As Deep Purple began their first U.S. tour in August 1970, guitarist Ritchie Blackmore was miserable. Stricken by a mysterious illness — one that doctors said had afflicted another rock guitar hero just weeks earlier — and desperately homesick, he spent the night of one Texas show confined to a hospital bed. And he was almost relieved.
The band had crossed the Atlantic to support their thunderous fourth album, Deep Purple in Rock. But when Blackmore fell ill, a young local guitarist named Christopher Cross briefly entered Deep Purple folklore by stepping in for a single night at the Jam Factory in San Antonio, Texas.
“I had a canker sore in my mouth under my tongue; I couldn't eat, I couldn't speak,” Blackmore recalled of the episode (via Ultimate Classic Rock). “I was miserable about that, and I wasn't happy about being on tour in America. The places we played were so far apart. I had no idea where I was. I wasn't in my comfort zone, and I kind of missed England.”
Cross later suggested the illness may have been a reaction to flu shots the band had been advised to take before their first American tour. Perhaps — though whatever was ailing Blackmore left doctors baffled.
“I remember being very miserable, and I was walking down the corridor with Jon Lord to go to the show, and then I felt very dizzy,” Blackmore recalled. “I grabbed hold of Jon, and he kept me walking. Then I fell down, and they took me to the hospital. They didn't know what it was. I think it was just pure misery. They kept giving me shots.
“The doctors would say, ‘Where's the pain? What do you feel?’” he continued. “I'd go, ‘I don't know. I'm just so miserable.’ It was interesting — they said the week before they'd had Keith Richards in for a similar kind of experience, which I wondered about.”
Fortunately, San Antonio had a capable stand-in. At the time, Cross — still performing under his birth name, Chris Geppert — played in the local covers band Flash and idolized Blackmore.
As Guitar Player has previously reported, concert promoter Joe Miller knew of the young guitarist’s abilities. With his familiarity with Deep Purple’s material, Cross became the logical emergency replacement.
“Joe — who was kind of managing me at the time — said, ‘You know, there's this guitarist in town who's a big fan of Ritchie's, and he could probably step in,’” Cross recalled.
According to Cross, Ian Gillan — whose first stint with Deep Purple later ended as his relationship with Blackmore deteriorated — was the only band member reluctant about the idea. Curiously, however, Lord would later claim the episode never happened.
“I came down, and I had a Flying V and long hair, and I'm this big Ritchie fan,” Cross said. “We played the songs that I knew, and then we jammed some blues. It was a great moment for me. And when they left town, I went to the airport and got to meet Ritchie, and he thanked me for covering for him.”
According to Setlist.fm, the show included newly released songs such as “Speed King,” “Child in Time,” and “Mandrake Root,” along with covers of the Rolling Stones’ “Paint It Black” and Little Richard’s “Lucille” — a song the band would perform with George Harrison 14 years later.
“I just stayed in the hotel being miserable and Deep Purple went on and did the show with Christopher Cross,” Blackmore said. “Luckily they played, because it's a terrible feeling when you're sick on the road and you let everybody down — the audience, the crew, the band. Nobody wants to be sick on the road.
“I can get quite depressed,” added the guitarist, who has been recovering at home following recent health scares. “And I was very depressed at the time, being in America and knowing I'd be there for three months before I got back to England.”
Elsewhere, Blackmore has reflected on rebuilding his friendship with Lord before the keyboardist’s death in 2012, while former Deep Purple singer David Coverdale has discussed the “downward spiral” surrounding the band’s decision to replace Blackmore in the mid-’70s.
