Rainbow - Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow [ORIGINAL RECORDING REMASTERED]
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Free Music Notes for Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow [ORIGINAL RECORDING REMASTERED]
Free Music Review: awesome debut!
Hit: 5 Stars
one of the best rock bands ever assembled and of coarse the best vocalist ever DIO!Free Music Review: Rainbow's first! :)
Hit: 4 Stars
Rainbow was formed in 1975 by lead guitar legend Ritchie Blackmore immediately after leaving Deep Purple. He met and struck up a friendship with Ronnie James Dio, who was fronting the bluesy hard rock band Elf. Ritchie was so impressed with Ronnie and the band that he formed Rainbow out of Elf. In other words, when they first began, Rainbow was basically Elf (minus their own lead guitarist, of course) plus Ritchie Blackmore.Although Elf was basically a bar-room boogie band, both Ritchie and Ronnie envisioned Rainbow to be more of a progressive metal outfit with lyrics concentrating on mystical, medieval, and occult themes. This is why Rainbow's first record has both of these styles represented on it.
It begins with what might be the greatest Rainbow song ever (certainly one of their greatest anyway, as well as one of THE best songs from 1975), a 4 1/2-minute song called "Man On The Silver Mountain." This is the original song that defined Rainbow's music: it starts with a good basic electric guitar riff, then the bass, drums and keyboards join in for support, and when Ronnie James Dio starts to sing, it quickly begins to take shape as the progressive heavy metal song it is. And it has one amazing guitar solo by Ritchie Blackmore!
"Self Portrait" is also a dynamic prog-metal tune, but "Black Sheep Of The Family" is a straight-ahead, slightly bluesy hard rock tune with some great slide guitar work by Blackmore, and is obviously one of the Elf-penned contributions to this record. It is also quite infectious; once you hear it, you can't get it out of your mind for hours.
"Catch The Rainbow," at six and a half minutes long, is the only long song on this album, and is also the most progressive-sounding. It's the one that really paved the way for their next album "Rising," as it sounds more similar to the songs on that record than anything on this one. It's a nice, introspective tune. "Snake Charmer" is almost the opposite; it is a short, loud, brash song that contains a lot of Dio-screaming on it. "The Temple Of The King" gets Rainbow back into fine progressive form, with lyrics conjuring up the medieval. The, they do a sudden roots-rock-about-face with the VERY Elf-sounding, piano-and-bass-driven, ultra-infectious "If You Don't Like Rock 'N' Roll," which some reviewers have dismissed on here, but I think it provides a neat departure for Rainbow on this album. Besides, it shows all of us where Ronnie James Dio really came from (no, not Hell): He came from rock's early days. That's right, he formed his very first band all the way back in 1958, called Ronnie and The Rumblers, so you can tell that he still had some of that influence left in him by the time this album was made. I think it's pretty cool. :)
The CD winds down with "Sixteenth-Century Greensleeves" and "Still I'm Sad." The former is probably the most medieval-sounding track on here, about a revolt against a tyrant, with some evil-sounding singing by Dio. The latter is simply one of the greatest heavy metal instumentals ever, with fast time-changes on bass and drums, and absolutely amazing guitar fretwork by The Man In Black.
If you know only a couple of their later hit songs, then give early Rainbow a try, especially if you already like Deep Purple. Some of these songs are very Deep Purple-ish. If you also like Ronnie James Dio's 80's stuff, then this CD is for you! And...If you don't like rock 'n' roll, THEN YOU'RE TOO LATE NOW! :)
Free Music Review: Classic debut
Hit: 4 Stars
Guitarist Ritchie Blackmore had his work cut out for him trying to put together a project that would do justice to the work he had done in Deep Purple. Miraculously he managed it with Rainbow, recruiting singer Ronnie James Dio from Elf, a band that had been opening for Purple for several years. With Dio as a songwriting partner and using the other members of Elf (except for the guitarist) as session musicians he recorded Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow. Released in 1975, this powerful debut is at least as good as anything Deep Purple ever recorded and a springboard for even greater things to come.
