Former Deep Purple guitarist Ritchie Blackmore has finally confirmed that one of rock’n’roll’s longest-standing, possibly apocryphal tales is, in fact, true.
The story goes something like this: During an early Deep Purple show at the Jam Factory in San Antonio, Texas, Blackmore was taken ill, and his place was taken for a single show by Christopher Cross, the soft rocker who rose to fame years later when his eponymous, multiple-Grammy-winning debut album sold five million copies in the US.
In the 2018 book about what’s come to be known as Yacht Rock, The Yacht Rock Book: The Oral History of the Soft, Smooth Sounds of the 70s and 80s, Cross relates the story, placing it in 1968 at Purple’s debut US show.
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“I had a promoter friend who I did a lot of kind of gopher work for and stuff like that,” says Cross. “And I had a local band, and Joe [Miller] was promoting that show, at a place called the Jam Factory. It was their very first show in the United States ever, and someone advised them to get flu shots.
“So they did, and Ritchie Blackmore got very sick. And so the decision was made that they didn’t really want to cancel the show if they could help it. And Joe Miller – who was kind of managing me at the time – said, ‘Y’know, there’s this guitarist in town who’s a big fan of Ritchie and he could probably step in.
“The singer [Ian Gillan] was in favour of it, I remember, but Joe pretty much ran the band and was the one who made the decision that it was better to play than not play. So I came down, and I had a Flying V and long hair, and I’m this big Ritchie fan.
“So we played the songs that I knew and then we jammed some blues. And they told the crowd Ritchie wouldn’t be there. It was a great moment for me. And then, when they left town, I went to the airport and got to meet Ritchie, and he thanked me for covering for him. He was cool.”
In the intervening years, doubt has been expressed over whether the incident ever occurred, with late Purple keyboard player Jon Lord reportedly denying that it had. “This is something that Jon Lord wanted to forget, and I wanted to remember,” Cross told Songfacts. But now Blackmore has confirmed the story in a new interview with Ultimate Classic Rock.
The incident actually occurred on Deep Purple’s In Rock tour in 1970, when the band were scheduled to perform two shows at the Jam Factory on August 28, one at 7pm and the second at 11pm. Blackmore played the first show, but then fell ill.
“I remember being very miserable, and I was walking down the corridor with Jon Lord to go to the show, and then I felt very dizzy,” Blackmore says. “I grabbed hold of Jon, and he kept me walking. Then I fell down, and they took me to the hospital. They didn’t know what it was. I think it was just pure misery. And they kept giving me shots in the hospital.
“I just stayed in the hotel being miserable and [Deep Purple] went on and did the show with, I think, his name is Christopher Cross or something.”
Blackmore recovered quickly and resumed his rightful place onstage the following night at the Civic Auditorium in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Cross, however, would have to wait a little longer before his moment in the spotlight.