![[hand]](/hs-pics/portraits/hands/gillan2.jpg)
![[face]](/hs-pics/portraits/faces/airey2.jpg)
He knows exactly what he wants
Guitar World has an interview with Steve Morse, and it gets pretty gear-heavy pretty quickly. Here it is, with more details on basic single coils vs stacked coil pickups than most of us ever wanted to know.
If forced to make a choice, would you rather buy a really good electric guitar and a cheap amp, or a cheap guitar and a top-notch high-end guitar amp?
Man, that’s a tough one, but the guitar wins. I need to have various tones coming straight from the instrument. The amp is a big part of things, but the guitar is the biggest. That is partly because some cheap amps sound like 80 per cent as good as a great amp. But most guitars that are cheap can’t do anything like the range of sounds on my guitar.
Read more in Guitar World.
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
I’m a huge fan of Steve’s albums, “Major Impacts 2”, & “Out Standing In Their Field”. His work with DP is untouchable in my opinion. A master of the guitar & a good natured fellow.
November 13th, 2024 at 02:32Come on you guys, that interview wasn’t thaaaaaaaaaaat badly guitar techie! 😁
Coming from Steve at least. 🤷♂️
November 13th, 2024 at 04:01I almost forgot: Nice – Native American kitsch imagery-free – T-shirt on that pic of him too, tokay gecko in Keith Haring style, not every gas station offers those!
https://64.media.tumblr.com/9718af3a13108a9ac5b9244036ac21af/tumblr_mzmnwleIBO1qdg223o1_400.gifv
November 13th, 2024 at 04:10Yo,
That was a good short read, especially for guitarists, as input like that goes a long way into your own rigs considerations.
And if you check-out the interview with Leslie West by clicking on the last tab on the RHS as you read through Steve’s article, you will be even more rewarded !
Adonai !
November 13th, 2024 at 22:48I really like Simon and “= 1” a lot. Deep Purple is still great.
November 13th, 2024 at 23:52Having said this, I really love the Steve Morse era of Deep Purple.
To me, every album was very good, a few, even wonderful.
The tours, really good, especially 1998-1999, GAD!
I was very sad when he left. He saved my favorite band.
Onward to Deep Purple and Steve Morse.
All the best to all these guys.
Deep Purple Forever!
Yep, I said it.
@5
November 14th, 2024 at 17:54I agree with you 👍🏼
Karin keeps spirits and morale high here!
https://media1.giphy.com/media/kZnx7rC0oSYE3cJ3oO/giphy.gif?cid=6c09b952nfrhpgok8llrofhtkehazj8afe9zug4y2kjyduqa&ep=v1_gifs_search&rid=giphy.gif&ct=g
November 14th, 2024 at 18:36@5
November 14th, 2024 at 18:53I also agree. The best part of this for me, was the cover of the Jeff Beck tune, which I hadn’t seen before. Awesome!
@7
I’m glad to keep up the both spirits and morale high here 😉
I do have a tiny question (forgot it in the other thread The Last Band Standing:
How come so many heavy bands touch profoundly on religious themes? I haven’t any experience in their lyrics, so is it meant as a mocking?
November 14th, 2024 at 21:01“How come so many heavy bands touch profoundly on religious themes?”
Do they really? I guess that lyrics about the devil and the occult or pagan themes lent themselves to darker, dramatic, larger than life music. But it’s mostly escapism or shock value entertainment, few bands really have a serious anti-Christian message (a band like Ghost certainly doesn’t) and there are of course also bands like Stryper that advocate Christianity.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uEgAs1HwUmE
November 15th, 2024 at 01:38@10
“Do they really?”
– well I don’t know! 🤷🏼♀️
When I compare to the lyrics of Deep Purple and ELO, that I know by heart, there is not much religious content, if any at all!
I guess you’re right here:
“But it’s mostly escapism or shock value entertainment.”
Have a lovely weekend gentlemen and ladies (suffragettes 😆)
The song of the day:
November 15th, 2024 at 07:29https://youtu.be/zi3lxg9SX28?si=Ch72kXnm0D9Cz17c
He was never a fit in Deep Purple.
November 16th, 2024 at 10:01In a way, yes, Henrik, and by the same token a role model in devotion to the cause. Steve gave all he had and that was plenty. But was it always a perfect match?
If there was a cultural or musical disconnect, DP were as much to blame for it as him.
