I'd never heard that story before! The video shows a slightly different version of the event, but the amp does explode at about 1:21 in this video:

Frickin nuts!

[Edited on 5/15/2020 by peachlovingman]

For whatever reason, I've never been all that impressed with Blackmore. I remember that he beat a very expensive Phillips television camera with the guitar... don't know why. An amplifier blowing up? Staged theatrics! Yeah, you can blow a 6L6GC over time or by abuse, but pretty much every major amp has a line fuse that will blow before flames or explosions occur. I'm sure the fans ate every bite!

I'd never heard that story before! The video shows a slightly different version of the event, but the amp does explode at about 1:21 in this video:

Frickin nuts!

[Edited on 5/15/2020 by peachlovingman]

This is the first part of the video where Ritchie explains what all lead up to that.
I heard an interview with Lord and Hughes talking about that whole thing also.
The rest of the band was RB 's soundtrack to him going off the rails, never missing a beat amazingly! Paice had to be beat when he was done playing that ending bit.

Wow not me. Blackmore has always been a favourite of mine. Heard Hush of the radio yesterday. Loved it.

I was at Cal Jam, 19 years old. Even then I thought Blackmore's histrionics were idiotic and I left after Purple's set and missed ELP. Yeah I missed a great set by ELP but I also beat 250,000 people to the freeway instead of sitting there for several hours trying to get out. Don't regret it, not much of an ELP fan anyway.

I was a fan of Black Sabbath and Deep Purple, the two bands I wanted to see, and both delivered the goods musically. Now that I know the story behind Blackmore's act, my disregard for him is even bigger. Let's face it, someone could have easily died in this onstage explosion. Ian Paice's glasses were blown right off of his face. Total disregard by Blackmore for anyone's safety, just so he could upstage ELP. But Purple band members have often spoken over the years of Blackmore's assh*le nature. I wonder if Purple's "Come Hell or High Water" DVD is still available for purchase. It was a 1993 reunion of the Mach II lineup. In it there are interviews with band members who comment on what a jerk Blackmore was. Pretty shocking for an officially released DVD to contain such interviews, but it's all there. That's why I wonder if it's still in print.

Just looked, the Come Hell or High Water DVD is still available through Amazon but a new one will cost you just over $20.

[Edited on 5/17/2020 by robslob]

Didn't know Blackmore had his amp to explode on purpose. No that is bad. Very bad. He could have killed or blinded someone.

We all know Blackmore has a bit of a reputation, to say the least. In part one of the interview, he states he really did not want to do the Cal Jam. Then the agreement was made that they would go on at dusk, no earlier. Lord in an interview backs RB on this(show time that is.) Go to the 50 sec mark in the video below and Lord starts to talk about it at that point. Hughes is after.

It was kinda bonkers what he was doing. No doubt it added to the presentation of the show. Yeah looking back at it was pretty dangerous, but that was a different time and era of RNR. The band played great. Rich was all "amped" up when he hit the stage(no pun intended ). Being harassed about going on earlier from what was written in the contract just added more fuel to his fire. Not defending him, its who he was at that time.

Those were all dummy amps, cab's and guitars by the way. Not sure if they were loaded with anything.

[Edited on 5/18/2020 by jszfunk]