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Twenty-one and life is beautiful

Glenn Hughes was a guest on Bulgaria’s Z-Rock radio (his gig in Sofia was on June 24th, and he mentions it as being “tomorrow”).

Glenn reminisces about writing and recording Burn, leaving Trapeze and joining Purple, working with Blackmore, meeting Coverdale and the prospects of collaborating with him again.

On the last issue, in particular, he said:

We have spoken about it in the last 10 years a couple of times. But David — he’s been very busy; I have been very busy. So, the window of opportunity is closing, because I’m not sure how long David wants to continue. And I am so damn busy that… If he said to me tomorrow, ‘Let’s get together and maybe do something,’ I would find the time, but I don’t wait for that opportunity, because we’ve had that time. We had a great legacy.

A lot of people would love to see Glenn and David together on one more tour. But I’m not sure [it will happen]… I mean, I think fans would like that. You never know. But I’m not sure.

Watch the whole thing:

Thanks to Blabbermouth for the info and the quotes.



45 Comments to “Twenty-one and life is beautiful”:

  1. 1
    James Steven Gemmell says:

    People would love to hear Coverdale & Hughes jamming together again. Maybe Ritchie would get off the tea and join.

  2. 2
    Jaffa says:

    I would have thought that putting together an EP in DC’s studio could be a lot of fun… doesn’t have to be an album or tour, just a 4 track and a promo video. Could be new material or covers of the stuff they grew up with. Would be cool I think.

  3. 3
    Adel Faragalla says:

    James@1
    I totally agree but realistically it will never happen. Sadly I think those days are long gone.
    Also I think Mr Coverdale vocal cords are in retirement mode.
    But BCC album and tour and coming soon so it’s very exciting times for Glenn.
    Peace ✌️

  4. 4
    robert says:

    Blackmore has no more interest in hard rock anymore and frankly his medieval career is coming to a close as well. Fortunately, I have tix to see GH here in the USA.

  5. 5
    Uwe Hornung says:

    Whatever they do, it would have to be very light on David’s voice, Glenn would have to do all the fancy stuff. But wasn’t it always thus? 😎

    But I would love to hear the two tackle some Sitting On The Dock Of The Bay, Inner City Blues or Get Ready, they could really plunder the Motown/Stax catalog.

    The type of album you could play at a dinner with friends who don’t really “get” DP … “These are the singers of Deep Purple you say, I would have never guessed?! It’s actually pleasant and they don’t scream.” 😂

    It would probably also sell more than any album with Glenn since CTTB. 😝

  6. 6
    Rock Voorne says:

    There is and was a place and time for everything.
    Usually when certain people dont really come to me in critical situations I m often making up ridicilous excuses for them.

    They re being too busy….

    Everytime I say it it hurts,because it just means you are below on the list of someones priorities.

    In this case there comes the added insult to the injury as well.

    Glenn KNOWS DC never really wanted to do it all these decades.

    There are no excuses.

    And where are Glenns backingvocals on that 1989 Whitesnake album, David?
    You re re making old material these days, so bring it on.

  7. 7
    Gregster says:

    @6…

    Well said. But to maintain some reoccurring media attention, you have to spread the “bollox” around, so that everyone gets some…That way, they come back for more.

    The really amazing thing, is that now after 50-years, their short tenure in DP is still discussed. And it was a good stay as far as I’m concerned, especially Mk-IV, where it was a better, evolving band, & in the right direction. A solid blend of people working together, & not wanting out.

    And let’s face it, “if” they did get together again, what would they sing ??? There’d be a conflict-of-interests with 2 x DP’s touring around, & I doubt people would want to see them for anything else. And who knows how-much $$$ from both sides would be totally wasted in court for its decision on who gets to tour with what name…

    Any media is good media.

    Peace !

  8. 8
    Leslie S Hedger says:

    I agree with Uwe. An album of their favorite Soul/Funky songs, with maybe a few new songs would be great. No hard Rock, just Funk and Blues, with Glenn playing the Bass on all songs.

  9. 9
    Andrew says:

    As DC can’t sing now and GH needs plenty of support as well, probably best left alone.

