Rod Evan's Bogus Deep Purple
Estadio Inde
Mexico City, Mexico
June 28, 1980
TV Broadcast Recording
DVD Audio Rip
MP3 320kbps
No Cover Art
01 News Report
(in Spanish) 1:12
02 Smoke On The Water 5:00
Rod Evans vocals
Tony Flynn guitar
Tom De Rivera bass
Geoff Emery keyboards
Dick Juergens drums
This is the Mexican Television news report on the band. The report is in Spanish and there is only one full track. The guitarist and keyboard player even tried to look like
Ritchie Blackmore &
Jon Lord respectively.
From thehighwaystar.com:
After leaving
Captain Beyond in late 73, just as he finished recording the
Sufficiently Breathless album,
Rod Evans changed his life and went to work in a hospital for a couple of years, until he was approached by some unscrupulous management company, that specialized in rip-off reformed bands with big names, who had just been taken to court by the owner of the name
Steppenwolf (John Kay), for running a bogus band named
Steppenwolf, with no original member
(reportedly original member Goldy McJohn was initially in that band, but left). To make a long story short, that
"Bogus Steppenwolf" had a guitarist, named
Tony Flynn and a keyboarder, named
Geoff Emery, who were house musicians of that dodgy management company. However, as they got sued by
John Kay, that rip-off management decided to go for another big name, to make a fast buck:
Deep Purple. In order to find an excuse for using that name
(Deep Purple) they tried to get
Nick Simper involved, who wisely enough refused to get drawn into such a (ad)venture, and then they found
Rod Evans. Looking for a change, and probably not as wise as his former mate
Nick Simper,
Rod Evans thought that this was his chance for a comeback and went for it. More than that, he got involved with some very bad people from that rip-off management, and was used as a tool by that company: making
Rod Evans the only shareholder, and therefore sole risk-taker of that
"Deep Purple 1980" venture,
Rod Evans was the only person, who could be taken to court.
It was not long before
Rod Evans got sued, as he was the only person receiving booking fee royalties and all other band players and management were on the wages list. To set the record straight here, it was
Tony Edwards and
John Coletta who sued
Rod Evans (reportedly Richard Blackmore and Bruce Payne were the driving forces...): they filed an action in
Los Angeles Federal District Court in June 1980 seeking an injunction to prevent the band from using the name
"Deep Purple" and asking damages under the provisions of the
Lanham Act, a federal statute governing trademarks and trade names. Eventually the court decision was made that
Rod Evans had to pay
672,000 US$ for damages caused by using the name
"Deep Purple" without permission. The outcome seems that the sole rights to the name
"Deep Purple" reside with the original managers. It seems that the agreement requires 4 original members
(whoever these may be?) to use the name...
Jon Lord (in March 98 via e-mail): "AFAIK Rod had enough of the Music Business, and became a paramedic. Of course he was not that naive - he thought he'd try it to see what happened, but try to imagine what would *you* have said when it all went wrong? I only blame Rod for being silly. He should've known it was going to be difficult to get away with a fake DP. After all - he was doing it in public."
Ian Paice commented (after the DP show in Halle an der Saale 18.03.96): "We didn't make that money, it went all to the lawyers involved... The only chance to stop that band was to sue Rod, as he was the only one receiving money, all others were on wages... Surely Rod did get involved with some very bad people!" However, as much I agree that
Rod Evans did something wrong by using the name
"Deep Purple" without permission, there should have been another way to clear that matter. Needless to say
Rod Evans doesn't have that money and will probably be in debt for ever. Therefore he also will never be able to perform again, as
DP(O) would be able to grab any money that
Rod Evans would make in the music industry. This leaves the
DP(O) in a bad light, that's for sure. Evens' greed is no justification for acting like this. There should have been another way, that's for sure and AFAIK all those white collar gangsters, who used
Rod Evans as a tool to feed their cash machines are doing quite well these days.
Jon Lord went on to say this in April 98: "It was not just Rod who was sued - it was the organization that was behind the fake
Deep Purple who were most responsible and it was they who were hit with the greatest part of that 'very large sum of money.' In respect of that money - what price would you place on your reputation and on the right of the public not to be sold something under false pretenses? And also you should be aware that these people were informed on several occasions that they were breaking the law, and yet they continued to do it. Suing them was the last option there was to try to stop them. I did not enjoy having to appear in court against a guy I'd once worked with - but he who steals my purse steals trash; he who steals my good name takes everything I have."
Yes Jon, but it seems that at the end of the day, only
Rod Evans had to pay the price and all the puppeteers are rehabilitated...
