Ahead of the release of Deep Purple's Ian Gillan's album with his boyhood band The Javelins, DW discussed with him how the whole rock'n'roll myth was built. The singer also offers good advice for aspiring musicians.
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Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan is releasing on Friday Ian Gillan and the Javelins, an album of covers with his boyhood band.
DW had a chat with him during the Montreux Jazz Festival last summer.
DW: You and Deep Purple are part of a whole generation that reshaped contemporary music history. Why was the impact of the British boom of the 60s and 70s so strong?
Ian Gillan: The world was a different place then. There were lots of things going on. To put it historically, when I started doing music, I was 15 years old. I was a boy soprano in the church choir, but then, when I was 15, I broke it all and started moving into rock and roll. It was only 15 years after the end of the Second World War. Everybody wanted peace. Everybody wanted friendship.
In 1969 I joined Deep Purple. And during the 60s in England, there was an energy, a postwar energy. It was a new generation that had freedom. The parents wanted to give us freedom because after the dark days it was... The country was flattened, bombed, flat. There was rationing for food when I was a kid. There was nothing. We had to rise again from absolutely nothing.
Following the Frank Sinatra era, which was immediately before us, we wanted to do things differently. We were listening to American blues. We were listening to old English folk music, listening to orchestral music, jazz, blues... all that sort of diversity was an inspiration for us kids in a band.
So we copied everything that we could find and gave it our own energy. And so it emerged, I think, as a style.
Deep Purple, a band nearly engraved in stone
They'll soon celebrate their 50th anniversary, they're releasing a new album, and they'll go on tour - there's no stopping Deep Purple. One of the oldest hard rock bands around, they're still belting out their own sound.
Image: Harvest
The Presidents of Hard Rock
In the British rock scene at the end of the 1960s, the Stones were the bad boys; Black Sabbath was devilish; Led Zeppelin was writing the best songs and Pink Floyd was doing psychedelic stuff. But Deep Purple was "the loudest pop group in the world." Employing a Hammond organ, hard guitar riffs and Ian Gillan's distinctive vocals, Deep Purple were the forefathers of hard rock and heavy metal.
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Green-eared and from Leicester
In April 1968, Rod Evans, Jon Lord, Richie Blackmore, Nicky Simper and Ian Paice form their new band, record an album and make a hit with their single "Hush." Two albums later, the group makes changes: a different record label and different band members. Ian Gillan replaces Evans on vocals; Roger Glover follows Simper on bass guitar. The legendary "Mark II" team is up and running.
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'Concerto for Group and Orchestra'
This cast of band members gives a landmark performance: a concert at Royal Albert Hall, accompanied by the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra. A rock band had never played there before. Deep Purple could do it because they had created a masterful combination of rock and classical music - largely due to the classically trained keyboardist Jon Lord. The "Concerto" became Deep Purple's first live album.
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Showered in Gold
The "Concerto" was lovely and all. But just to ensure people didn't forget what kind of music they really were doing, Deep Purple took a harder line. On the album "In Rock," songs like "Speed King" and "Child in Time" showed people what they were all about: total hard rock with classical elements, along with Gillan's explosive vocals. It was a global breakthrough and garnered gold numerous times.
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The band collapses
With the award-winning double LP "Live in Japan," Deep Purple reaches its "Mark II" zenith in 1973. After years of hard work, the band implodes - Glover and Gillan leave. David Coverdale takes up the microphone. But the "Mark III" line-up doesn't last even two years. Blackmore leaves because he can't stand Coverdale. His replacement, however, cannot fill the gap, and the band breaks up in 1976.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/Martin Athenstädt
1984 - the return of the cult band line-up
The legendary "Mark II" line-up is together once again - a record label allegedly offered each musician a pretty penny. The boys get right down to business: The album "Perfect Strangers" serves up the old Purple sound, but with fresh elements. Their fans are grateful, and the album goes Top Ten everywhere. The band tours, and everything is going well - until Gillan and Blackmore lock horns again.