November 16th, 2024 at 18:56Yo,
Leiber Uwe stated…
qt.”If there was a cultural or musical disconnect, DP were as much to blame for it as him”.
Bollox !!!
The issue isn’t with Steve or DP, it’s the fact that DP had a prior history, & so you have a large group of fans that can’t make the adjustment to DP being a completely NEW band, but with the old title / trade name…And they all want RB back, yet he was the asshole that placed the band in such a position in the first place…
Get over it…
This had to be done, & will always leave people divided that knew the band for the decades prior to Steve’s ( or Simon’s ) joining. That’s why we still have foolish people, stuck in a time-warp unwittingly wanting RB & a Mk-II reunion lol !
You must always think of each new Mk as actually being a new band, & give it its worth, for better or worse. If better, stay-on & applaud the new music. If worse, no one will miss your comments, so move on.
I once thought that the world of DP revolved around RB, & eventually discovered what an idiot I had been, with my reasoning having no basis at all with the extraordinary fine new music being created with Steve in the band, but with some stupid ideal that RB was it, & without him, there was no band. I wasn’t listening or giving the new band a chance…Very, very foolish…
We all make mistakes, & certainly one of my biggest mistakes in life was putting all my DP musical eggs in the RB basket, what an idiot I was…But I have to thank RB for putting me through that learning process, & a fool I am no longer. I learned what an even better band DP were without him, that continues to grow & deliver the goods.
DP is dead, long live DP ! They just keep getting better & better if you listen closely, & without prejudice.
Adonai !
November 20th, 2024 at 10:53Do I really look and act like a Blackmore acolyte to you, Gregster? 🤣
I pour derision over most of what Rainbow did and Blackmore’s Night does. I’m a staunch defender of Mk IV (including their bassist/second lead vocalist I might add). I own pretty much any scintilla of what Steve ever played on.
But Ritchie had his strengths (not to the exclusion of everyone after him) as Purple’s lead guitarist and so did Steve Morse. And both had (different) weaknesses too.
November 20th, 2024 at 14:34Yo,
Herr Uwe asked…
qt.”Do I really look and act like a Blackmore acolyte to you, Gregster”? ….
RB maybe, GH for sure…
You enjoy posting everything there is to post about any subject regarding the band, for the intent of informing the people that visit here. That’s a good thing !
For myself, I try not to engage in all-of-that, as there’s simply too much baggage to carry. At this stage of my life, I’ve acquired so-much music, that if you lined-up all my CD’s in succession, I’d doubt that I’d get through listening to them all again, but it’s nice to have them there in case you do. That said, there’s also a limit I have in exploring the bands that may have links to DP, as I see no purpose in it. I have my faves, & try to keep-up with their output whilst keeping one-ear-on-the-ground with current music & trends. And when one adds in ones own playing-time on the guitar to keep-up the skill level, time availability runs low, as there’s not enough to go around.
There was probably 10-15 years that I didn’t really give DP a chance, from say 1994-2009, where I listened to them, but didn’t give the Morse era a serious listening to, namely because of all the RB bollox that was attached with the band. Once I severed that link, I was fine, & could enjoy the new band as a new band, & what a friggin’ ripper band it was, & remains now with Simon.
The beauty of the DP (overseas) Live Series CD’s is that you get reasonable gigs captured of a time long past, that were at the time of their release, a refreshing change to hear the old Mk’s in a new way,as they were different or fully released shows, & added finality to those era’s. This allows the new & current material to shine head & shoulders above the old, because it took over 25-years to get the band members right. And they’re even more fortunate here with Simon today imo, as the new album reveals, with its continued ongoing success.
It’s everyone’s right to support whomever they wish, & RB I’m indifferent to, but with GH, one has to wonder why there’s so much interest…That I don’t understand, & don’t wish to know. The chapter he has in DP history is more than enough for me to endure.
Adonai !
November 20th, 2024 at 21:54“You enjoy posting everything there is to post about any subject regarding the band, for the intent of informing the people that visit here.”
Guilty as charged, lieber Gregster! To me the Purple Family is like a terrarium with an insect colony – I like to sit and watch, it’s a microcosm. How bands and their musicians interrelate has always interested me. I don’t give a hoot whether I have an autograph by Paicey or not, but I rejoice at a CD of The Maze featuring him.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZWemJww9uvo
Some people’s fascination with Glenn (including me) stems I think from the fact that someone associated with Deep Purple writes, sings and plays music like this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wDjNgkFiJYE
It is what mesmerized David Bowie when he hung around with Glenn in his ‘Thin White Duke’ Young Americans/Station To Station phase, he marvelled that someone in as mundane an arena hard rock act like DP (to Bowie at least) would have a love and competence for radically different music.
