5. Blackmore and Gillan’s Guitar and Voice Games Live in Japan: Rock Falsetto as an Auditory Spectacle
Who Do We Think They Are? - Deep Purple and Metal Studies - Andy R. Brown
Catherine Rudent [+]
Université Sorbonne Nouvelle
Description
As Catherine Rudent demonstrates in Chapter 5, Gillan is very conscious of the R&B/Blues and Soul tradition of ‘parroting’ – that is, where the falsetto vocalist imitates or copies the notes of the guitar in a rising interchange, which, in the case of Deep Purple, may or may not be due to the influence of Led Zeppelin, on tracks like ‘You Shook Me’ and ‘Dazed and Confused’ (both 1969), and in their ‘live’ ‘on stage’ performances (Waksman 1999: 250-253; Fast 2001:44-47). Certainly, the reference to parroting is clear in an aside made by Gillan during a break or moment of repartee, in a filmed ‘live’ performance of ‘Strange Kind of Woman’ in New York 1973, when he says to Blackmore, ‘Get that parrot out of there’ (4.02-4.04).16 And there is clearly an amusement shared between the two of them over this, as Rudent also notes in her description of this performance. However, the central point that Rudent seeks to establish, through her detailed analysis of all three Live in Japan (1993) versions of ‘Strange Kind of Woman,’ and the two ‘Speed King’ encores, is that all of these performances, which are very different to the studio recordings, involve an extended segment of guitar vocal interchange which, in many respects, becomes the main part of the ‘live’ performance of the song; or rather that the song becomes secondary to the drama of the virtuosic rock falsetto auditory performance exhibited to the audience in these moments. For Rudent, these performances can be likened to a dialogue, or even a playful game, but where the stakes are high, particularly for the vocalist since the guitar can reach to heights that the voice cannot necessarily copy. In this respect the guitar and vocal interchange is decidedly a duel in which Blackmore is ‘raising the bar’ for his musical partner, suggesting higher and higher notes for Gillan to match. However, despite the allusion to parroting, Gillan’s performance surpasses that of the parroting technique in key moments, notably when he takes the lead in the contest and also when the finale is reached; it is then, and only then, as Rudent observes, when he is able to sustain the falsetto vibrato above that of the guitar, which becomes silent allowing him to scream alone. From this analysis, Rudent seeks to contextualise its reception, firstly in relation to the established framing of musical genre and gender, then in respect of a framing of the performance as an auditory spectacle.