Brian O. reports in Feb. 99: "
The Bogus Purple were managed by
Steve G., a slick rip-off promoter, who ultimately got in a lot of trouble. He was mentioned in the
John Kay Steppenwolf autobiography... Today I called
Steve G., the unscrupulousness agent of old
Bogus Steppenwolf and also
Bogus Deep Purple, which he denied... The talk we had by phone was fairly tense... He didn't seem to want to talk about the old days, said it was "a long time ago", and that
John Kay is a nice guy, a good singer... But why is anyone interested in what happened so long ago. He did admit that they won the right to the name
Steppenwolf, yet said Goldy and Nick never got a dime. I still don't know if he means royalties... or got paid when they played the bars between 77-80. At any rate, he was a dickhead to me... when I brought up
Deep Purple 1980 w/Rod Evans he really got pissed off... did not want to talk about that.
Steve G. made everything sound like it was water under the bridge, and old shit, was trying to make me feel like a fool for asking about it... He is rude. He did not want to make the connection between
Tony Flynn in the
Bogus Deep Purple and the
Bogus Steppenwolf... finally he said that
John Kay's book is full of lies!!!".
It seems that nobody, who should know the facts behind the curtain on the
Rod Evans and
Deep Purple 1980 case, wants to talk about this really, so you make it out yourself, who are the guilty parties...
This website however, presents the story of
Rod Evans and
Deep Purple 1980 trying to shed some light into
"what really happened...", while a lot of other websites simply try to ignore it. It seems that this band never got much press coverage, probably also due to the fact that
DP(O) was applying pressure on the press, so you get the idea of how they looked on stage here for the very first time by looking at the on stage photos.
Over the years I have heard various stories about
Rod Evans, working in a gasoline station or in a dog-breeding farm. Whatever may be true or not: it is a shame that a great vocalist like
Rod Evans had to end that way. Remembering him singing
"Starglow Energy" or
"Lalena" (to name a few only),
Rod Evans will always be a hero to a lot of people, no matter what else he did!
If anyone out there reading this article knows about
Rod Evans, reportedly he is living in the San Fransisco area, please let me know and let him know that there are still some people out there, whom I know well, who still remember him and would like to hear from him. No matter what he is up to now, he will not be forgotten, that's for sure.
Info on members:
ROD EVANS: Detailed information about Rod Evans you can find at Wikipedia, Hartmut Kreckel´s Captain Beyond website or at The Highway Star site
TONY FLYNN: Born in 1955, Tony lived in Hollywood in 1980. His full name is
Tony Romano Flynn, his great-grandfather´s family (Romano) was Spanish, his mother and her ancestry are from Denmark. He got his first guitar at the age of nine years, about his musical inspirations he mentions
B.B. King,
Howard Roberts, the flamenco guitarist
Carlos Montoya or
Paco De Lucia. In September 1977 he replaced guitarist
Kent Henry in the "new"
Steppenwolf band, where he played together with original keyboarder
Goldie McJohn and bassist
Nick St. Nicholas. He stayed in the band until the spring of 1978 before he parted, to be replaced by
Ruben Raven. He joined the
Steppenwolf band again in October 1979 and stayed there until early 1980. Tony planned to record a solo LP in Mexico with
Rod Evans,
Goldie McJohn and
Geoff Emery, but this never happened.
DICK JURGENS: Coming out of family fame, Dick went to high school in Sacramento, California, in the early 1960´s. His uncle managed the
"Sacramento Memorial Auditorium", so Dick was given frontrow seats and backstage passes to all the shows that came around. Being just a young man, Dick got to meet many of the Big Stars there like
The Doors,
Janis Joplin,
Jimi Hendrix and Dick´s drumming hero
Mitch Mitchell, he also met original
Deep Purple there in their early days. For the time of about eight months to a year Dick was also part of the "new"
Steppenwolf band when
Nick St. Nicholas hired him out of L.A. in 1978.
GEOFF EMERY: Not many things are known about the keyboardist
Geoffrey W. Emery, but he also was a part of the "new"
Steppenwolf band: In the spring or summer of 1978
Goldie McJohn left
Steppenwolf and was replaced by Geoff, who stayed there until early 1980. In different formations he played with both -
Dick Jurgens and
Tony Flynn - there. In 1978 ten tracks had been recorded for an album in Los Angeles, CA, but never released. Emery and
Dick Jurgens were members of the band in those recording sessions. Geoff seems to have been working in the music industry for some independent record label.
TOM DE RIVERA: Reports say that Tom won some audition when the "new"
Deep Purple band was searching for a bass player. After the 1980 court decision it seemed that he disappeared from music business. Latest news say that Tom played together with a band in South Orange County, California, in 2006. In February that year they recorded two songs. Tom is playing bass and doing the lead vocals.
More Info:
http://www.thehighwaystar.com/specials/1980/pressevans80.html