November 21st, 2024 at 10:14Yo,
Herr Uwe stated…( And this is really funny btw )…
qt.”It is what mesmerized David Bowie when he hung around with Glenn in his ‘Thin White Duke’ Young Americans/Station To Station phase, he marvelled that someone in as mundane an arena hard rock act like DP (to Bowie at least) would have a love and competence for radically different music”.
ROTFLMAO !!!
1. GH was without a band, & DP didn’t even tell him that they’d broken-up initially at that point circa early 1976…(He was likely feeling remorseful about being such a dick-head & causing the DP break-up, & wanted to drown his sorrows in the snow with DB)…
2. He found out that DP broke-up by chance at IP’s wedding.
3. Are you Herr Uwe so entrenched with tunnel vision, that you think David Bowie, was hanging around with GH ???…Surely it’s the other way around…And without doubt, Coke was the calling-card, not the music…(It was Coke that messed his stint with Black Sabbath up…GH is his own worst enemy)…
Apart from recent years, where the fact that GH just happens to still be with us & is actually part of rock history, (namely due to his very short stint in DP), most people I’d suggest learned the hard-way by working with him about what he was/is all about. That’s why there’s no consistent work / long term working band that he’s involved with…He may have played with many people, but it seems that he over-stays his welcome in most cases, & is engaged with in sporadic short bursts…Like a coin that after a flip, bounces from head-to-tails over & over, never wanting to stop or settle down.
Adonai !
4.
November 24th, 2024 at 02:32Ah, the Tasmanian Glenn-naysayer! May I give some comments entrenched if not in tunnel vision, then so at least in facts?
You’re getting the years wrong, lieber Gregster. Bowie stayed in Glenn’s house in 1975, pre-CTTB. You can tell by the promo shots of Mk IV where Glenn looks smaller than usual because he is the only one NOT wearing platforms anymore. Standing he is about as tall as diminutive Little Ian (1,70 m) on these pics,
https://lh6.googleusercontent.com/proxy/CfyOinTi35awQI5luE6EopCn2itX4rQTPbMJHJ0Ly49TLM3ksH4ddpUw1fn8PRhKYYYVjiqOhmhgfyD1M0n5PDn6ag
but Glenn is in fact 1,84 m, that is almost as tall as DC (1,87 m), but you wouldn’t know it from this pic:
https://64.media.tumblr.com/e6f9f4d19ade355b12c9402028286dfd/c344176e20bdf879-a8/s1280x1920/ef429532d8a438675470a0e93c26f3f8564e1205.jpg
On this pic you see his shoes and that he is the only one without platforms:
https://media.gettyimages.com/id/84882415/photo/photo-of-jon-lord-and-tommy-bolin-and-ian-paice-and-glenn-hughes-and-deep-purple-and-david.jpg?s=594×594&w=gi&k=20&c=pCqqz3TyDu4lAcVwpOEs9wAFKa-AqK1CX-IPDYy40qw=
Now what do shoes have to do with David Bowie? Easy, Bowie was by 1975 de-glammed in his Thin White Duke mode and, while staying in Glenn’s house, threw out all the latter’s platforms with the comment: “These are no longer fashion.” And Glenn somewhat sheepishly followed suit. You don’t argue with David Bowie about what’s fashion and what’s not.
There was even talk in 1976 that Glenn’s scheduled solo album (which he was intent on doing notwithstanding his Purple commitments) should be produced by David Bowie, but nothing ever came of it for reasons of again record company squabbling. But announcements of Bowie being the producer were already in the German press.I was elated.
Of course both were coke-kindred spirits! But don’t forget that David’s last album had been Young Americans, he was discovering American Black Music. And had seen Glenn on US TV in the ABC-aired Cal Jam spectacle where he was stunned by a DP bassist singing in a soul voice (during Glenn’s part following SOTW which you hate so much! 😘). Bowie even wanted to have Glenn sing backing vocals on his next project, but the Purple management together with Ritchie put a halt to that arguing that it would “confuse fans”.
