The April 6th 1974 California Jam is a great story- and for the first time here is discussed by Deep Purple's Ritchie Blackmore. The man In Black stole the show with a virtuoso performance and pyrotechnics to match!
For all the talk I hear and read about Ritchie being 'difficult' and whatnot, he certainly was in the right here. I have a feeling he endured lots of broken promises and being taken for granted, but he simply stood his ground where other musicians played along just in order to keep peace and thus he earned a bit of a reputation. I admire him for that, a man of principle.
Randgalf Yea you got it, he stood his ground. he knew he was right. I watched the california jam vid again after this, and yea he was right about going on at dusk. What a performance
That was how it was with most bands back then, even big ones. The record labels ruled!! Richie was right in this case. A show always looks better under the lights.
If anybody is still listening --- I was there in 1974 and am so glad that he held up the show til dark as it was something I can still remember to this day-- About 30 yards from front and center---- Incredible
I was also there in 1974. It was my first live concert ever, I was only 14 at the time. I think it changed me, like I finally got to attend something that was cool!
I'm happy to finally hear Ritchie's side of the story. Too much has been made of his "adverse" attitude and blah blah blah. He's an innovator and one of the most important guitarists of the 20th Century, and if he knows it then that's your problem. When you hear about the fates of musicians like Badfinger and post Terry Kath Chicago, Don Felder of the Eagles, etc. - people like Ritchie Blackmore get more and more of my respect. From a musician's standpoint, if you didn't have a manager like Peter Grant your career was always in a state of flux. Ritchie just didn't take any shit from anyone and didn't have to. Good for him. Now start playing with both Ians and Roger again, dammit!!!!!!
You gotta love a man of pure conviction who stands his ground! Thank you Ritchie!!! Thank you for that, and thank you also for your wonderful musical talent!
what's REALLY funny is how hard Deep Purple tried to UNDERMINE ELP, ha ha. (I love both bands.) EX: they did a long RONDO-type jam that was nearly identical to ELP's famous piece (!!), and Lord even used his knees etc on his hammond, to Steal Emerson's Thunder (!), AND did crazy synth stuff that was Emerson's trademark, so the umpteen regular ppl in the crowd would think those were DP trademarks and ELP would be LESS impressive, and everyone would say DP were the best band of the show.
And it was in the contract as to what time Purple would take the stage. From a legal point of view, ABC was violating the terms of the contract. Ritchie was well within his right.
Great discussion! I was curious to hear what Ritchie had to say on any issue because there are a lot of people who badmouth him. I just found out why: He’s a highly intelligent, highly skilled, highly talented man who knows how things SHOULD be, and will accept nothing less than the fulfillment of that vision. Ordinary people can’t take that, so they start talking trash about their betters. Me? I’m with Mr. Blackmore. He gets it right!
When you here Ritchies side of the story's it all makes perfect sense! People just dont respect peoples wishes and deals. Good for him to make them rethink there bullshit way of dealing with musicians. A hero true all the way
Yeah, it's like Van Halen and the "no brown M&Ms" contract rider. The band's perspective is admirable and makes perfect sense. But it's always used as an example of "childish, arrogant rock bands".
@@aquamarine99911 WELL... i've worked in the PRESS for 30 years... and they lie 99% more than your worst fears. (ANd I worked in NYC, Media Capital of Earth.) The entire press could and should be arrested today. FRAUD is their bread and butter. (ANY deception [or omission!] for monetary gain is a felony. But the press makes sure no earthling knows this!)
@@hoodoohullabaloo2848 you're off a bit: 1) the fans WANT all that stuff as souvenirs; 2) reportedly, those amps etc were BORROWED from someone who was a dick, which is WHY Ritchie trashed them. (I'm no fan of destruction, but a-holes only speak that language.) 3) I WATCHED THE CLIP AGAIN THE OTHER DAY... and it almost looks STAGED (which would make sense for obvious reasons) (DRAMA SELLS)... watch it and tell me I'm wrong. EX: RITCHIE pulls each hit of the ABC camera! LOOKS FAKE. Staged drama. (REMEMBER THIS: almost everything is FAKE. Even the sky isn't really blue!)
