As i am in my late 50ies i understand why a man wants to cut back his work schedule though i enjoy the priviledge of having a thinker"s job…and Jon did not stop working at all, he changed his goals, something really wise
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One of the last conversations I had with him was along the lines of he still loved performing, and if he could be “beamed in” like on Star Trek, he wouldn’t have left. But he didn’t like all the time is spent in airports, aeroplanes, buses and cars, let alone living out of a suitcase for months at a time.
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No worries, my deletion above was an accident, in my solipsistic universe where I am constantly plagued by doubts whether you guys even exist at all, I still would not leave your many raised points unanswered! 
Dann wollen wir mal:
- I find it amusing that most Purple fans are always adamant how DP is not and never was Heavy Metal (or very near it) and then when we discuss TBRO’s lack of commercial clout all these weird comparisons with Pantera, Metallica & Co come up. Shouldn’t you rather be comparing a Purple release to the Stones’ Steel Wheels or Voodoo Lounge (both are better than TBRO btw) if DP are sooooo un-Heavy Metal and fish from a totally different pond? One of the nicest own invalidations of a claim I have ever come across, vielen Dank.
- So I don‘t like Ritchie Blackmore, says one, AND want his name on my gravestone, says the other. One of them must be wrong, just like Mark Knopfler said about “two men say they‘re Jesus“ in Industrial Disease. Call me when you’ve made up your mind. For the record: On a good day of his, Ritchie’s soloing speaks to me like no other guitarist’s, but I don’t consider his anus to be the centerpiece of our solar system, ok? Call it scientific objectivity, I’m merciless that way.
- Ritchie as a constant source of creativity, never repeating himself, with a song like Anya given as a prime example, regurgitating a riff from Stranded released 10 years earlier as a Rainbow track! Need I say more? And if you’re telling me that since 1993 Ritchie has been more creative without Purple than Purple have been without him, then I seriously doubt if you - like me - own all the Blackmore’s Night eleven studio offerings (compilations, remixes and live albums not included) and have heard them as often as I have. If that ain’t stagnant, I don’t know what is. Blackless DP aren’t always great for sure, but they don’t wear musical blinders all the time like a Purple-devoid Ritchie does in his secluded artistic world either.
- Internal strife in a band can create a spark for live performances and make them special, no argument. I once saw Velvet Revolver with Scott Weiland after he had received his notice after an online spat with Matt Sorum (Scott’s drug vices played a role, he just loved his smack …) and I swear it was one of the best rock gigs I ever saw though Weiland ignored the existence of his band mates on stage completely and vice versa. It was a singer and a band performing on stage at the same time, in perfect sync, yet in different universes. In the studio, however, such an atmosphere can be more often than not debilitating.
- Very good observation on the amount of touring with and without Blackmore, Doug, thanks. But the almost doubling of annual touring activity was only possible because DP could for the first time visit territories His Majesty Sir Blackmore had verboten in the past, just like he had ruled out the majority of Mk II’s songs from ever being performed live. No, he wasn’t stifling at all. From a neutral stance, the amount of stuff you Blackmore acolytes let the guy get away with is a-ma-zzzing! Your idol gets a free pass with everything, religious zest and fervor alright.
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Uwe - I can confirm I am just a figment of your imagination.
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Ad 1 : i never considered Purple a heavy metal band…after relistening to MIJ and my other 70ies gigs on my shelves the music is Rock played with the attitude of jazz musicians…i’ve seen a lot of fusion/modern/even traditional jazz shows and yes Purple had jazz cats on all instruments incluiding the vocals, lots of group understanding and free space for the individual Player…
So, das musste ich loswerden
Cheers
I file you in my “NIGHTMARES” folder, Doug! 
Which reminds me, know this?
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLsJWUHBWRq57hILuEJxJHHdwZnex5tmFO
What a great band they were, but they fell thru all the cracks, too early for New Wave, too glam for rock, too cerebral for Glam …
Erik: Ich leugne den Jazz Einfluss bei Deep Purple nicht. Aber auch nicht ihren nicht hinwegzudenkenden Einfluss auf Heavy Metal.
Uwe: habe nicht gemeint dass du Jazz-einfluss leugnest, ich persönlich definiere Heavy Metal anders.
