{"id":266455,"date":"2025-11-16T18:09:09","date_gmt":"2025-11-16T18:09:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/266455\/"},"modified":"2025-11-16T18:09:09","modified_gmt":"2025-11-16T18:09:09","slug":"deep-purples-ian-gillan-reveals-he-is-going-blind","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/266455\/","title":{"rendered":"Deep Purple’s Ian Gillan reveals he is going blind"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Ian<\/p>\n

(Credits: Far Out \/ YouTube Still)<\/p>\n

Sun 16 November 2025 11:03, UK <\/p>\n

Deep Purple frontman Ian Gillan<\/a> has discussed his worsening eyesight and admitted that retirement isn\u2019t \u201cfar off\u201d.<\/p>\n

Gillan, who is now 80, wrapped up an arena tour with Deep Purple in late 2024, which included a huge date at the O2 Arena in London, and the rock legends remain active.<\/p>\n

However, in a new interview with Uncut, Gillan has conceded that he is losing his vision which is making life difficult.<\/p>\n

He said (per Music News<\/a>), \u201cIt\u2019s one of those things. I\u2019ve only got 30 per cent vision. That won\u2019t get better. It makes life mysterious. The hardest thing is working on my laptop. I can\u2019t see anything on the screen unless I use my peripheral vision \u2013 I pick up a line by looking at it sideways. But you find a way. You adapt.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gillan<\/a> then reflected on ageing, noting, \u201cIt\u2019s hilarious this growing old thing. It\u2019s a laugh a minute. Well, sometimes yes and sometimes no. I walk down the road and hear something drop off \u2013 clang, there\u2019s something else gone. Nothing\u2019s changed really apart from I can\u2019t pole vault any more. Other than that, things move a little more slowly. But nothing\u2019s changed.\u201d<\/p>\n

The rock vocalist then looked ahead to the future of his career, and said he will stop if necessary, sharing, \u201cI think if I lose my energy I\u2019m going to stop. I don\u2019t want to be an embarrassment to anyone.\u201d<\/p>\n

He then admitted, \u201cWe\u2019re not far off that. It creeps up on you \u2013 you don\u2019t really notice.\u201d<\/p>\n

Although Gillan does have retirement on the back of his mind, Deep Purple<\/a> are set to play only their second show of 2025 tonight at the Sport Palace in Tbilisi, Georgia. They will also headline the Coca-Cola Arena in Dubai on November 20th, and the Mega Star Arena in Kuala Lumper, Malaysia, on November 23rd.<\/p>\n

Then, in April 2026, the rock legends will play a series of shows in Japan before returning to Europe for a number of festivals and summer concerts.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n

Related Topics<\/p>\n

The Far Out Music Newsletter<\/p>\n

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Straight to your inbox.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"(Credits: Far Out \/ YouTube Still) Sun 16 November 2025 11:03, UK Deep Purple frontman Ian Gillan has…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":266456,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[52312,96,52313,128,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-266455","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-music","8":"tag-deep-purple","9":"tag-entertainment","10":"tag-ian-gillan","11":"tag-music","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom","14":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266455","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=266455"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/266455\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/266456"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=266455"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=266455"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=266455"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}