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Doing nostalgia for Australians
In anticipation of his Australian tour, Glenn Hughes recently spoke to The Rockpit:
Andrew : How did you find working with Blackmore? At that stage he was moving more towards a classical style that has distinctively become his over the years.
Glenn : Ok Andrew, let’s talk Turkey here. The Holy Trinity, in my opinion of the early 70s, was Blackmore, Beck and Clapton and then of course, Tony Iommi. I joined the band with John Lord and Ian Pace and Blackmore, who was a very strong soloist as well. It was a different thing for me to do. As i mentioned to you before it worked because they didn’t want to replicate Mark II. Why would they want to have somebody sounding like Ian Gillan or somebody playing bass like Roger Glover? It wasn’t working to them any longer. David and I came in and refreshed the band.
Andrew : Working with a young unknown at that stage in David Coverdale what was that like? What did you find that he brought to the band and especially “Burn”?
Glenn : When he passed the audition they didn’t tell him for like two weeks they kept him waiting. When they did get a hold of him, David came down to see me at my house and we became very fast friends as we were going to be singing these songs together, so my friendship has been very good with him from all these years ago. He’s got a great voice, he is a funny guy and again Andrew, I think the vocal arrangement and the partnership we had vocally on the “Burn” album, “Stormbringer” and “Come Taste the Band” is exceptional.
Read more in The Rockpit.
In other Glenn related news, his former guitar player JJ Marsh is releasing a new album with a project The Master´s Brew, led by keyboard player Tomas Bodin (of The Flower Kings fame). The album is called Elixir, and you can find more information on bodinmusic.com.
Thanks to BraveWords for the heads-up on Glenn’s interview, and to Pär for the JJ news.
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
JJ’s solos on GH records are great. I also like Bodin’s contributions to the Flower Kings, which bounce nicely off Roine Stolt’s songwriting and playing. Now, their new album is the real news for me as opposed to Glenn’s umpteenth take on what happened back in 1974. I was born in that year, never cared about Glenn’s opinions back then, do not care now.
October 4th, 2024 at 20:21Glenn told a sacrosanct truth: surely given the internal tensions in MKII, MKIII was a fresh change at the beginning, the peace was short-lived though…
October 4th, 2024 at 21:41Touring Australia again, sheesh it must be all the sunshine & everything else that keeps luring Glenn Hughes out here. Are there that many aficionados out here, well obviously there are & good on Hughes for travelling all this way, not many do for such small concerts, especially repeatedly. I wish he would come down to Van Dieman’s Land. I would most likely kick off me boots & attend. Sorry, Uwe, are you still there, Uwe, wake up, it wasn’t a dream, I did just say that. Hell Freezes Over & even Gregster may attend a concert if Hughes & his band played in Launceston. Sorry for all that shock Uwe. Just have a nice cup of tea & a little siesta, all will be fine. Cheers.
October 4th, 2024 at 22:09Nice interview.
Flash thought: Couldn’t der liebe Gregster go to one of those spoken word shows and casually ask Glenn why he single-handedly ruined Mk III’s and Mk IV’s live performances with all his screaming and was also responsible for Tommy falling into a drug hell? I’d like to hear the answers to that. 😂
Seriously, when I hear Glenn say that no one in the Purple camp saw Tommy’s addiction issues coming, I always take that with a grain of salt (though Jon and DC have said the same over the years again and again). I think one phone call with Dale Peters or Jim Fox of the James Gang or with ex-Energy Stanley Sheldon (at that point in Peter Frampton’s band) would have been enough – and if they wouldn’t have spilled the beans immediately, then you can still hear between the lines of an answer to a question like “Can we reliably take Tommy on a one year tour around the world in huge venues and will he not fall apart if we do?” By Miami (the second James Gang album from 1974), Tommy’s addictions were well out of control, which was a reason why the rest of the James Gang were not too distraught about his departure, they could see where this was going.
Moreover, heroin addiction is not incurable, physically you can get someone off smack pretty quick (quicker than with most other similar drugs), it’s the psychological addiction that lingers, that longing for the heroin high that is supposed to feel like an hours-long orgasm, all warm and cozy (that’s what I’ve heard, I’ve never tried it, it’s a description Steven Tyler once made, himself a smack junkie for decades).
Of course, heroin wasn’t Tommy’s sole demon, no drug was really ever safe from him, he was a multiple-addictive personality.
October 4th, 2024 at 22:12I’m happy if you go, Herr MacGregor, seriously. I’d like to hear what you think of his bass playing live. As a drummer you should have a real ear for it (and he’s well up in the mix! 😂).
