On display

Have we shown this on the site before?  A couple of people were discussing it recently as one turned up for sale, so I though it was worth a look. Basically it’s a large in-store display item for the Made In Europe album release. It’s printed on corrugated card and cut out around the logo. Main record shops were sent one of these each to staple to the wall along with a few sleeves. It’s quite large too, and I remember trying to get it on the bus after I managed to get the local Virgin Records shop to part with it before anyone else got their hands on it!  Because they were printing it onto quite a crude surface, the dot resolution was quite high but it does make a stand out piece of memorabilia (the image here is off the web so a bit low fi).  I don’t remember cut out card pieces like this for many Deep Purple albums, except for Come Taste The Band. EMI did a large thick card version of the glass from the cover for that. We don’t have one in the archive (though I do know a shop owner who has one, and said I can have it once he empties his store room. I’m still waiting Barry!).  Thanks to Tonny and Pericle.

The Open Ear

Award yourself a house star if you know where that motto comes from….  Purple Records kicked off back in 1971 and like a lot of other slightly esoteric seventies labels has gained quite a following amongst collectors in recent years.  Purple never quite managed to focus itself as much as labels like Vertigo, Charisma or Threshold, and lacked the determined resources of labels like Harvest, mostly because the people involved were always being kept busy looking after Deep Purple themselves. Nevertheless as well as being home to many Deep Purple albums and singles over the years (and the label design continues to appear on various reissues to this day, including this years record Day single), the label did handle a lot of interesting solo projects as well as offerings from musicians outside the immediate ‘family’. Buddy Bohn, Silverhead and Bullet rubbed shoulders with The Colditz Story, Yvonne Elliman and Curtiss Maldoon.
Rare record collector Neil Priddey has been working on a book detailing the story of the label and this is now nearing completion. He has spoken to a number of people behind the scenes as well as musicians on the label. The book will be illustrated with the covers of all the albums and a discography as well as the singles and rarities, press material and other memorabilia.
Label designs, inner sleeves and more are a feature of Neil’s work. His recent book on the Charisma ‘pink label’ albums has been nicely received (not least on Simon’s album sleeve blog) so we’re expecting good things from this follow up.  More details will follow as and when along with publishing information and ordering details. Meanwhile if anyone out there has any rare items from the label’s history do please get in touch and I’ll pass your email along.
Here are a few rarities from the label’s history to be going on with: a German art sleeve for Bullet; a very strange 12″ featuring “long” disco versions of two tracks (both normal album cuts in fact); and an obscure edition of Rainbow’s first album on the Purple label.

Mumbling Thing Blues

All good things must come to an end, and the archive series of Deep Purple titles released in the past through Purple Records and the Sonic Zoom collection will disappear over the next few months. As a recent announcement from DPO has explained, they will resurface in new editions on a German label, starting with Paris 1975. I’ll not be involved in that work. As you know I spent many years building this small but core catalogue up (starting back in RPM days) with the help of many fans, dedicated studio folk and of course the original manager and it was mostly a lot of fun. Thanks to everyone who had kind words to say about the releases over the years, and helped in any way on them.

Silverhead reissues due

Never reissued in the UK, the two Silverhead studio albums issued by Purple Records are due out in October, remastered from original production tapes for the very first time. Singer Michael des Barres has been interviewed for the notes, and both CDs contain alternate unreleased tracks. Vinyl editions are also mooted, more details to follow. You can read more about the CDs and the band on the DTB Blog here. They can be pre-ordered from DTB Online store.