@@hoodoohullabaloo2848 It didn't go onto the innocent crowd, there was a fenced off area between the stage and the crowd. What he did was fking awesome to watch, which is exactly what you want to see at a huge gig like this.
Saw the Smoke on the Water tour...in Pittsburgh...that was the greatest rock show I ever saw...period.....I can still remember 17,000 people going stark raving bonkers....one hell of a night.....one hell of a band..
True story, I once met Blackmore after a show and he was super nice, we talked for awhile about music and guitars. He was very modest and said there were at least a 100 guitarists with better chops than himself. I said surely not Ritchie, your' the best there ever was, he was so happy that he signed one of his white strats and gave it to me ... and then I woke up in a cold sweat.
I guess. I loved him as a teen. I wanted to be him. But stories about how Purple dealt with personnel changes and his drinking and mood swings,etc....just turned me off!
I did an interview with Ritchie back in 2000. he told me exactly the same when I asked him about that issue at California Jam. He said he insisted on playing next to last.
@rv6205 he was both very amicable and talkative. I didn't feel any arrogance or anything like that. He was candid and true, so I had awesome hours of conversation with him and Candice
Idk "Who told him" but... As he said in an interview, Tommy Steele was one of his early inspirations. His father, Lewis was a former ww2 sergeant and as a military man i guess he was kinda perfectionist, so when he bought Ritchie his first guitar, he encouraged him "if you want to learn how to play, then learn it perfectly". He took a few lessons with Big Jim Sulivan. and the rest is the result of his talent+practice.
I got great respect for Ritchie and I still do now. He is one of my top 5 guitar heroes! And he was on point! He stuck to his side of the bargain but the people on the other side of the fence just don't care! He stuck to his principles like glue! I love this guitar god and he did an awesome performance on that night! Thanks also to that roadie with quick thinking!
We the crowd was glad they waited. The sun going down happened to set right center of the stage. As the sun settled behind the horizon Deep Purple came out cranking. Thanks Ritchie!
I was@Cal Jam..Ontario Speedway. They went on at dusk. It took me 30 minutes to get to the front. Sea of humanity, well worth it. Richy hair caught on fire. And still played a great show.
It was in their contract, but with the Cal Jam running ahead of schedule, they wanted Purple to go on early. Essentially, they were trying to break the contract, so Blackmore had every right to stick to his guns and say "not until dusk."
This is fascinating to see this. I was there-mainly to see ELP. Seeing Deep Purple and Sabbath for the first time even made it all the more interesting. But when I heard ELP was performing, I told myself I was going. I will never, ever forget it. I got there the night before and waited in parking lot. About an hour after I got there, got a taste of ELP doing sound-check and apparently Carl tuning his Synth-drum kit. We all heard it and loved all 15-20 minutes of it!!
Ritchie was spot-on. RU-vid any of their performances that night and you’ll see the difference between night and day. That dusk made for it as much as the massive crowd ... the rest was Purple.
This guy was my first guitar hero (still is by the way), but now that I hear him talk I admire him even more for having the courage to always stick to his principles and not putting up with any nonsense.
+MisterGuitarItalia Blackmore used to be my favorite guitar player but 20 years of kissing his amatuer wife's twat with that inferior folk shit has dulled his playing & his legacy.
+the great gavonne You are sadly misinformed there gavonne. Blackmore has said since the seventies he had a desire for medieval music up the classical era hundreds of years before his time. You or me don't know the facts but according to interviews Candice said that "it was just a spark. We clicked" talking about music tastes. IT DOES HAPPEN. As for Blackmore's legacy, if it has been shattered at all it was because of the man himself. Ritchie is my favorite guitar player as well - close to a hero at that for me. But I still understand he is a 5-star douchebag and a bit of a nutcase. He has lame excuses to act the way he does not just at California Jam but to EVERYONE. You should look up Ronnie James Dio and what he's said about the man in black here. Not positive, I'll tell you that. Nevertheless he's up there with Hendrix, Page, Beck, and Iommi.
Don't know. If it was personal that means it's private information lol. What can I tell ya? Ritchie is an odd eccentric. He has a wife but who knows, maybe he came onto Ian and Ian didn't like that too much. Some weird shit like that I really don't know. Anything could have happened.
