Legendary British rock band Deep Purple made Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi’s day with a short go to to their high-profile superfan on Friday as they returned to the nation they first toured greater than half a century in the past.
Takaichi’s status as an novice drummer and fan of laborious rock and heavy steel has been properly documented, and he or she has referred to Deep Purple as one among her favourite bands together with the likes of Black Sabbath and Iron Maiden.
“You are my god,” a giddy Takaichi stated in English to Deep Purple drummer Ian Paice, presenting him with a set of made-in-Japan drumsticks that she signed.
After a short photograph session with lead singer Ian Gillan and the opposite members, Takaichi informed the band she had purchased their “Machine Head” album in grade college, which options a number of the band’s largest hits equivalent to “Smoke on the Water” and “Highway Star”. She performed keyboard in a Deep Purple tribute band in center college after which switched to drums in college, she stated.
“These days, when I fight with my husband I drum to ‘Burn’ and cast a curse on him,” she joked.
The group’s courtesy name was a welcome respite for Japan’s first feminine prime minister, who vowed to “work, work, work” when she took workplace final October.
Since then, Takaichi has needed to grapple with a diplomatic fallout with China, financial pressure from a weak yen and rising costs, and now the specter of an power disaster as a result of Middle East battle.
“I have the deepest respect for the way you continue to make rock history while embracing new challenges and creating captivating music to this day,” she stated by way of an interpreter.
The band’s ties to Japan run deep. The double stay album “Made in Japan”, recorded throughout Deep Purple’s first Japan tour in 1972, cemented its status as one among rock’s most formidable stay acts.
The band kicks off its 2026 Japan tour on Saturday at Tokyo’s Nippon Budokan.
© Thomson Reuters 2026