  10. 10
    Uwe Hornung says:

    There is no question for me who Deep Purple is, the current Mk IX line-up of course. But since Mk IX doesn’t do any Mk III/IV material, and that is all Glenn and David would do, I don’t see any serious competition either. They could go out as “Mk III” just like Appice/Butler/Dio/Iommi went out as Heaven & Hell and not as Sabbath. That said, I don’t think that David is up to performing DP songs anymore, nor does he need to, I would rather hear him and Glenn do something else and encore with, say, You Keep On moving and Might Just Take Your Life.

    As regards David and Glenn still being known for their Mk III/IV days, people tend to forget that DC and GH were the new faces of DP when their commercial peak was really registered by the public (with sales largely generated by the previous line-up, but the public didn’t care about that). The last 12 months of Mk II’s tenure weren’t especially happy, basically band spirits had been going down the drain since the Summer of ’72 and the erratic WDWTWA recording sessions. The first Japan tour proved to be a final short-lived high point, but from then on … The band withdrew from interviews, especially Gillan and Glover. By early 1973 Mk II was a wounded bird fluttering.

    When Glenn and David joined in Summer of 1973, they were fresh, young (six years younger than their predecessors – that is a lot if you weren’t even in your thirties yet as Gillan and Glover were when they departed the band) and eager to speak into any microphone offered to them by journalists. They reaped the fruits of Mk II and for large parts of the public became an integral part of DP (unfathomable for us here, most casual rock/pop listeners don’t realize that Hush, SOTW and Burn feature four different lead vocalists from different Purple eras nor do they give a damn). And the Mk III/IV era was the one were Purple were kings of US stadium rock: Early 1974, Mk III picked up the award for most sales in the US by any group in 1973 (eg sales of Machine Head, Made in Japan and Who Do We Think We Are, all Mk II of course) + during their time in the band, Glenn and David never saw DP ever open for any other band again. Mk III/IV also flaunted a certain mid-70ies rock star decadence that wasn’t as apparent with Mk II which had come from humble beginnings to ascend to stardom in more or less two hard-working years and could only enjoy that stardom for a short while before things soured. Mk III otoh lived the rock star life to the hilt, demoing in Clearwell Castle, leasing their own tour airliner

    https://media.gettyimages.com/id/164306261/it/foto/united-states-1st-december-members-of-the-rock-group-deep-purple-posed-with-gold-discs-on-board.jpg?s=2048×2048&w=gi&k=20&c=5-a8lfb3u8tLjr2cmZHNcDS-z64Q_2NrcL3-sHB6018=

    headlining the California Jam above bands such as the Eagles, Black Sabbath; Seals & Crofts (back then hugely popular in the US), Black Oak Arkansas (did DC meet Tommy Aldridge there for the first time?) and ELP, touring Asia and not just Japan, it was all pretty fabulous, doing what rock stars do like spending an intimate evening with your friend’s wife at his request …

    https://www.loudersound.com/news/david-bowie-once-asked-his-friend-glenn-hughes-to-sleep-with-angie-bowie-the-deep-purple-man-felt-awful-for-doing-so

    Re Blackmore not “allowing” Glenn to record with David Bowie because of alleged danger of harm to the DP brand, were we really THAT intolerant*** as DP fans back then? I loved Diamond Dogs (the album) & Station To Station (ditto) at pretty much the same time as Burn, Stormbringer and Come Taste The Band, I would have been elated had Glenn played bass and sang backing vocals on Bowie’s Station To Station! Darn, what a missed opportunity! Blackmore was probably just jealous for not having himself been invited to guest by an enigma and international star like Bowie. Jealousy and competitiveness were always his driving forces with DP.

    ***I’d say that DP fans more than pretty much the fans of any other group were accustomed to solo ventures of DP members NOT following the Purple recipe: Gemini Suite, First Of The Big Bands, Windows, Sarabande, Butterfly Ball, Ian Gillan Band, Paice Ashton Lord, Tommy Bolin solo albums, Play Me Out & first two DC solo albums anyone? Not a single real hard rock album in sight. The only one who provided reliably, if not always adventurously heavy rock product (and subsequently painting himself in a corner with it) was the Man in Black himself.