I met Ritchie 29th November 1984, He wanted me to be in his football team, This was in Perth Western Australia, We had a jam at the Sheraton Hotel, Eric Clapton was staying in the next room, Eric sent his heavy man Alfie to Knock down the door! And Threatened kill us! It was Ritchie 's plan to get back at the Hotel, Because they had workmen in at 6.00am each morning renovating waking him up. Ritchie played my Guitar He played it resting on his knees, He was playing it like a piano! I like Ritchie as a person because He only goes off his head if things are not going His way, I found him to be a genuine good bloke!
Man...Eric Clapton can be a boring A- hole most of the time...he used to dislike all these heavy groups (zeppelin included) and he even dismissed cream's heavy music. When asked about the white stripes, the black keys or other new bands he goes: "NAH i'll pass...tooo freakish or loud"...it's almost like if he quit being associated with all sorts of hard rock artists shortly after Cream's demise, he became wayyy too soft when he was hanging out with delaney and bonnie. Lol
Yeah, Ritchie has a massive ego, but he’s also very principled and professional. It’s more about being a professional and making sure things go right. No wonder he was so pissed at the end of the set. I really don’t blame him.
yeah throwing that fit was very professional considering he could have injured audience members and backstage personnel. sure he should stand for what is owed to them but not like that. the principle was right but the action with which to uphold it was wrong.
A lot of people have slagged Ritchie over the years mainly he's difficult to work with but I tend to think he is a perfectionist and if you are not good enough to do the job then away yo go and he probably does not suffer fools or fake people this man is as iconic as what Jimi is
Darknes is so important to ritchie , even writing songs in darkness brings him on a higher level . Thats when the magic begins for him , Because he is the guitar wizard .
One of the toughest guys on Earth. Brutally honest. Doesn’t fuck around. I could’ve easily played with a guy like that. You wouldn’t have to worry where you stood with him.
I play guitar in a Deep Purple tribute band and we got asked to play an annual outdoor spring festival this year. Guess what my one and only demand was. Damn right. Festivals tend to be a pain in the ass, I don't get off playing outdoors in the summer heat, but that one request (demand) makes it all worth it. And ok, it's just a tribute band, but Blackmore is 100% right. Being the first band to play after it gets dark is the only fun time slot of the evening.
I'd say the only problem is kinda being apart of the reason 200,000 people sat around for two hours wonder wtf is going on, but thats 99% management/organizers fault. But also being the first band with lights is a super pompous thing to request so I can understand how one guy requesting that out of the whole band not even caring in the first place is pretty egotistical in it's own right.
I have absolutely no understanding as to why many voices carry on a bad message of this man - as a hooligan. I love his approach in his recollection of life. I respect his mature seasoned conversation. He may be someone that I would ask to be in my band.
I don't know, man. Dio didn't get along with him, but that may say more about elfling RJD than Blackmore. I mean, Ronnie knew what he was getting into, and with that voice could have started his own band then.
Ritchie does what he Likes - and what he think it is Right ! Love him for that !!! His Fender Strat Playing is one of a Kind and He made some Great Records !
Sounds like Blackmore was dealing with savages and he beat them at their own savage game. Meanwhile he gave the good people a spectacle that's more than what they could've asked for. Brilliant!
Actually it was a bit of a good thing to have to wait because the lines for water and to use the restroom were so long it let us play a little catch-up. My group partied and had a great time waiting. We were refreshed for DP who kicked ass and for ELP, who also put on a great show.
I think his best solo was from the California jam in 1974, not to say he didn't play equally as good with Purple in 93', or with Blackmore's Night in 2011, but his tone in 74' was perfection to heavy progressive rock fans alike.
I decided to watch some RU-vid videos of some classic blackmore solos and I’ve got to say he is a complete genius so people say things that are bad about him but he’s got major rocket fuel behind guitar.
I went to several of those big festivals back in the early 70's (and I was the lone person of the era who was actually not at Woodstock LOL!) but Ritchie is right as these festivals were nightmares for both musicians and fans alike. The sound typically wasn't that good and more often than not, the weather some how or another impacted the day. By the time it hit the mid 70's, you couldn't get me to a festival regardless who was on the bill. And Ritchie was also right in forcing them to honor the contract they had agreed too.
