Elly Roberts reviews
Purple Rainbows
Various Artists
Distributed by
EMI / Universal Music TV
- Year: 2004
- Rating: 9/10
- Cat. No: 9821194
Track listing:
Disc 1:
1. Deep Purple - Black Night
2. Deep Purple - Strange Kind Of Woman
3. Deep Purple - Fireball
4. Deep Purple - Speed King
5. Rainbow - Long Live Rock & Roll
6. Rainbow - Since You've Been Gone
7. Whitesnake - Fool For Your Loving
8. Dio - Rock 'n' Roll Children
9. Gillan - Restless
10. Deep Purple - Child In Time
11. Deep Purple - Highway Star
12. Gillan - Mutually Assured Destruction
13. Dio - We Rock
14. Rainbow - Kill The King
15. Whitesnake - Here I Go Again
16. Deep Purple - Woman From Tokyo
Disc 2:
1. Deep Purple - Smoke On The Water
2. Deep Purple - Burn
3. Rainbow - I Surrender
4. Rainbow - All Night Long
5. Graham Bonnet - Night Games
6. Whitesnake - Don't Break My Heart Again
7. Whitesnake - Love Hunter
8. Gillan - Trouble
9. Gillan - New Orleans
10. Dio - Hungry For Heaven
11. Deep Purple - You Keep On Moving
12. Rainbow - Man On The Silver Mountain
13. Rainbow - Stargazer
14. Deep Purple - Knocking At Your Back Door
15. Deep Purple - Perfect Strangers
16. Deep Purple - Hush (1988 Version)
Big hair – big riffs: Purple Rainbows
is a rocker’s delight. Like a hammer
from the gods this 2 CD - 32 tracker goes retro, to an era when rock ruled
the world – well, musically anyway.
Featuring high voltage performances from
‘ Rock Gods ‘ like singer Ian Gillan, guitarist Ritchie Blackmore of Deep
Purple, and various offspring’s like Rainbow, Dio, Whitesnake, Gillan and
Graham Bonnet. These guys might seem like dinosaurs now, but in their
heyday they were the top singers and guitarists. Collectively, they amassed
a staggering 63 singles in the UK charts. That’s pretty impressive as rock
bands go. However, they still hold their own in the 21st century and this
collection gives a colourful insight into music that has influenced
generations of budding guitarists.
Somewhere along the marketing process the
producers got the formatting seriously wrong. One music critic gave the
music content 5/5, and 1/5 for the presentation of the tracklisting, which I
have to agree with. It skips annoyingly from group to group in a haphazard
manner: just as your getting into one band – it wanders into another
totally non-chronological track. The small bonus is, that it lifts from
both the huge singles and albums back catalogue.
Commercially, Whitesnake
scored the most chart entries – 21 in all. Deep Purple had 15, Dio 7, Gillan
8, Rainbow 10, and Graham Bonnet 2.Not all these entries are track-listed
here, but it provides a fair representation of their overall success.
Classics include the great riffs of Smoke On The Water, Black Night,
Fireball, Child In Time, - Deep Purple, Since You’ve Been Gone - Rainbow
and Whitesnake’s Here I Go Again.
Deep Purple is still going strong with Ian Gillan back in the fold and
original drummer Ian Paice and bassist Roger Glover. Dio (Ronnie James Dio)
made a comeback playing gigs in August, while Whitesnake are gigging in
October. If you’re interested in their extraordinary family tree check out
The Highway Star.com
Review & concert pics copyright © Elly Roberts, 2004-2010.
