It’s coming up for three years since Jeff Beck passed away, and Ritchie Blackmore has been paying tribute to the guitar great in a new podcast interview.
Blackmore was talking to Rock Of Nations With Dave Kinchen and Shane McEachern when conversation turned to his contemporaries, including Beck.
" Jeff was a great guitar player," says Blackmore. "That was a big blow, him going, I mean, he was vegetarian and he didn't take drugs particularly or anything. I was very shocked to hear about him dying that way. That was terrible.
"He had a very special way of playing. It was so different from anybody. I always used to go and see him play, because I found him very refreshing. And he would always put himself down. I'd say, 'How is your latest record, Jeff?' And he'd go, 'Oh, it's a lot of rubbish.' And he would always say that about anything he put out. He was always reaching for something he couldn't find."
Blackmore also spoke about the early days of Deep Purple. “It was the five of us… we got together in this old deserted house and rehearsed there and did our first record – Hush. We did it in two takes. You can tell if you listen carefully, you’ll hear the singer [long lost original Purple frontman Rod Evans] singing a bit flat. There were no pitch controls in those days.
“I came up with the name Deep Purple. I was thinking of Pink Floyd and the Moody Blues. There were all these colours, so I thought ‘well we should have a colour’. There was a piece of music that my grandmother used to play – ‘When the deep purple falls’ blah blah blah whatever it’s called. I was just happy to be in a band and to be making some money.”