Hell yes. If I hired a contractor to do something for me, and they show up and tell me that the main thing in the contract isn't going to be honored, then yes, I'm going to get pissed too.
Right, I think the last one I attended was Alice's Nightmare. The heat- ya deal with it; it's SoCal in summer. But the fkn firecrackers all day long! And a drunken Alice stumbling around. Pretty sure that was it for me.
As a twelve-year-old kid who waited all week, and got permission to stay up until midnight, to watch the ABC broadcast of California Jam on television (with simulcast on FM), I'd like to thank Mr. Blackmore for all the irritation he put up with to go ahead and play. You could pretty much tell he was pissed, and I think the performance was better for it. I always wondered why they agreed to go on before Emerson, Lake & Palmer. I hadn't thought about the fact that they just didn't want to be waiting around all day to go on at 3 O'Clock in the morning...Heh...That was an epic experience back then...Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and ELP on network television...
I doubt blackmore was pissed, he said himself in this interview that he'd only had a few drinks and there's no way a few drinks would have got him pissed, probably not even half-cut. Obviously he'd have been pretty pissed off with management and maybe a little miffed at the other guys in band.
As a teenager I was at the California Jam, Deep Purple was amazing at dusk and ELP afterwards was amazing as well. Best show I’ve ever been to in my entire life.
The irony of it all is that a lot of festivals at that time would run behind because of technical issues or just how long it took to put the stage together and Cal Jam was a rarity is that they were running ahead of schedule. No matter how pissy Richie might have been they still put on a helluva show. In fact, what a lot of people forget is that that show was one of the first for Coverdale and Hughes, so the pressure was really on that day.
I agree 100%! The obituaries are filled with nice people who never say no! They had an agreement, and to knowingly allow betrayal is to betray ones own self! God bless Ritchie for sticking to his guns and being a shining example to all people doing any kind of work to not be exploited!
I watched that long ago, the whole concert. I didn't realize Ritchie set the whole stage on fire on purpose...even tho his plan wasn't to set the whole stage on fire, lol.
The caljam1 set up with railroad tracks platforms so bands could set up ahead of performance, made it very productive and caused the concert to be ahead of schedule a couple hours. Thats why he was waiting for sunset
Its a fact ritchie loves playing in the dark , he even covered the Windows . For him its that magic moment . I could see and hear him all day and night .
“Dusk”, Ritchie says, to me even during Summer is about 6pm, maybe 7pm. It’s when the sun is setting, not 9pm as he clarified. Perhaps it means something differently in the UK, akin to the evening time. Either way, glad those kids didn’t get wild and waited for Deep Purple! I’ve got the concert DVD, and love everything about it!
This reminds me about Page talking how they become no1 in the world. They already were best live band in the world, they had huge hits but main thing was their manager who was giant wrestler, protecting band to the full, ready to quarrel and fight with all "businessmen" and "organizers". And they made conditions: Whole money payment before show, no festivals, no other bands doing shows with them, they are starting when they want... They were in absolute control of everything, when, how and what they will do. Biggest bands were disbanded because of managers and organizers insolence and ruthlessness, remember how Beatles stopped to do concerts - conditions how they toured, concerts without stage monitors and open concerts on hard rain waiting electrocuting.
Chuck Berry got ripped off so often that he'd demand cash payment in advance. He would also play for a specified length of time, and then stop, even if it was mid-song.
lol... A friend and I went to get water and I wandered off to see how long the line was and ended up having one hell of an adventure that included wearing a guitar for a shoe, starting a biker war, spending an hour trying to get over a 4' fence that ended two feet away and watching crystals falling from the sky.... Thanks to 4way Clear Windowpane and three days of serious partying before that.
If you had the chance to spend the day with a celebrity like van halen did with there lost weekend competition (rock fans should check that out on RU-vid )I would choose to have a few beers with Ritchie blackmore (the black knight ) and talk about music,life,and no matter what subject comes up Ritchie would make it interesting, his outlook on life is good, unbelievably talented and intelligent as well as being very witty and funny, I would choose to meet him over any other rockstar. Legendary not just with DP but rainbow too with the latest great cozy Powell R. I. P
