Live In Germany 1976: 30th Anniversary Edition Box

Performer: Rainbow
Distributor: MSI Music Distribution

Notes: Rainbow: Ronnie James Dio (vocals); Ritchie Blackmore (guitar); Tony Cary (keyboards); Jimmy Bain (bass); Cozey Powell (drums). Recorded live in 1976. Digitally remastered by Joe Lambert at Classic Sound Studios, New York, New York. 30th anniversary special edition box. When punk rock came crashing onto the music scene in the mid-'70s, the movement was specifically targeting groups that had become self-indulgent. Just by looking at the amount of extended guitar solos that cropped up at latter-day Deep Purple and early Rainbow shows, Ritchie Blackmore certainly stood for everything that the snarling young punks detested. And while they certainly had a point (all the long and winding solos did numb your brain after a while), there's no denying that Rainbow early on could certainly cook up some rockin' tunes, as evidenced by any of their three studio recordings with singer Ronnie James Dio. But by containing only a total of eight songs and warranting a double-disc release, the Rainbow concert set Live in Germany '76 captures the group at its most bloated. If you were to cut out all the soloing, there certainly are some worthy compositions here that rate among Blackmore's best work ever, such as "Man on the Silver Mountain" and "Catch the Rainbow (even though the latter is very similar -- both musically and lyrically -- to Jimi Hendrix's "Little Wing"). Since another Rainbow release, 1977's On Stage, contains most of these tracks in similar versions, only hardcore Blackmore fans will need a copy of Live in Germany '76 in their collections. ~ Greg Prato

Ritchie Blackmore's combustible guitar riffs in the seminal band Deep Purple were the sparks that fed the conflagration of a whole new genre: heavy metal. Blackmore's musical ambition led him away from the band in 1975, after which he poached members of the band Elf--including vocalist Ronnie James Dio--to record the solo project that would evolve into the band Rainbow. Dio's lyrics were a castles-and-kings affair and Blackmore's classical-derived music suited them well. The pair--with an ever-rotating line-up behind them--recorded several popular albums, until Dio was lured away by Black Sabbath in '79. Blackmore reunited with Deep Purple in 1984, revisiting Rainbow briefly in the mid-'90s before finally pulling the plug on both bands and moving on to the medieval folk act Blackmore's Night.

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