  11. 11
    sidroman says:

    I would have loved to see a Mk3 reunion when Jon Lord was alive, but it’s time has passed. Coverdale’s voice is pretty much shot, and even Blackmore has issues playing guitar. He’s nowhere near as fast as he used to be. Also who would the keyboard player and drummer be? I can’t imagine Ian Paice doing it, he seems happy and committed to the current Deep Purple.

  12. 12
    MacGregor says:

    @ 10 – “headlining the California Jam above bands such as the Eagles, Black Sabbath; Seals & Crofts (back then hugely popular in the US), Black Oak Arkansas (did DC meet Tommy Aldridge there for the first time?) and ELP, touring Asia and not just Japan, it was all pretty fabulous, doing what rock stars do like spending an intimate evening with your friend’s wife at his request …’ Uwe you are slipping again old son. ELP were the official headliners, especially as we all know they did close the show. Joint headliners, is that possible on the same day, possibly as the print stated that from my memory of seeing & reading things over the years. ELP were huge in the USA at that time. Probably bigger than Purple me thinks. Blackmore wanted the ‘sundown’ clause enacted & he succeeded in that, but headline the CJ? Cheers.

  13. 13
    MacGregor says:

    @ 10 – “There is no question for me who Deep Purple is, the current Mk IX line-up of course. But since Mk IX doesn’t do any Mk III/IV material, and that is all Glenn and David would do, I don’t see any serious competition either. They could go out as “Mk III” just like Appice/Butler/Dio/Iommi went out as Heaven & Hell and not as Sabbath.” A totally different scenario there & it wouldn’t work. The Sabbath guys were an official band, from the initial (after Bill Ward dropped out early) 1980 tour of the Heaven & Hell album & the following Mob Rules & Dehumanizer albums. Same band all together again. Dio could still sing wonderfully also in 2007/8/9. Who would back this so called MK3 shenanigan? A disaster in the making. Who are the backing musicians? Forget it. Time gentlemen. Cheers.

  14. 14
    Uwe Hornung says:

    ELP bigger than Purple? I know you like’m, Herr MacGregor, you probably also keep a fabled armadillo with tank tracks and side cannons as a pet and named it Tarkus, but let’s not get carried away. Both worldwide and in the US, DP outsold ELP a whopping 2:1 at all relevant times, wrap your brain salad around that or I’ll call a surgeon to do it for you! ; – p Which is hardly a surprise given how little accessible (and largely instrumental) most of ELP’s music was. They were the epitome of a guys-only band, music-to-never-get-laid-to, nuff said.

    I’ll grant you – however grudgingly – the “co-headliners” status though

    https://media.gettyimages.com/id/85348561/photo/photo-of-concert-posters.jpg?s=1024×1024&w=gi&k=20&c=CfTOBc4LMcy7tgh7Cfc6vVxO6Nx8Usf4NzcBDs9Z4WE= ,

    but Purple were a bit more equal as THEY got the choice from the promoters to play last or take the penultimate slot (which they did for the sundown effect). Alas!, Keith Emerson had to play in the Marshall ashes Blackmore left behind, hope he didn’t smudge his ivories … But Glenn and Keith obviously bonded there:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9XvUDkiVSmQ

  15. 15
    Fernando Azevedo says:

    MacGregor.
    In fact Purple was hired to be the last act of the California Jam. The “problem” is that they had a show in another city the next day and asked to change times with ELP

  16. 16
    Rock Voorne says:

    Didnt recall Blackmore being dismissive about Glenn singing for Bowie.

    Jealous? Mmmmmhhhh, he didnt want to let Dio sing at the Butterfly Ball because of
    ….? I dont think it was to stab Roger.

    Recently I understood Bowie asked Fripp to think Blackmore when doing work for him. Tried to hear but…..