First the performances. Maestro Ritchie Blackmore whips out his patented guitar histrionics while displaying a level of subtlety and finesse only hinted at in his previous work. Ronnie James Dio proves immediately that he is one of the two or three finest rock vocalists ever, letting loose in a captivating and powerful way. Dio's former Elf bandmates deliver here as well. Drummer Gary Driscoll and bassist Craig Gruber make for a funky and grooving rhythm section, and pianist Micky Lee Soule comports himself well, although he seems a bit restricted by the guitar-oriented sound Blackmore was trying to acheive with Rainbow. The album is reasonably well recorded, but not spectacularly so. This is suprising considering that it's the legendary Martin Birch in the producer's chair. One assumes that deadlines and budgetary restrictions compromised his efforts somewhat.
The songwriting team of Blackmore and Dio is immediately a winner, producing some of the finest rock music in the history of the genre. Dio's melodic sense and sword-and-sorcery lyricism works very well with Blackmore's trademark classically-inspired heavy riffage. Some of the songs here are amongst either man's best, with highlights including "Man On The Silver Mountain" (a staple of Dio concerts to this day), "Catch The Rainbow" (a gorgeous ballad), "16th Century Greensleeves" (melodic yet brutal), and the introspective "Self-Portrait". Most of the other tunes are also very good, and there's a very cool instrumental cover of the Yarbirds classic "Still I'm Sad". It should be pointed out that Rainbow was still trying to feel out their direction, and there are are obvious leftover elements of both Elf and Deep Purple that make this Rainbow's most interesting and varied release.
So with all these good things to say, why only four stars? Two reasons. Firstly there's a couple of stinkers here. "If You Don't Like Rock'n'Roll" can only be described as generic filler, and the cover of "Black Sheep Of The Family" isn't any better (it wasn't a great song to begin with). Secondly the band isn't very well suited to the material; the obvious jazz and blues influences of the previous members of Elf don't always work in this context. Fortunately these men would soon be replaced by the world-class lineup that appeared on the follow-up release "Rising".
Don't let these reservations throw you. I reserve five-star ratings for albums that are perfect or very close to it, and if I give something four stars that means I like it a lot.
The bottom line: Dio, Blackmore, and "Man On The Silver Mountain". This is an album no rock fan should be without.
Free Music Review: Come down with fire...
Hit: 4 Stars
Basically proclaiming Deep Purple a lost cause and bereft of further importance, Ritchie Blackmore teamed up with American band Elf to form the first of the MANY lineups of Rainbow in early 1975. Blackmore had struck up a relationship with Elf's singer, a man christened Ronald Padavona but who sang professionally as Ronnie James Dio and thus a legend was born. Rainbow's debut, though it was meant to be a break from the funk metal that Purple was now trotting out and the honky-tonk styling's of Elf was in practice sort of a combination of both. However the future of the band was encapsulated in at least two of the record's most important cuts. "Man on the Silver Mountain" is quite simply one of the greatest rock songs ever and could very well be my favorite song of all time. The medieval, mystical lyrics combined with the Machine Head era heavy riffing to create a masterpiece. "Sixteenth Century Greensleeves" became another goth anthem from the debut with its castle and dungeons imagery. "Catch the Rainbow", "Self Portrait" and perhaps "Temple of the King" also moved in direct of the next Rainbow project which would leave no doubt behind that Rainbow was a serious metal band, especially during the genre's toddler stages. I have always had a lot of affection for this record but there are moments that make me cringe, but none from the above mentioned songs. Blackmore would soon jettison the entire band sans Dio and start again....and the results would be truly magical.Free Music Review: Blackmore in transition
Hit: 4 Stars
Given the Dio/Blackmore combination (and the sound of the other Rainbow records of this era), you would expect this to be a really heavy hard rock album, but its not. I think Blackmore was still suffering a funk hangover from the last two Purple records which infects some of this, keeping it from rocking as hard as it ought to (and making this the weakest of the albums with Ronnie James Dio). Actually, if you listen to "Stormbringer" and "Rainbow Rising", its easy to see this as a transitional record between the two.That said, Blackmore is in great form here and the songs are generally pretty good. The only complete stinker is "If You Don't Like Rock 'n' Roll". This is a good record, just lacking the expected heaviness and aggression. "Man On The Silver Mountain" and "Sixteenth Century Greensleeves" are great songs, but these original versions barely hint at the power they would have live.
I read somewhere that Blackmore originally wanted Purple to cover "Black Sheep Of The Family", but the rest of the band refused. Apparently, they were more interested in playing garbage like "High Ball Shooter" and "Holy Man". Not that "Black Sheep" is all that great, but it is better than most everything on "Stormbringer".