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Ian Gillan's back-and-forth
Ian Gillan leaves the band again after four years. A new vocalist steps in, but the band is losing steam. All the personnel changes rattle fans as well. The 1990s album "Slaves & Masters" does not garner much praise; the new singer has to leave. Much to Blackmore's chagrin, the band again tries to win Gillan back. And he does come back one last time.
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Satriani takes over for Blackmore
The band patches things up and manages to make another good album together. But between two tours, Blackmore exits for the last time. Joe Satriani steps in for him and plays the Japan tour. And the weird back-and-forth of the band line-up continues. The band continues to produce albums and tours - up until today.
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Wacken at sundown
Of course, the band also has to perform at the biggest heavy metal festival in the world - in Wacken, Germany. In 2013, Deep Purple opens its gig in front of 75,000 people with "Highway Star." Ian Gillan appears a little feeble. Still, the live album "From the Setting Sun…" is released, and simultaneously "…to the Rising Sun" - with a live recording from Japan.
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Regulars at the famous jazz festival
The Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland is famous for expanding the boundaries of jazz. That's why Deep Purple are welcome guests at the festival. They were there in 1971, when a fire broke out during Frank Zappa's concert. Jon Lord followed that up by writing Deep Purple's biggest hit: "Smoke on the Water." It vies with "Satisfaction" for having the most famous guitar riff of all time.
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Aged but agile
The old Deep Purple champs Ian Gillan, Ian Paice and Roger Glover still play everywhere these days. Don Airey took up Jon Lord's place at the keyboard, after he passed away in 2012. Steve Morse plays guitar. And now in their 60s and 70s, they're still rockin'.
Image: picture-alliance/dpa/J. Niering
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And by the end of the 60s, early 70s, there was a desire to break free even more. And because by then, after an eight or 10 years, some musicians were becoming absolutely brilliant virtuous musicians. They were as good as classical performers in orchestras. The stage craft and the personalities were also evolving.
And, when you put together the bands — Deep Purple, Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin — they became all different although they were part of the same genre that was called rock...
How do you see the whole myth built around rock and roll?
Well, I give credit to the journalists. I believe that you can't judge contemporary music objectively. You have to be part of it. It's a generation thing. If it's good enough, it will survive and become classical. If not, it'll fade away and just become a niche movement of some kind. In any case, the journalists who traveled with us were writing about the parties every night.
In those days, we'd play in clubs with 40 people or 100 people. Because they were tiny rooms, it looked like a lot of people. But at the bar, there was always a journalist, there were the publishers, there were the record company people, the managers, the agents, the promoters — all young people. And they were the ones. I mean, that was the "sex drugs and rock and roll." It wasn't so much or it wasn't exclusively the bands. That's for sure. Deep Purple never took drugs at all. I mean, I didn't smoke my first joint until I was 38 years old.
Deep Purple in Cologne in 1974Image: picture-alliance/dpa/Martin Athenstädt
Our life was exciting and fast moving. After we'd finished a show we drive back to London, go to a club, but we are all exhausted. Still the next day we'd read about all these things that were happening, and it was the journalists. They were writing all about those experiences and I think they captured the mood pretty well.
Do you have any advice for new music talents?
Yes, of course. Some things never change: Copy while you're developing, while you're finding your voice. Copy everything that you love, trying be the same. In my time, I was trying to be the same as Ella Fitzgerald, Brook Benton, Elvis Presley, Little Richard, Buddy Holly, Cliff Bennett and The Beach Boys... I mean, all of my heroes, I tried to copy and learn the technique of the voice.
Learn from them and share them. Practice practice practice with other musicians as much as possible. Listen to what they like and try and be part of a unit. And then one day, it's not guaranteed, but one day you might find your own voice and if you have all this experience of the technique, then you've learned the craft. Because there are two elements to being a performer. One is to learn the craft and the other is to be able to express the art. It's like painting. If you learn about perspective and color and texture, then maybe one day you'll be a great painter. But you have to learn that first: the craft.
So, just enjoy it and, if you get good, you will want to practice more. Because you'll see progress and it will be encouraging for you. Embrace music even if you don't have commercial success, music can be a wonderful friend for life.
