“I’ve played Smoke On The Water with some heavy metal drummers and not one of them has played it right. Ian lets the music do its work. He’s probably the most important member of the band”: Ian Gillan bigs up Deep Purple colleague Paice

Deep Purple have a new album out today (July 19th) and have been talking about their past and the present.

In an interview with the Sun, Ian Gillan gave props to the two other long-standing members of the band – drummer Ian Paice and bassist Roger Glover. “Without them, you wouldn’t have a rhythm section and without a rhythm section, all the solos mean nothing.

"Ian Paice grew up as a child in a musical family, the same as me. And he’s been the rock behind the band since it started. He’s the founding father now that Jon [Lord] is gone, and the only rock drummer I know that swings. That’s because of the way he grew up and his influences.

“I’ve played Smoke On The Water with some heavy metal drummers and some very famous drummers and not one of them has played it right. They were all bashing the hell out of the drum kit. Ian lets the music do its work. It’s in his bones and he’s probably the most important member of the band.”

Gillan and Glover go back even further. Before joining Purple, the singer and bassist were both in Episode Six together. “(He) was almost my mentor because he started writing before me,” Gillan recalls. “We spent days and weeks and months practising the craft of writing, learning about the percussive value of consonants, learning about which vowel sounds to use on a high note.”

Meanwhile Glover himself has been talking to Billboard about =1, the band’s 23rd album. “We can’t stop,” he insisted. “We love what we do; that’s the bottom line. And we’ve had the opportunity to carry on. 

"Most bands don’t get that opportunity…well, I don’t follow bands that much, but certainly for us that’s been the case.

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The band have a three-week US tour coming up with Yes next month, which led Glover to recall the last time Purple crossed paths with them: “We worked with them years ago in the ’70s,” the bassist said. 

“We did some festivals together - one in particular called the Plumpton Jazz and Blues Festival in ’71. Ian Gillan and I had only been in the band a couple of months at that point. 

"There was an argument about who’d be closing the show, and they won the argument and were closing the show. Ritchie (Blackmore) set fire to his amplifiers and made them explode on stage. So they were delayed a lot and weren’t very happy with that.”

This year’s tour is likely to be friendlier affair. “We’ve met them since. They’re a great band. We saw Steve Howe a couple years ago. We got on, no hard feelings. I don’t know which state they’re in now, which combination of musicians they have, so I’ll be happily surprised.”