For me Heavy Metal is a musical style with no or very little connection to the blues roots that are detectable in Rock and even Heavy Rock
I think it’s much simpler:
Heavy metal didn’t exist in the 70s.
the founding fathers, the holy trinity and the other demi-gods of the 70s made hard rock.
They laid the foundations for future heavy metal, probably more Black Sabbath and Rainbow than Deep Purple.
the only hard rock band that converted to heavy metal, the really heavy one, was Judas, which lawyer Uwe loves so much.
It’s also true that with the hard rock they were already predisposed to that change.
perhaps only Whitesnake made such a heavy change with 1987, but there was a different melodic hard rock component.
I loved Painkiller and some of the newer songs, but I never understood this radical hardening.
Judas sounded like another 25-year-old Thrash metal band!
They overtook Van Halen, Kiss, Virgin Steele, Saxon and positioned themselves alongside Iron Maiden, Metallica and Pantera, in a certain sense holding high the flag of the “old glories”.
I don’t know how long-time Judas fans judged the “Painkiller style”
Blues & Country & Jazz —> Rock’n’Roll —> Rock —> Hard Rock —> Heavy Rock —> Heavy Metal
Any other lineage is self-deception, sprinkle some folk and classical influences over the whole thing. And I don’t see what’s so terrible about that - logical - heritage either. It’s like denying that primates and humans are related.
Andersrum gefragt: Woher soll Heavy Metal herkommen, wenn nicht von Bands wie Deep Purple? Von den Beach Boys?
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Music genres were invented by record executives to sell stock.
Music is Music. Like what you like (which is why I bought Gillan and Adam & the Ants with my birthday money in 1982 
)
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indeed. That record company executive or banker at the Hendrix gig “this noise makes money, and lots of it”.
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I believe he said literally the same in public too. “Beam me up, Scotty” and all that.
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The whole ‘heavy metal’ thing leaves me perplexed and amused to say the least. It took over from punk, rebellious, anarchic, aggressive, an anti society message and attitude in so many ways. This is why it is so popular in this day and age. More and more of all that and it will continue. Certain music followers lump that terminology in with the big names of rock music to garner more support and popularity, simple really. There I said it again, some of that I have repeatedly stated before. It is an ‘army’ sort of following if you know what I mean. March forward and damned if we do and damned if we don’t. Each to their own, but seriously why else is that genre so popular. I don’t even consider Iron Maiden ‘metal’, just good old rock music to me with plenty of theatre involved. Besides, all that leather and studs, whips and chains, it all sounds too painful, if you know what I mean Uwe. Maybe you wearing your work attire was a good idea after all eh? At least your good wife Edith wouldn’t be suspicious when you arrive home following the Judas Priest concert. Cheers.
Doug, me the same in 82 alongside John Mayall’s Turning Point…how i loved Gillan’s Magic..
I meant: Purple ain’t Heavy Metal for me…it is clear that Purple, Sabbath, Blue Cheer…are the root of Heavy Metal
I still have my original scathing review of the album, penned days after the premiere in 1998 
but I’m not sure if you guys want to collect such artifacts. Back then, Fingers To The Bone was the only instant love from it, but it grew heavily over the years and now I like it. There’s still a fair dose of a filler on it, but '69, DMMH, Any Fule Kno That and Watching The Sky slyily make the favourites, while Seventh Heaven grew silently over time to a forgotten classic, IMO.
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Come on Martin, don’t be shy, show us the review! I’ll be easy on the Robię sobie z ciebie jaja-thing, promise! It’s against my nature in any case to pour ridicule over myself and other people.
Gentle Martin the druzgocąca krytyka-scribe, nie mogę się doczekać! 
Deep Purple have always been a heavy rock band. Whether they’re “Heavy Metal” is really up to each individual, but they are heavy, loud and pretty much every Heavy Metal band lives off of what they did first (alongside a couple of other groups, of course).
The debate is similar to asking whether “Rocket 88” is a rock’n’roll record? Was it released when the term rock’n’roll was in common use? No. Can you hear the difference compared to music recorded later and commonly labeled rock’n’roll? Also no. I rest my case.
the difference between Purple’s hard rock and heavy metal for me is abysmal.
Purple’s heaviness is nothing in comparison, and in heavy metal there are compositional, rhythmic and sound clichés that have nothing to do with Purple.
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