Deep Purple lore

I post stories I hear about Deep Purple along with their sources

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Ian Gillan has a personal YouTube channel titled CarambaTV. It mainly has shitposts, but two videos on the channel are not appropriate, so heed with care.

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Ritchie and Ian used to share a hotelroom.

This piece of interview is in the Come Hell Or High Water concert film, placed right before Knocking At Your Back Door starts... Now whatever would that mean? 🤔

Come Hell Or High Water

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I found all MK II members retelling of the spaghetti incident. Here's it all compiled:

【Ian Paice's Story】

Someone, presumably Ian Gillan (because who else) smothered Ritchie Blackmore's plate of spaghetti in ketchup. Ian Paicr was in the dressing room Deep Purple shared when Ritchie entered and he heard a noise, turned around and saw Ian covered in ketchup and a broken plate on the floor. He thought Ian would kill Ritchie right there and that the band was over.

【Roger's Story】

Ritchie falsely accused Ian of putting ketchup on his spaghetti. Rogee saw him entering the dressing room, not really saying much. Then, he whacked the plate in Ian's face and Ian stood up, trembling in rage. Roger thought Ian was going to hit Ritchie, but he didn't. If Ian had lashed out, which he had the right to according to Roger, it would've been the end of the band. Luckily, admirable self-control, Ian walked out.

【Jon's Story】

Someone had put ketchup on Ritchie's plate of spaghetti. Ritchie came into the dressing room with the plate. He said things like, 'you think you're funny' before he put the plate in Ian's face. Jon looked at Roger and Paicey, thinking this was the end of the band. He also thought Ritchie's life was endangered for a few seconds with how angry Ian was.

【Ian's Story】

Ritchie entered the dressing room with a plate of spaghetti and threw it into Ian's face. Ian was so angry he wanted to dismember Ritchie and began to approach him, but remembered someone's advice to ignore Ritchie or he'd do something he'd deeply regret. He'd had loved to break Ritchie's nose, but walked out instead and burst into tears of frustration.

Months later, Ritchie came back to it and acknowledge that it wasn't Ian who'd done it. He didn't apologize, though.

【Ritchie's Story】

Jim, one of Ritchie's roadies, had a plate of spaghetti for Ritchie. Ian saw it and said, 'Who's this for?' Jim replied, saying it was for Ritchie, and Ian proceeded to smother it in ketchup. When it got to Ritchie's private dressing room, Ritchie asked, 'Who did this?' and Jim said it was Ian. Ritchie took the plate and went to the Deep Purple dressing room. He asked Ian, 'Did you do this?' and Ian said, 'Yeah'. So Ritchie responded by saying, 'Really?' and throwing the plate in Ian's face.

Source: this video

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Ian Gillan once fell over on stage during a show in Malmo in 1985. Here's the full peformance.

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According to Ritchie Blackmore, Graham Bonnet from Rainbow was told repeatedly not to cut his hair and to grow it out. Ritchie Blackmore says he'd gotten someone to guard Graham's hotel room so that he wouldn't sneak out to get a haircut. Graham Bonnet then proceeded to climb out of the window, as Blackmore tells. He found it hard to be on the same stage as that haircut and had to suppress the urge to smash him with his guitar.

According to Graham Bonnet, he simply got it cut as he passed by a barbershop. When he came on stage that evening with his new hairdo, Ritchie was shocked and played from behind the stack of amplifiers the entire show. The following day, Ritchie called for a band meeting and pointed out Graham's hair was too short and that he must've gotten it cut as a personal attack to Ritchie. Everyone laughed at him.

Bonnet also says they had rooms on the seventh floor of the hotel and claims that, everytime Ritchie tells the story, he adds something new.

Sources: Ritchie Blackmore's side and Graham Bonnet's side

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At a Deep Purple concert in Australia, 1975, David Coverdale was prohibited from saying the word, 'fuck' on stage by authorities. He proceeded to use words such as love-making and fornicate, riling up the crowd to yell back the word he wasn't allowed to say. Afterwards, he was apparently arrested for inticement, but the charges were quickly dropped.

Sources: bootleg of the concert, this blog. I have no idea if that blog is reliable. If anyone knows if it is or isn't, please tell me. There are more posts on the matter, search 'David Coverdale arrest 1975' on Google and ignore the AI overview

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In 1997, Deep Purple peformed in Chile and fans got so enthousiastic that they started to climb the lighting and sound tower. It collapsed and 44 people were injured. Luckily, no one died. Commenters claim Steve Morse fought with a fan after the show because the fan kept comparing him to Ritchie Blackmore.

Source: Deep Purple's official youtube channel