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A good piece of music is still a good piece of music
Roger Glover and Ian Paice did several interviews for the German press while attending the documentary premiere in Düsseldorf. Most of them by now are quite repetitive, so we won’t list them all, but the one from WAZ.de is a wee bit off the beaten path. And nothing like stirring a little controversy asking about a hot political topic or two.
We are now offering it to you in reverse translation from German, with all the usual caveats applying.
Wouldn’t it be tempting to play a concert without Smoke on the Water in the setlist?
Ian Paice: Never! We’re not crazy! 90% of the audience come to hear the old stuff!
Do you really take it to your heart what your fans have to say?
Paice: You can not make it right for everyone. Our real fans are pretty critical, they immediately speak out if they don’t like something. They have their own taste, but that’s okay.
Roger Glover: It all has changed with the Internet. When we played the first test concerts with Steve Morse, my stepson said in the morning: “Hey, it was probably a great show yesterday. — It’s all over the Internet.” I’ve even made friends with a few fans over it. But you have to set boundaries between them and yourself.
Paice: Oh yes, three or four years ago I had a few Jack Daniels’ too many and signed up for Facebook — oh man! I was busy for two days.
Glover: It is not like in the old days anymore, when you could leave your fan mail somewhere in the corner because it simply became too much. Nowadays people expect to get an answer.
You have hinted lately that the next tour could be your last.
Paice: It is more likely that we will do another album than we would do yet another world tour after this one. The music that you record is immortal, but the musicians are not. Some time age will take its toll, either you won’t be on that planet any more or you can’t play any more like you should. That day might come sooner than you think. At the moment we are not brave enough to say: “This is the end, this is it!”
So what then?
Paice: After the tour is over we’ll take a break for six months and then decide what to do next. And maybe we’ll play a concert here and there. In any case, we do not want to make a farewell tour like other musicians — and two years later say: “Okay, we are back”.
Glover: The first annual reunion tour… (laughs)
But are you not bored to play the same songs over and over?
Paice: A good piece of music is still a good piece of music even after 50 or 100 years. And when it’s really good, it’s always fun to play it. I’m sure if you go back 200 years, you’ll find a lot of classical pieces that are rubbish. What we know is the good stuff. And our music is like jazz: there is a structure, but within it everybody gets a chance to do something different every evening.
What do you think about Trump and Brexit?
Paice: I voted against the Brexit, it takes away a lot of amenities from me. But: the European Union was founded as an economic community, which was a good idea. What we have now is a federal state with far too many regulations from Brussels.
Glover: I didn’t vote, I’ve been living in Switzerland for eight years now. I would have voted to stay. And against Trump.
Paice: What a rebel you are! Trump talks like the blue suits [??? – ed.] after they had a few drinks at the bar. He does not talk like politicians should be talking.
Glover: I lived in the US for 30 years — today it looks to me as if they have a new civil war. Not North against South as it used to be, but the Middle against the East and the West coasts. It’s a disaster!
Thanks to Deep Purple Tour Page for the heads up.
Interview: Jens Dirksen for WAZ.de.
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
Glover: The first annual reunion tour… (laughs)
March 22nd, 2017 at 21:09I always mused that the T in Donald Trump was his middle initial… & that Brexit was some kind of food you ate for breakfast. Smiles!.
March 22nd, 2017 at 22:53@ed. : blue suits = police
March 23rd, 2017 at 07:07reference: https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=blue+suit
Very refreshing to see an interview that did not include “What was it like when you wrote Smoke on the Water”? Cheers and kudos to the interviewer for making it interesting.
I remember the early days of the internet that Roger refers to. Once upon a time, on Tuesday evenings, there was a Deep Purple Chat room gathering on the AOL chats. We would gather together and discuss DP. Usually, it was civil. Not many flames, if I recall. The coolest thing about our Tuesday Nights was the one or two occasions when Roger popped in to join us in discussing his job. That was the coolest thing ever. Glad he took the time to do it. Jon, who also had an AOL account at the time, never stopped by for a visit. If he did, it was not a night I was in attendance. Those were good times.
Looking forward to the arrival of InFinite.
March 23rd, 2017 at 13:53That’s exactly my point. When the shine and glitter fades away only the music will last. So all this worthless videos about what the band get up to behind stage and recording is only for the present but the future is for the immortal pieces of good music.
March 23rd, 2017 at 16:37The coolest picture of Rodger Glover is inside the cover of Made in Japan. Thats when i saw them…..totally bad asss……
March 23rd, 2017 at 19:37Pretty certain that this tour will sadly be the end. I’d love to think the band would do a ‘final-final’ tour of the UK in smaller venues in 2018 (how do you say goodbye from an arena?), but probably not. In saying that, these guys have always done things their own way and never followed anyone else’s way. I’ll miss ’em. Roll on Glasgow 2017!
March 24th, 2017 at 11:55The editor of THS put a question mark after Ian Paice’s comment about Don speaking like “Blue Suits”. A Blue Suit is, from Ian’s British experience, a reference to Police Officers.
In American vernacular, it can refer to certain street gangs.
In this instance, it is safe to presume Ian is referencing the police.
March 26th, 2017 at 17:03