October 4th, 2024 at 23:30@ 4 – I agree Uwe in regards to the other Deep Purple members not ‘knowing’ about potential Tommy Bolin issues. However if certain members themselves had issues, the obvious nature of proceedings can get rather delayed or become cloudy, for want of a better description. So ploughing on with the band was the number one agenda, before anything else & then the old British attitude of ‘chin up’ is naturally invoked. Let’s get on with it chaps, etc etc. Cheers.
October 4th, 2024 at 23:51MacGregor @3, I echo Uwe……you might really like what you hear. He’s playing in St. Kilda (Melbourne) on the 12th of this month….it’s only a short ferry ride away! I’ve seen Glenn play several times in small venues….he’s gives it 110% every time.
October 5th, 2024 at 00:58Yo,
Herr Uwe asked…
qt.”Couldn’t der liebe Gregster go to one of those spoken word shows and casually ask Glenn why he single-handedly ruined Mk III’s and Mk IV’s live performances with all his screaming and was also responsible for Tommy falling into a drug hell ?… I’d like to hear the answers to that”…. 😂
*** Oh, I don’t have to go to a show my friend ! GH reveals all & then some within the DVD “Phoenix Rising”…In fact one doesn’t even have to read-between-the-lines with anything in that DVD, it’s all plane-obvious, & everything hangs-out, at least from GH’s POV, if one can endure the prolonged revelations & total GH self-indulgence.
And then one only needs to listen to the Mk-III & Mk-IV DP ( overseas) live series releases to get the full picture… The other band-member comments over-the-years simply add icing & strawberry’s to the cake…The trick to getting through it all is to eat a little at a time, & edit-out the GH addendum within the live albums released.
I dig what he’s doing touring live, & many fans will be pleased, but I have no need to see a show, especially when I recall the torture of enduring the GH addendum already heard in my life-time. It would be worse than going to see a dentist for multiple emergency stage-1 or 2 root-canal-treatments, so *uck that yo !
Also, anyone that’s been to hospital & needed “general anaesthetic” to ease-the-pain will have a very-good idea of what opium is all about, & how truly-awesome the effects are. Aware people realize its better left for medical treatment however, though there’s nothing wrong with being surprised at receiving some opium-blended-hashish in one’s younger daze, & enjoying the moment lol !
It’s a cruel world indeed, & tragic that Tommy fell-over-the-edge…Once one is lucky enough to move through those phases of life, a better POV & experience can be had for sure, but to expand on here, is beyond the scope of the thread…But cigarettes provide a great example of that addiction type, & when you work at sea for months at a time & everyone runs-out-of-them, you soon realize that not smoking doesn’t kill you, & its actually easier to drop the habit than one may think. Mind over matter, & maybe 2-3 nights of restless sleep as your body expels the toxins, & you’re set after that, if you choose to be.
Adonai vasu !
October 5th, 2024 at 01:14DP “Dynasty”
October 5th, 2024 at 08:27At the end of the DP Mk IV journey 1975… soap operas happened… Hughes kidnapped Bolin’s girlfriend, Glenn’s girlfriend ended up with Jon Lord, and her twin sister got into a relationship with Ian Paice.
Glenn is (as I’ve said before) a hero of mine, a gifted musician and vocalist who at times operates in the same sphere as Chris Cornell… which imho is high praise. I’ve caught him live many times, and feel he now strikes a wonderful balance between the sublime and the ridiculous… granted the late period MK3 into 4 shows are sometimes a little hard to listen to, but that’s not all on Glenn… David’s voice was shredded, Blackers at times disinterested, or Tommy just plain woeful… why single out Glenn? who by his own admission wasn’t exactly on the same planet as most of his during those indulgent screaming moments.
When he reaches for the stratosphere these days, it’s at the right times and doesn’t detract from the performance… indeed it defines him somewhat and (for me) is a part of his soul that he needs to display for it to be a true GH show… Personally I love him for it, and (especially at his age) he blows his contemporaries out of the venue and straight into the local retirement village.
Hughes far from ruined Purps, he took them to places they’d have never gone otherwise… awesome diversions for a band that sounded so different during the MK2 days… a logical progression perhaps, but not one that would have been possible without the Hughes/Coverdale axis… it’s made the band more interesting, more diverse… it’s strengthened the legacy not destructed from it… no Hughes, no Bolin… no awesome CTTB… I’d much rather Glenn had added his contribution to the history of this wonderful band…
October 5th, 2024 at 09:11@10: Exactly! Thanks for writing exactly what I think but am too lazy to write. Very true, every word.
October 5th, 2024 at 09:19