.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BY8i2D1I5NA&t=115s
November 29th, 2025 at 00:50I’m flipping through ‘Seven Decades of Deep Purple’ as I write this. It only cost me $17.99 here in Canuck land. I think I may buy a couple more for that price. It’s a heavy book weighing nearly as much as the ‘Made In Japan’ box set. 640 pages with hundreds of pics from Mark I to = 1. Over 200 pages is on the post Blackmore Rages On era.
November 29th, 2025 at 02:34I listened to the whole interview, I wasn’t very impressed by Martin Popoff, I expected more, and I even disagree with some of his statements. (Maybe I’m not used to Americans’ ramblings).
Phil Aston’s questions are very interesting and inspire more subtle concepts that Martin doesn’t develop.
the best part is Phil’s final recap.
December 1st, 2025 at 23:42That’s why I’m undecided whether to buy the book or not….
I’ve been reading the book for about 2 months. ( well before it went on sale at Chapters ).
If you know Martin’s work,Seven Decades follows his Album By Album approach and offers his view on the high points and low lights of every record.. Martin’s very good at weaving many chats with the band members into an entertaining narrative.As always,the book is well-researched and informative. Lots of great pictures,too.
I’m at the Now What chapter,the beginning of Ezrin era…..most probably the last era of Deep Purple.The entire studio catalog,plus a smattering of live albums,is covered.
With the retirement of Coverdale,the dehydrated stumble of Hughes and the medical maladies of Gillan and Blackmore an epilogue may soon be needed. For now,I consider this 640 page tome the definitive history of Deep Purple.
December 2nd, 2025 at 17:50