  17. 17
    MacGregor says:

    I did not mention album sales in my estimation of how popular those two bands were at the time in the USA. Concerts probably put that fable to bed as ELP were a tour de force at that time, especially over there. Me thinks ELP were probably bigger overall than Purple for that early to mid 1970’s period. I was as surprised as the next Purple aficionado as to how DP didn’t ‘headline’ that concert, as in close the show. I always presumed Purple did just that watching the VHS for decades on end. I still cannot see how ELP could have followed the demolition & energy that Blackmore & company delivered that evening. ELP’s set having a few acoustic songs & probably too many solo sections for a outdoor festival performance for my reckoning. Blackmore apparently was friendly with Keith Emerson & always respected him & that band. A strange setting but Blackmore had his way so I suppose that is all that matters, he he he. I am not sure what you mean by the ‘guys only band’ there was plenty of feminine support for ELP, for different reasons. ELP were a much better ‘looking’ band, don’t you think. The ladies enjoyed Greg Lake & his ability to entice them into another realm. Much more ‘radio’ friendly band also than Purple at that time me thinks? Lucky Man, Still You Turn Me On, Fanfare For the Common Man etc. We can keep going into the classics if you want to. Cheers.

  18. 18
    Gregster says:

    @14 said…

    qt.” Alas!, Keith Emerson had to play in the Marshall ashes Blackmore left behind, (I) hope he didn’t smudge his ivories” …

    ROTFLMAO !

    * As great as the DP Cal-Jam performance is, from what I’ve seen of the Black Sabbath performance, the crowd got-into BS more. Amazing to see so many people getting into the music…I guess by sunset, many were worn-out from a huge day of solid performances.

    Peace !

  19. 19
    Max says:

    @5 Agreed!

    Soul, Blues, funky stuff or even ballads and classics …you name it. Just no more screeching. Yeah, something you can listen to with the old lady or driving around on a summer evening … not in the fast lane.

  20. 20
    MacGregor says:

    There was never any fear of Emerson having to setup in the ashes of those Marshalls. He was on the opposite side, the same place Jon Lord was & the safest place on that stage. Also Emerson needed that side to install the spinning grand piano set up, have to laugh at that when it happens. Regarding the waiting, impatient & possibly quieter (not for long though) crowd, that would have been due to the delay in DP appearing. That dastardly Blackmore again causing problems. Black Sabbath’s music was popular in the States at that time also & the more rocking & rolling, the more the crowd response. Plus getting in herbal & other substances usually also has a helping hand at times. Also coming on after the Eagles & Seals & Crofts & the other bands, best to crank it up & get into the vibe of harder rock music. Cheers.

  21. 21
    MacGregor says:

    @ 15 – thanks for that information Fernando & that would make sense. Cheers.

  22. 22
    Uwe Hornung says:

    Re California Jam, Sabbath in broad daylight always looked weird to me, but it was a good performance alright. I just read an interview by Geezer Butler where he said they didn’t even know that they had been booked and would be playing there until the night before, thus they had no feeling of a special event.

    Sabbath served a greatest hits package pleasing the crowd. Deep Purple were more ambitious: They played five songs (four of them as the first four numbers of the set!) from an album that at this point had only been in the stores for six (!) weeks + SOTW in the middle and Space Truckin’ at the end. That was incredibly brave. The majority of that audience heard the Burn songs for the first time back then.

    And Herr MacGregor, with all due respect, female ELP fans are – much like unicorns and mermaids – creatures of myth. They don’t actually exist. There are just a handful of women who mistake Greg Lake’s soppy songs with Cat Stevens, that’s all.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cCVj4-bao4

  23. 23
    MacGregor says:

    A British invasion of sorts the CJ. The 3 big names cranking it & it has made me wonder for a while what other bands were approached before these 3, if any? That band that Uwe cannot resist from naming constantly because he is so infatuated with them, would have been one we would think. The Stones & perhaps The Who? Or did the 3 who ended up putting in an appearance simply say yes when approached, although according to the Blackmore interview in recent years John Coletta was trying his hardest to be persuasive 6 months before the event. Sabbath only having one day, sheesh that is pushing it. Regarding Sabbath’s performance it amuses me regarding Ozzy’s rather quiet demeanour on stage. At least compared to how he ended up with his communication with an audience in later years. Regarding Purple’s performance with new songs, bravo I have always thought. Why not move on with a big statement like that. A pity some other bands don’t ‘support’ their new material with that vigour. Some artists do go even further & play a new album in it’s entirety. Now about those Unicorns, they do exist Uwe. You just haven’t come across any as yet. And Mermaids are wonderful creatures. Very surreal, sublime, elegant & rather endearing, at first. Then they start demanding this & that & all of a sudden, well it doesn’t last long unfortunately. Oh well back to the drawing board, again. Cheers.

  24. 24
    Uwe Hornung says:

    Correction: It was actually a week before California Jam when a roadie told the Sabs that they’d be playing there according to their itinerary.

    Sabbath Bloody Sabbath is actually my favorite BS album of the Ozzy era, it’s their Sgt. Pepper – and, yes, Geezer agrees with me!

  25. 25
    Gregster says:

    @24…

    Agreed about SBS…I’d probably add however Sabotage to that statement, & think of both albums representing a side each of the same coin…

    Peace !

  26. 26
    Uwe Hornung says:

    Lol, Sabotage is my second-favorite. Great album, but recorded in unhappy circumstances due to their strife with their manager. I think that Butler bio “Into the Void” is gonna be interesting.

  27. 27
    MacGregor says:

    A weeks notice before the CJ sounds a little more feasible, thanks for the update. Yes Geezer’s book hopefully will be shining a little light on a few things no doubt. Comical though that a roadie informs the band, a little un organised although we do hear stories of a similar nature with some of those bands at that time. That 1973/75 era is my favourite Sabbath musically & album wise. A pity they couldn’t back it up with the songs being played live, nice to have all the bells & whistles in the studio & I am glad they did, but live it was back to the grunge limitation again. Not to worry. One hilarious story re Sabotage sessions is Ozzy walking into the recording of the choir for Supertzar instrumental. He walked back out thinking he was in the wrong studio, ha ha ha. Then he was ropeable allegedly when he found out, ‘This is Black Sabbath, not the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra, what the eff is going on”. Something along those lines. Thankfully he was ignored & the band etc kept recording. Cheers.

  28. 28
    MacGregor says:

    Actually the Ozzy comment regarding the orchestra could be from the Sabbath Technical Ecstasy album sessions & the song ‘She’s Gone’ with the string section. He did walk in & out at the Sabotage session with the choir recording the instrumental Supertzar. The main reason I thought I had better clarify that comment was to avoid any possible ramifications of being torn apart here by anyone. Certain aficionados here can be so critical at times (never me of course, he he he) & it can be very stressful commenting at times. Cheers.

  29. 29
    Uwe Hornung says:

    I believe a more mature Ozzy did eventually come to terms with orchestral arrangements!

    https://youtu.be/pYomVbcJKhI

    ELO – Electric Light Ozzy.

  30. 30
    MacGregor says:

    The last O$bourne album I ever purchased, the one with Ozzy writing everything on it. An amazing musician indeed, how did he do it, conjuring up something out of a hat or from somewhere else. A musician by the name of Louis Clark was apparently responsible for the string arrangements. My faded memory thought Don Airey may have been responsible but to make sure I looked it up online. I should have just believed the O$Bourne’s & that Ozzy did everything. Cheers.

  31. 31
    MacGregor says:

    Apologies Uwe I should have looked up Louis Clark before posting above comment. ELO indeed. Cheers.

  32. 32
    Uwe Hornung says:

    No issue, I knew neither of Louis Clark nor of his involvement with Ozzy or ELO. Now I’ve learned something. I just always thought that Ozzy’s ballad sounded like ELO and was meant to sound like it too. Ozzy is a Beatles buff und the jump from Beatles to ELO isn’t a great one. And of course they’re all Brummies.