Bowie lived with Glenn in that phase where Blackmore was on his way out and DP were looking for a replacement. It was actually Bowie who said to Glenn that DP should continue, “but get someone completely different to Blackmore”. And he condoned Tommy Bolin as “really being something different” (though Tommy loved his platforms, but then Yanks tend to be a little behind in fashion). Bowie actually drove Glenn in his Mercedes to the first DP session with Tommy (where Tommy was wearing platform sandals).
While Bowie was recording his magnum opus Station To Station in the fall of 1975, Glenn was preparing for CTTB in Pirate Studios LA and then off to Munich for recordings – those sessions where Glenn was sent home to England because of his by then raging coke addition which was certainly not helped by Bowie sharing his house for months on end.
You’re absolutely right that neither Glenn nor Tommy were told by either Jon, Paicey or DC OR the management that DP had ceased to exist after that fateful Liverpool Empire gig and that Glenn only found out on Little Ian’s wedding to the identical twin sister of Glenn’s former girlfriend (soon to be Mrs Lord, giving Jon and Little Ian the opportunity to swap wives from then on without anybody noticing!) – but all that was in 1976, not 1975.
Better luck next time bashing Glenn! You’ll think of something, I’m sure. 👍 Never let facts get in the way of a healthy disdain.
https://youtu.be/y39q-D4t98A
November 26th, 2024 at 01:42Yo,
Thanks for clearing that up Herr Uwe, but are you speculating once again?…Anyhow, what your suggesting, is that DB perhaps stayed with GH to hide away & take drugs…
Kudos for DB suggesting DP keep going, & the band finding Tommy, & Mk-IV was born. It would have been much better had GH left with DB however…This speculative time-line could have seen a few more albums from a speculative Mk-IV with say the sublime input from a person like James Dewar stepping-up into the role of bassist, or perhaps even RG being reinstated…
Anyhow, I’m so over GH & speculation, I may well say farewell to any-more contributions here.
When one finds & discovers that so called aficionado’s & supporters of a band are disappointed with the band, even when their latest album goes soaring through the charts into No.1 position around the world, eye-brows are raised & confusion arises…
Add in the GH element that keeps on popping-up like faeces that doesn’t want to flush-down-the-loo, one gets quite weary, especially when that turd was flushed away nearly 50-years ago…There’s a speculative time-warp that I just can’t get into I’m sorry, & GH has not been a part of my interest or on my radar since around 1985, after watching the “Cal Jam” for the first time, & being so disappointed with his antics, from what was otherwise a great moment in Rock history. It could have been the best DP moment ever caught on film too…Alas for GH…
Finally, when facts are clouded-over with the overcast fog speculative bollox, it’s time to move on to greener pastures. May your dreams & wish-full thinking keep you happy.
Long live DP, happy Christmas & New Year to all ! Here’s to 2025 !
Adonai !
November 26th, 2024 at 09:15There’s no speculation, I’ve just been following what Glenn does since 1975. Not because all of his musical contributions are great, far from it, I find him interesting from a music history/family tree perspective. That doesn’t mean I can’t laugh or shake my head in desperation about him.
It strikes me, lieber Gregster, that you deem Glenn’s musical contributions to Mk III and IV irrelevant because you disliked his over-singing. You always avoid discussing his bass playing because you are disappointed by his vocal antics it seems. You say Roger Glover should have been reinstated for the Mk IV sessions with Tommy? In that case, I severely doubt that Tommy would have ever joined DP, given how he himself stated that he went to the DP audition thinking that he would not like it and then being “utterly surprised about how funky they were”. How can it escape you that Glenn and Tommy struck an immediate musical rapport and bonded as people too (which might well have to do with the fact that they were both hedonistic addicts)? How do you think Glenn ended up uncredited on Tommy’s Teaser album, singing the last lines of Dreamer (most people initially thought that was a black woman singing).
As for David Bowie holing up with Glenn because he could uninhibitedly give in to his cocaine addictions there, I don’t dispute that for a minute. Co-addicts are in tune with each other and Bowie was in a state of constant paranoia at the time, living on a diet of coke and milk. But what does that have to do with the music they created during that phase and that Station to Station is a pivotal album in Bowie’s oeuvre and Play Me Out one of the blackest albums to come from a pale-faced Northern Brit?
There is no question that Glenn’s addictions harmed DP (as did Tommy’s), but he also contributed to and shaped the music that was Mk III and IV. You blend all of that out, however, and just concentrate on his live vocal performances rubbing you the wrong way. That’s hardly a historically objective view.
