109 Quotes by Ian Gillan

I was an avid collector of Elvis' early stuff; for a young singer, he was an absolute inspiration. I soaked up what he did like blotting paper. It's the same as being in school - you learn by copying the maestro.

It was immaterial to me that Elvis didn't write his own songs. Those were very different days, and he selected whatever suited him best from material supplied by publishing houses and teams of writers - all of whom were extremely conscious of his style of delivery.

Although he appeared in some awful movies, Elvis could also be pretty damn good as an actor.

The biggest income we make is from live performances, without any doubt. That's about a 4-to-1 ratio from anything else.

'Classic rock' is never a label that we've given ourselves - it's one of the many labels that's been imposed on us.

We always used to describe ourselves as an instrumental band. Basically, the music was always instrumentally based, so the songs always came later.

I've never listened to any of Purple Mk III's records.

No matter what I do, I've always recognized that Deep Purple is primarily an instrumental band. That's where all the music comes from in rehearsals - it all stems from the music.

If you've got a wound, and it's just about to heal up, and it's got a nice scab on it, and you think in two or three days, that's gonna be completely healed, then somebody comes along and pokes it with a stick, and it opens up again. And that's what happens with the Ritchie-and-Deep Purple situation.