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Ian Paice mit Demon´s Eye in Zoetermeer - Live 2007
Zoetermeer, Niederlande, 22.02.2007

von Michel De Pourcq

This morning I woke up, after a short night, with a headache: I came home at 03:00 am, and had to get up at 06:30.

Before I have been at this concert:

Would I ever drive twice 230 km to see a Demon's Eye's concert?

No.

Would I ever go to a Demon's Eye's concert much closer to home?

No.

Why?

Simply, I've never heard of the band before.

I checked out their website and everything looked quite "geil" to use a German word.

So it was only due to the fact that Ian Paice was drumming with them at Zoetermeer, we (as usual, Johan and I) took the chance, only to find out that we were too late to order tickets online. A quick phone call with a friendly Simon assured me that there would be tickets at the gate for us.

The traffic from Brugge to Zoetermeer was reasonable, despite the rush-hour; so we arrived too soon, around 18:30. At the "Boerderij"- building I saw a sign "Casa" and thought that it was a strange way to write "kassa" (pay desk) and queued in line only to find out that the index of the schedule of prices was something completely different: joints, marihuana,.

We then had a look around the building to discover that we had to spend an hour before the doors opened. So we went to the pub, next to the "Casa", where almost everybody was blowing (maybe the reason of my headache?).

An hour later, after a few Dutch beers; the turn-up at the entrance door was very poor, so there were plenty of tickets left, but these are the ugliest concert-tickets I have ever seen! Luckily after the gig a nice gentleman, who was there with his 17 year old son, gave me his ticket (and I found out it was more expensive to order tickets advanced!?)

We now were in the building, but still had to wait another half an hour before the doors opened. Thus we went to the bar; another Dutch beer would go in. Someone over there saw my Deep Purple Hub t-shirt and welcomed me and we chatted a bit. When returning from the men's room, I saw Ian Paice sitting just in front of me, having a meal. Johan wanted to ask his autograph, me too of course; and take a few pictures. But I thought it would be impolite to disturb him while he was eating, so we left him in peace.

At 20:00 we could enter the - rather small, but cosy - hall. We saw some other fans that we often meet at Deep Purple concerts. A lot of them were asking for Marc Brans, the chairman of the Belgian Deep Purple fan club. And, Johan, well. he still is infamous.

Someone took a picture of my Deep Purple Hub t-shirt.

At 20:33 the hall was still quite empty.

Half an hour late(r) we were welcomed by the singer of the band to meet Mr Paice, who, on his turn, welcomed us, and about the band: "these guys know what they are doing".

The concert kicked off with

BURN. One word: Awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!

Even Ian was applauding the band after this one, which he did quite a few times that evening.

"Great to be in Holland again. never been here before" (mmmm. Gillanism!)

"Are you READY AND WILLING?" I must confess that I did not quite know what song this was; I heard it before, but. It was Johan who told me the title. Never been a Whitesnake fan myself. But I must say that Robby T. Walsh sounded a lot like Coverdale.

"Here is a song about a bloke. blah blah. a great song called WHITE ROOM".

Nice one! Steve Curly, the guitar player: WOW!!!

After a bit more chit chat from Robby "SAIL AWAY" Just close your eyes and you did hear Deep Purple Mark III.

"Here's a song for ya" (even the same introductions) "this is a thing called EMMARETTA"

Nice to hear this one. Paicey was smiling all the time.

"I want you to help me sing it" CHILD IN TIME. The intro was a bit different than the original one, but what can I say? It was fukkin great!!! This band knows indeed what they are doing! I sure did not feel sorry for coming here, to a band I never heard of before. This gig already was memorable. They all performed with pleasure and loads of skill.

Maik Keller, virtuously played the five string bass.

Florian Pritsch, looked like Don Airey's brother, performed Lord-ish great on Hammond.

Robby T. Walsh, one time sounded like Gillan, the next time like Coverdale. He reminded me a bit of Doogie, who also has that ability of sounding exactly like the original singer.

Steve Curly, well, he IS Blackmore! He even looks like a young Ritchie

Andree Schneider, founder (together with Steve) of Demon's Eye, was taking a step back to let Ian doing the drumming and did the backing vocals and some tambourine. I wonder whose drum kit it was, Ian's or Andree's?

And Ian Paice? Well he simply IS Ian Paice!