  33. 33
    Ronnie Bellamy says:

    @12 Blackmore chose to go before ELP because he wanted to go on as the the sun was setting, and the mischievous chap was going to blow up his amps and he knew it would make it incredibly hard to follow that. So, ultimately, it was Purple that decided whether they closed the day or not rather than ELP. Yes, ELP were big but during that 73/74 period Purple sold more albums than even Zeppelin so they were definitely the bigger act at the California Jam, and the only tune that was more popular than ‘Smoke…’ in the States was the national anthem.

  34. 34
    Uwe Hornung says:

    But Ronnie, you can’t just challenge Herr MacGregor in public like that! Somewhere in the Australian Outback, where the wild monitors roam, small tribes have formed the opinion that ELP’s Pictures At An Exhibition was to early 70ies adolescents what Saturday Night Fever was to the next generation of youths in 1977: their preferred dance album. In that alternative universe, millions of American Girls adorned their bedrooms with pictures of Keith, Greg und Carl – move over David Cassidy! While counting out ELP’s strange meters, they would marvel all day long what the term “Brain Salad Surgery” might mean and why the cover of the album of the same name was kinda indistinct in places … Ronnie, you can’t argue with culturally ingrained beliefs like that!!!

    As for me, I incidentally went to an American high school from 1973 to 1976 in my blossoming adolescence. Compared to popular mainstay bands of the time such as:

    Grand Funk Railroad, Three Dog Night, Led Zep, Loggins & Messina, Elton John, Beatles, Alice Cooper, Bread, The Carpenters, Stones, CSN&Y, Bowie, Pink Floyd, YES, Jethro Tull, Doobie Brothers, Cat Stevens, Black Sabbath and, yes, even that commercially negligible outfit called Deep Purple with their one little freak hit Hush Over The Water,

    Emerson Lake & Palmer were a respectable fringe band with cool album covers at best. Good guitar solos too.

    But don’t let Herr MacGregor hear that! It’s our little secret.

  35. 35
    MacGregor says:

    @ 33 – as we were talking about the CJ concert, I was talking about concert drawing attendances, not album sales although Uwe mentioned that initially. According to what we can read over the history of that era ELP were only trumped by three bands during that 1973/4 period in the USA for concert drawing popularity. The Who, The Rolling Stones & that band that Uwe is addicted to, you know the one from England that only lasted about ten years. Still makes me wonder out of curiosity as to what other bands were approached or were not interested in that CJ. Were ELP & Purple the first bands on the minds of the organisers, possibly not me thinks but they may have been, who knows. All water under the bridge these days. I am not a huge ELP follower although I have a few of their classic albums from that era & a profound respect of their ability & music & their interpretations of other composers which was no doubt a definite appealing lure for many music fans back then. As a live band I would have definitely attended a concert of theirs. A dynamic group of the highest order. They were very popular because of their diversity of all things, well most styles of music not to mention the delivery of it & all out expenses to put on the best show for their fans as possible. Over the top at times, but it was the 1970’s after all & what band wasn’t extravagant during that time. Cheers.

  36. 36
    Uwe Hornung says:

    I saw ELP opening for DP Mk VII (or: they were the penultimate act at an open air rock festival headed by DP) in the mid-nineties, they played well, had a long set, but it went straight over the heads of the Purple crowd. ELP just isn‘t very accessible. Unless you like long keyboard solos , long drum solos and limp ballads of course.

    I doubt whether LZ would have played the Cal Jam with DP as co-headliners. They were very particular with whom they played and for instance threw Grand Funk Railroad off a tour with them when GFR‘s “people‘s band“ boogie rock went down too well.

  37. 37
    MacGregor says:

    I do remember reading about those mid to late 90’s concert double billings with the classic 70’s bands. Yes & Kansas, Tull & ELP I think from memory, DP & ELP & DP with a more recent band in Dream Theater. I don’t know how popular those gigs were, no doubt some fans would have lapped up certain concerts. I have always wondered as to ELP playing outdoor concerts, not the sort of setup for that to my mind, their set list would be much better suited to indoor, so the CJ always surprised me. Grand Funk Railroad now there is one band I did think of playing towards the end of the CJ. They were pretty big back then & being locals they would have gone down a treat I would have thought. Some bands avoided those outdoor festivals for obvious reasons. Tull use to as I remember Ian Anderson talking about it many years ago. Same rave as Blackmore really, too much can go wrong & it usually does. I also remember Jon Lord talking about the CJ & saying similar things. Indoor concerts sound better anyway, especially if in a more intimate setting & not a concrete bunker (sports stadiums). Horrible acoustics in those.buildings. Cheers.