November 26th, 2024 at 17:43EDIT: Coke, carrots & milk, that was David’s daily diet during his Thin White Duke phase, I forgot the healthy vegetable content!
https://youtube.com/watch?v=XAj2iX9xqCo&si=4_s3RARlp8xD0KJy
(Yup, Herr MacGregor, that is your Tony Kaye of YES playing keyboards in David Bowie’s touring band, but you probably knew that already. Not a lot of video material available from that particular line-up.)
November 26th, 2024 at 18:00Yo,
The year is 2024, DP have an album, & singles from it reaching the No.1 position all around the world, & this is a Steve Morse thread…
Why are we discussing GH ?…(circa 1975) ?…
If the above question can be answered by the persons responsible, there may be a solution to the problem at hand, & good mental health restored.
Adonai !
November 26th, 2024 at 22:29@ 22 – it certainly is Uwe, although I had forgotten about Tony Kaye’s move to LA in the early to mid 1970’s. Thanks for the reminder and I did a little catch up reading about all that this morning. Kaye eventually adapted to using more modern up to date keyboards after apparently refusing to do just that when still in Yes in 1971. A staunch Hammond only player Kaye was at Yes. Hence their move to get in someone who would adapt in Rick Wakeman. Cheers.
November 26th, 2024 at 22:52Ouch, a Germanismus (“ausblenden”) crept in @21 🙃:
“You blend all of that out, however, and just concentrate on his live vocal performances rubbing you the wrong way.”
It should of course be “block all of that out” …
https://m.media-amazon.com/images/I/91ibCZFwVmL._SL1500_.jpg
Der Teufel steckt im Detail.
November 27th, 2024 at 01:59Then Detective are no secret to you either, Herr MacGregor?
https://youtu.be/YMvD9sFzXf4
Ex-Silverhead, -Steppenwolf and -Yes people …
Michael Des Barres is my favorite Sleaze singer.
November 27th, 2024 at 13:47“Why are we discussing GH ?…(circa 1975) ?…”
A profound question indeed. Perhaps because some guy @16 brought him up after no one else before had?
Was that the answer you were looking for? 🤷🏻♂️
November 27th, 2024 at 14:07I am not musically aware of Detective at all. I did not follow Tony Kaye after his departure from Yes. I suppose it was his gig with Bowie that sort of kept him in the public eye somewhat, very briefly. He was rather underground so to speak. Not emerging again until the Trevor Rabin era ‘Yes’ around 1983. Cheers.
November 29th, 2024 at 00:59Not even Badger? You faithless Thomas!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d3qo_NHmYgs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kt5A_AH0HQo
November 29th, 2024 at 20:39@ 29 – I have heard of Badger, but I have never heard their music until now. I know, I should get out a little more. It is a similar story in regards to Rod Evans & Nick Simper, until the internet came along I had never heard any of their post Purple work either. Nobody I knew owned any of it and certain musicians slipped under the radar I guess, particularly if they didn’t end up in a more higher profile situation. The same situation with Glenn Hughes & Trapeze & there would be a few more musicians who have been in a favourite band at a certain time, that also haven’t been heard. Better late than never I suppose. Thanks for the links. Cheers.
November 30th, 2024 at 21:54Morse does (Jeff) Beck – all tasteful.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uc4fEB7N5MQ
December 1st, 2024 at 00:19It’s not like you could walk in any German record store and find Captain Beyond, Warhorse, Trapeze or Bolin’s albums with The James Gang in the racks, but you could get them with some intensive searching and mail order sources as well as vinyl record fairs. Took me a couple of years even back then to get them together though. I actually started collecting albums by split groups before I had all my DP together, thinking that the obscure stuff would get deleted quicker than the Purple product. Dear prudence!
December 1st, 2024 at 10:34So did I Uwe. Who would have thought it would be just a couple of clicks away to listen to the Artwoods in 2024 when it took me years to get a hold of their album in the late 1970s… In fact that album and Green Bullfrog were hard to hunt down for me. Stuff like Elements, Northwinds, Private Eyes I could find in the magic triangle of Karlsruhe, Pforzheim and Heidelberg though. I remember walking into a music store/record shop in Detmold asking if they had the new album by David Coverdale in stock…sure, the.lady said and presented me with the current longplayer of Howard Carpendale!
December 1st, 2024 at 12:05