Anyone familiar with Deep Purple are fully aware of the ups and downs of their long and dynamic career, but when Ian Gillan returned to the fold in 1992 no one had any idea just how dramatic the following year would be for the band.
When Gillan was sacked in 1989, the key reason was the much publicised feud with founder member and guitarist Ritchie Blackmore. Blackmore’s former Rainbow vocalist Joe Lynn Turner stepped in for the 1991 album Slaves And Masters.
With the twenty-fifth anniversary fast approaching, the trio of Jon Lord, Ian Paice and Roger Glover were adamant that it should be celebrated with the classic Deep Purple line-up featuring Gillan. This second line-up that originally came together in July 1969, dubbed Mark II, was always considered the definitive Deep Purple.
The only stumbling block to this was Ritchie Blackmore. After a lot of initial resistance he eventually accepted the situation, and the classic Deep Purple line-up was re-launched for the third time with the album The Battle Rages On (1993). A world tour was planned, but it came to an early end after only thirty-seven shows.
It didn’t take long for news to filter back to fans that the friction between Gillan and Blackmore was manifesting itself again – on and off stage. An early example emerged during the Italian shows.
At that point, Strange Kind of Woman was performed during the encore. On previous tours the song featured a guitar/vocal duet where they would break into an impromptu performance of Jesus Christ Superstar (as Gillan sang on the original 1970 soundtrack album). This time, Gillan would start to sing it as normal, but Blackmore completely ignored it. For whatever reason, he now refused to play the tune. After a few false starts, the song was unsurprisingly dropped from the show as the tour continued.
Blackmore’s increasing dissatisfaction with Gillan, whose performances he considered as “not professional,” rose throughout the tour. Gillan no doubt felt exactly the same way. The band was overall frustrated by the situation. Something had to give, and it did.
By the time the band had reached Prague Blackmore had handed in his resignation. He was willing to see out the rest of the European dates, after which he would leave.
Fast forward to the UK shows. It was not yet public that Blackmore was leaving, but news of the conflicts between the guitarist and singer left many UK fans wondering if this would spill over into the performances or not. On some nights, they were brilliant – at the first date at Manchester’s Apollo the band produced a top quality professional show, with no signs of the much talked about in-fighting.
On the other hand, for the next show at London’s Brixton Academy, for whatever reason, Blackmore appeared to have lost interest and the band in general seemed deflated for whatever reason.
The second Brixton show the following night was superb, but Blackmore slipped on dry ice at the start of the gig and severely damaged his ankle. A doctor was called in before the next show at Birmingham NEC and strapped up the injury. He advised Blackmore not to perform and to cancel the show, but this final UK show went ahead as planned.
Who knows if the plan to film this show for video was a factor. Blackmore had been in favour of filming one of the earlier shows in Germany, but the film company was insistent that Birmingham was the gig they wanted to film. Blackmore consented on the understanding that no cameras would be allowed on stage.
I am sure everybody already knows how the rest of this story is going to play out.
The NEC, Birmingham. 9th of November 1993. It is showtime. All the players are in place, as is the video team. The house lights dim. The intro tape is rolling. Ian Paice’s familiar drumbeat appears over it. This signals the intro of their opening number Highway Star.
The intro continues. Other band members gradually join in as normal, but something is clearly afoot. The intro is continuing for much longer than normal. After a while, the reason is becoming apparent: Blackmore is nowhere to be seen.
The other four band members are all on stage by now, and in progress of setting the world record for the longest intro ever to Highway Star. They keep playing, look around, and look at each other. Eventually they seem to decide “to hell with it,” and launch into the number. With no guitar.
The entire intro, first verse, first chorus, second verse and second chorus is played with no guitar, and still no sight of Blackmore. It’s certainly a sight to behold.
At that point, right at the beginning of the guitar solo, a guitar can be heard from somewhere, and out of the blue, Blackmore finally appears on stage.
Something’s not right, though. It is clear that Blackmore is very annoyed. He might have appeared in time for the solo, but his focus is elsewhere. As he plays a faultless solo, he is eyeing up one of the cameramen on stage right. After the solo, he strolls over to Jon Lord’s keyboards, picks up a glass of water standing there, and hurls it at the camera on stage right. The video shows a shot from that camera, its lens drenched in water.
As Gillan was just in front of the camera, merrily banging away at his conga drums, it appeared to many watching as if the water was aimed at him. It is however clear that it was the camera that got a soaking!
Blackmore continued to wander on and off stage during the opening two numbers, after which the drama seemed to die down and she show settled into a normal groove. Blackmore was however clearly in a mood. This is disappointing as it led to some numbers being kept to a bare minimum, with a lot of the general improvisation and soloing gone.
To this day fans still discuss the reasons behind Blackmore’s actions. The man himself merely reiterates that he had instructed no cameras on stage and this was the reason he did what he did. “The incident was in no way directed towards any member of the band,” Blackmore said, “and certainly not towards the audience. I had already made my mind up to leave Deep Purple for reasons of my own; I was told by my management at the time that BMG wanted to film the show at the NEC. I agreed to this providing there would be no cameramen on the side of the stage. I find they put me off my performance; many of you that are paying your hard earned money should not have to put up with this!“
Memories of Ritchie’s run-in with a camera on-stage at the California Jam springs to mind, and Ritchie is quick to bring up the comparison: “I would have thought I had made my point clear enough at the California Jam. I was quite categorically told, “Don’t worry Ritchie, they won’t be there.” As the intro to Highway Star started I walked out only to trip over one right in my way. I pushed him off the stage he should never have been on in the first place, then told the people working for us to get him away. At this point they snuck him around to the other side, which, had they done in the first place wouldn’t have bothered me, but by then my temper was up. I threw the water. It is a very nerve wracking experience to play a show like this; I feel I have earned the right to have a set-up which will enable me to give my best to everybody.”
His assistant Rob Fodder also recalls the event: “I went to tell Ritchie that the intro tape was playing and that he had a couple of minutes, and he told me to get the cameras offstage. I went back on stage and told a cameraman who was between Roger and Jon that he’d better move offstage. He then proceeded to break down his camera and move off. I went back to get Ritchie and we walked to the stage. When we got there, we saw that the cameraman hadn’t left at all. Ritchie calmly turned around and walked back to the dressing room. I ran back on stage and told the cameraman again that if he didn’t get off, he’d be risking the show. Again I went to the dressing room to let Ritchie know that there weren’t any cameras on stage.
By this time the band were well into Highway Star, Ritchie walked out on stage and joined the band. Then he noticed that the cameraman had just moved into the shadows behind Jon, he picked up the water by the keyboard and threw it at the camera – not Gillan, not Jon, or even the band member wives, but definitely at the camera. Not many people know that in between Highway Star and Black Night, Ritchie ran behind the amps with a beer and soaked the cameraman again as he was still wiping water off of his equipment.”
The show was amazingly released as planned on both CD and DVD, funnily enough with the title Come Hell or High Water. See what they did there?
Nobody will claim that the live document from that evening in 1993 represents the band at their best. It serves as a decent souvenir from the last tour Blackmore did with the band, which wasn’t a happy tour. While the show certainly contains good moments, it is fair to say that it is more memorable for what happened in the first five minutes than anything else.
After this show the news about Blackmore’s imminent departure came out, and the tour concluded after the four remaining shows across the Norselands. After the final show in Helsinki, Blackmore stayed on stage for a little while longer than normal to shake hands with the first row and then it was back to the hotel. They all knew the end for this particular line-up of the band had come, but Blackmore and Deep Purple would both go on to make a lot more music separately in the years to come.
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