"This song has not been played since 1972, it is about a little devil behind you, and is called. Ian". THE MULE. Included a 6' drum solo, he did things I never seen him do before. But then it also was the first time that I was really really close to stage, only half a meter. Ian even took off his glasses, because they were falling off. Of course he did his one arm drum solo. "On the drums: Iiiiiiaaaaaaan Paaaaaaaaaaaiiiiiiiiice!!!!!!!!!!!" The whole place went nuts.

Ian took a short break, and let Andree prove that he can play the drums as well.

Then. A song I always wanted to hear live; hoped Deep Purple would do it in 1999 at the Royal Albert Hall, but in vain. And here, before my very eyes, and ears. APRIL!!!! Man! WOW! Johan did not recognize it at first; I did from the first note. The song was finished off with HALL OF THE MOUNTAIN KING. This was the first song tonight that I felt that something (or someone?) was missing.

Ian took over the drums again. Robby asked us "how many people had a bad day today? Someone really pissed you off? Here's a tune!" MISTREATED. I was flabbergasted. The little crowd was watching them in awe, only a few were dancing, like the one who stood next to me, I hoped he did not knock off my glasses. And again: the fact that I am not dancing, does not mean that I don't enjoy myself, on the contrary, I am really listening to the music!! The song ended with a piece of IN THE HEART OF THE CITY. "You are fantastic, it only can happen in Holland". He ended the song singing "I bin loosing my mind" in a gay-ish way.

"This next song is a Jimi Hendrix song, I don't know the words, you gotta help me." Someone in the audience shouted HEY JOE. "You got it". This song did not do much for me. Don't know why.

"Thank you, you've been great". Ian threw his drumsticks in the audience, the disturbing guy next to me, caught one and went ballistic. Robby noticed it: "let the guy shut up."

The closing song of the set was SMOKE ON THE WATER. I did expect a little more doodling at the beginning of the song; but still it was amazing.

Lots of people were taking pictures; I took 533, but after a first browse today on my pc, 293 already were binned, and more have to follow. That one guy - yep the one next to me - held his picture-taking-cell-phone at one moment very very close to the guitar player, maybe 30 cm away from his legs. One only can imagine the reaction if this guitar player would have been a certain Master Blackmore...

At 22:30 Ian took the mike: "This band made it so easy... We can make a deal: we go backstage; you clap and shout; we come back. But we won't do that, we're gonna stay."

SOLDIER OF FORTUNE. Mmmmmmmmm nice (said in a way like the presenter of the Jazz Café in the Fast Show)

"Come on! This is it! BLACK NIGHT." Interpolating a too short STRANGE KIND OF WOMAN-duel between the singer and guitarist. I kinda expected Long Live R 'n' R. Then we were treated with a stunning bass-solo.

Introduction time:

"On dishwasher and microwave." Florian

Etc.

The banjo player received lots of applause.

No need to mention the applause Little Ian received.

"Here's a song before you go" PERFECT STRANGERS. A Blinder!! Still missed - as with Deep Purple themselves - the laser show.

Well, it was over much too soon. I did enjoy the enjoyment of the band; they themselves were having a great time, their improvisations felt like real improvisations.). As a matter of fact I felt that they were more Deep Purple than the real Deep Purple nowadays. (Don't get me wrong, it still is my favourite band of all times). But I don't know why Steve had a red guitar on stage. We stayed quite a while in the hall waiting to meet the band. Having a chat with some of the other - too small, only 150 max - audience, had a lemonade (as I am driving), exchanged e-mail-addresses.

I bought the CD (I do think that, on stage, Robby's voice is more Gillan-esque than on their CD which I feel is a bit too clean), tried to get a t-shirt, but have to get it later at the website.

Talked to Andree, who seemed very pleased. We never saw Ian Paice again - that night.

We stayed quite a long time at the bar, it looked we were the only Belgians tonight. But every body had one thing in common: everyone was very very happy to be here and to witness this event. Lots of the people we talked with asked us if we knew Demon's Eye before. We said goodbye to everybody and took the long way back home, including some piss-stops.

Well.

Would I ever drive twice 230 km to see a Demon's Eye's concert?

YES

Would I ever go to a Demon's Eye's concert much closer to home?

YES

Why?

It has always been my dream to see Deep Purple Mark II perform in 72 - 73. Well... this dream came true!!!!! Through Demon's Eye!

Maybe one small thing: why didn't they perform Demon's Eye??????

And...

We'll be spreading the word!!!!!!

See you next time

cheers

Michel De Pourcq