  38. 38
    Frater Amorifer says:

    #20: Back in 1973, Circus magazine (remember them?) published an interview in which Blackmore clarified that their contract said they were to start “at dusk, specifically at 7:00 PM” (Blackmore’s exact words). Then the show ran ahead of time, which was very rare back in the day. The organizers then suddenly demanded that DP start early, which they weren’t ready to do (at least RB wasn’t). So DP got hit with all of these accusations about throwing a tantrum, etc. This was NOT one of Blackmore’s famous tantrums – he just insisted on following their contract, that stipulated a 7:00 PM start time, to the letter. The organizers were going to cancel them, but their roadie Ossie Hoppe (HOPPE – NOT HOPPER) saved the day by going onstage and telling the audience that they were having equipment problems, and would be on soon. The organizers couldn’t cancel them after that.

  39. 39
    Frater Amorifer says:

    #36/37: I saw ELP second-billed to DP back in the 90’s, with Dream Theater opening. DP and ELP were both brilliant. Dream Theater played their instruments brilliantly, but weren’t as strong musically. They relied too much on long, pointless jamming. Also saw ELP opening for Jethro Tull at the Universal. ELP was originally scheduled to play just 40 minutes, as Keith was just recovering from some wrist issues. When he decided he could play longer, Ian Anderson generously gave them about 20 minutes of Tull’s time (the venue had a 10:30 PM curfew). ELP filled that 20 minutes with what was basically a copy of the last half of the MIJ version of Space Truckin’, so Tull might as well have kept their time.

  40. 40
    Frater Amorifer says:

    Uwe #36: Cream did the same thing to DP Mk. 1 on an early USA West Coast tour in 1968. Tossed them off the tour after 2-3 shows for being better than them.

  41. 41
    Uwe Hornung says:

    Yeah, I knew that, seems to explain to me why Blackmore never said anything nice about Clapton (and Clapton ignored him completely) though he nicked one of his riffs for Lazy!

    I read that Clapton was not amused about Ritchie’s habit of playing snippets of light novelty tunes in between – very humorless, but Cream were a miserable-feeling band by then and Clapton all stern-faced about making music.

  42. 42
    MacGregor says:

    @ 39- Dave Brubeck’ s Blue Rondo a La Turk that would be. The Nice were playing that well before Purple. So Emerson & company kept it going. Did Purple borrow that idea? I would say so. Both bands ‘borrowed’ heavily at times from previous music & composers. Regarding the Cream band tossing DP off the support tour, that could be for a number of reasons. Better band? At that time it is more like Cream were possibly spent by then & not suffering fools gladly including themselves. Cheers.
    The Nice with Rondo 1967
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tqQWntzevy4
    Here is Brubeck & company playing it.
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j9GgmGLPbWU

  43. 43
    Micke says:

    @ 12 I always got the impression that Purple chose the slot at sundown because of it’s effect..? And that was why Blackmore refused to go on before. That in fact Purple really was the headliners. And by the time for ELP most people would have been worn out.

  44. 44
    Micke says:

    @ 24 Sabbath Bloody Sabbath and Sabotage are definitely the best albums Sabbath ever did. The only other albums from the band that comes close is Black Sabbath and possibly Heaven and Hell.

  45. 45
    Svante Axbacke says:

    @43: What I have heard is that ELP was supposed to go on last. I guess that would make them the headliners. That would have meant that DP would have played while the sun was still up. Ritchie didn’t want that. ELP didn’t want to swap slots with DP so Ritchie stalled their entrance to be able to start later. This resulting in ELP having their rightful headline slot but that the audience was exhausted once it was their time to shine.

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