Deep Purple Are Not About to Retire

With over fifty years of career under their belt, Deep Purple are no strangers to having to deal with the passing of time and have already had to deal with the idea or the speculations of their retirement from the scene. As repeatedly stated, however, the thought of saying goodbye to music or playing live is still something terrifying for the historic band. On the occasion of the release of the new album of the British group, “=1” (read our review here), released last July 19th as the first album to feature guitarist Simon McBride – who took over from Steve Morse,

Singer Ian Gillan has released a new interview to “Ultimate Classic Rock”. During the chat, the artist he assured that Deep Purple are still going strongconfirming that the band is not about to retire.

Currently on tour with the group, who also starred in two concerts in Italy last July, Gillan explained that, although he is not so naive as to believe he can continue recording albums and touring for decades to come, he is not willing to retire as long as his health allows him to live the musician’s lifestyle. During the interview for “UCR”, in answering the question about how “realistically” he sees the end of the adventure of the historic English band and regarding the rumours of a possible retirement, the voice of Deep Purple stated:

“To answer your question: It is what it is. As soon as you start to feel like you can’t perform at a certain level, of course you adapt and do your best. But when your energy level drops, it’s time to stop before it becomes embarrassing, and nobody wants that. But so far, everything is going great for us.”

Ian Gillan’s words are in line with what was already declared last December by drummer Ian Paice during an interview for “Zoom”. On that occasion, the Deep Purple drummer explained: “We never planned a quit date Let’s be realistic.

We’re getting older, and there will come a time when maybe one or two of us won’t want to do it anymore or it won’t be physically possible for them to continue. But we don’t think about that. We’re still having a lot of fun.” While admitting that playing live could become difficult in the coming years if mobility issues were to arise, Ian Paice said he was confident that .Deep Purple will still be able to record new albums. He added: “I don’t think we’ll ever know what the last show or tour will be. I think it’ll come along and surprise us. Unless there’s a definite plan, which there isn’t, to do something like a final goodbye, I think we’ll just say, ‘Sorry, guys. We’re done. We can’t do this anymore. It’s been wonderful.’ But even then, I think if we stopped touring, there’s no reason why we couldn’t make more records.”