Deep Purple met Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi in Tokyo on Friday, and the first female leader in Japan greeted drummer Ian Paice with a line that cut through the formality: “You are my god.” She handed him signed Japanese-made drumsticks as the band visited the capital while touring across Japan.
Takaichi, 65, said she had loved the band since primary school and once played in a Deep Purple tribute band before picking up the drums at university. She told the group, “I can’t believe Deep Purple are here,” and said she hoped the tour would “thrill and excite fans all over Japan” while promoting cultural exchange between Britain and Japan. Paice said it was always a pleasure to visit Japan and called the meeting an “added bonus.”
The encounter carried extra weight because Takaichi is not just a fan in the front row. She became Japan’s first female prime minister in October and has since been dealing with strained diplomatic ties with China, rising prices and a sluggish economy. On a day when her government had plenty of serious problems to manage, she chose to spend part of it talking rock history with one of the genre’s defining bands.
Deep Purple, formed in England in 1968, remain one of the “unholy trinity” of British heavy metal bands alongside Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. Their catalog still looms large in Japan, where they recorded the 1972 live album Made in Japan. The band also pointed to a long personal link with Takaichi, saying on Instagram that she has often named Deep Purple as one of her favorite bands and bought their Machine Head album in grade school. That record, released in 1971, included “Smoke on the Water.”
Takaichi has talked before about the band becoming part of her life, including her habit of drumming to “Burn” after arguments with her husband. She was also known to carry several sets of drumsticks because she tended to break them during intense performances. For Deep Purple, the Tokyo stop was more than a courtesy call. It was a reminder that the group’s Japanese connection, built over decades, still reaches all the way into the prime minister’s office.
The question now is whether that shared affection can do more than produce a photo opportunity. Takaichi wants the tour to lift fans and deepen ties, and for one afternoon at least, the music did something diplomacy often cannot: it got a country’s leader and one of rock’s old giants speaking the same language.
