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Depth and immediate identity
A couple of vintage Ian Gillan interviews on Louder Sound.
First, was a 2015 contemporary chat with Geoff Barton on the occasion of another snub of Deep Purple by the Rock’n’Roll Hall of Fame (the band was eventually inducted next year). As such, the interview was a part of Classic Rock feature celebrating the band, in spite of the Rolling Stone-affiliated HoF snub.
Which was the first Deep Purple track you heard, prior to joining the band?
I had the first three albums, but I can’t remember the first track I heard._ This Bird Has Flown_ was possibly the one. I’m not sure. It could have been April, could have been any of them, really. It could have been Hush. I had them all on my old gramophone.How was it going from your previous band, Episode Six, into the melting pot that was Purple?
It seemed quite a natural transition to me. Joining with Roger at the same time made life easy. We joined not just as a singer and bass player, but also as a songwriting team. We were ready for everything except success. That’s the only thing we hadn’t been trained for.
Did you feel a sense of rivalry with other bands?
I don’t think we felt any sense of competition. It was the fans and the press who made big things out of the so-called rivalry between Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath. All the bands used to drink together. We never even thought about competitiveness.
Continue reading in Louder Sound.
The second one is a reprint of an interview taken by Malcolm Dome, originally appearing in Metal Hammer issue 155, dated July 2006. This interview deals with Born Again and revolves around numerous anecdotes from the stint, most of which you probably have heard before — from joining the Sabs after having one too many at the pub, to the life-size replica of Stonehenge.
It was agreed that the newly configured Sabbath would record the album at Manor Studios in Shipton, Oxfordshire, a complex that was then owned by Richard Branson]. But, as the singer recalls, the process was anything but normal. In fact, the whole situation was slightly surreal.
“I hardly ever saw the rest of the guys,” he says. “I’d work in the studio during the day, and party at night. Tony and Geezer would party during the day and sleep at night – or something like that. Here’s how it would work. I’d go into the studio until about 5pm. And as I was leaving, the rest of the guys would arrive. We’d probably talk very briefly, and I’d tell them what I thought of one or two ideas they’d recorded the previous night. They would work until about midnight, then go to a club in Birmingham, and get back to the studio about 8am, at which time I was up and boiling the kettle for my first cup of tea – just as they’d be ready to crash out and sleep! It was crazy, but it seemed to suit all of us.”
Continue reading in Louder Sound.
Thanks to the stalwart commentator Uwe Hornung for the 2015 link.
Unauthorized copying, while sometimes necessary, is never as good as the real thing
So a ‘certain bassist’ could be allegedly responsible for the Born Again album’s overall sound? I have missed that comment before in that older story. I often don’t read all of these repeated stories from decades ago and only look for the ‘juicy’ bits and pieces and that comment definitely is one of those. Hmmmmmmmmmm, better get the popcorn out. Cheers.
March 23rd, 2025 at 05:43Honestly, I think that “Geezer did it!”-thing is a myth. Maybe something did go wrong in the end mix, it happens. And Iommi has said that they did not listen to the end mix before the master tape went to the pressing plants – when they finally heard the end result, shops were already stacking the album and it was moving up the charts (#4 in the British Charts, pretty much unheard of for a Sabbath album in a long time), so why rock the boat and admit you have recorded a faulty product? I mean that would be tantamount to giving the wrong measurements for a Stonehenge stage set, who would do such a thing plus hire a height-challenged actor to play a devil baby? Preposterous.
All that that said and accident or not, I (+ Svante who must share my hearing impairment) like that “The Blair Witch Project”-mix of Born Again, it’s both goth and alt rock, unsettling even. As regards US airplay of course suicidal, but then look who’s talking, Herr Gillan!
Likewise, SOTW as an encore – it didn’t bother me and I didn’t see it as compromising the Sabbath oeuvre either, it was a nod to a legendary song featuring a legendary singer, a heavy metal staple and “only” an encore. Not too much different to Van Halen encoring with “I Can’t Drive 55!” when Sammy Hagar fronted them.
The “different time zones” mentioned by Big Ian in his sabbatical collaboration have also been confirmed by Geezer Butler. He was taken aback initially that Ian took so little influence on the music and in return expected Sabbath to leave him a free hand with lyrics and vocal melodies. “But Ian told us that that was how he had always recorded with Purple too; we accepted that, but it felt very strange.” Butler liked Born Again (and is adamant that he had nothing to do with the end mix which he says he disliked as well!) except for some of the lyrics which he deemed “too personal Ian Gillan”.
March 24th, 2025 at 03:28PS: Ian saying he owned the three Mk I albums … The question is when? Prior to his joining or already while he was still with Episode Six? The third Mk I album (commonly referred to as “April” in Germany) didn’t even see a release in the UK until Ian and Roger had already been Mk II members for several months in 1969. Maybe he bought them to acquaint himself with the material.
In other interviews both he and Roger have stated their bemusement at meeting Ritchie and Jon who were expensively, but not fashionably dressed, and still wore bouffant hairdos which by 1969 were smirked upon in the UK. They looked American – no doubt from having spent so much time there.
March 24th, 2025 at 03:39Gillan’s version of the Mk1 tunes are great if not better than the originals. He has always claimed that he was aware of Deep Purple before he joined and IMHO his versions show respect to the originals. I can’t say the same for Mk3 n Mk4 versions of Mk2 songs.
March 24th, 2025 at 18:12