rainbow

Rainbow one of my favorite bands in all line ups and musical shifts that occured during the original run and I even like Strangers in Us All, that at times was so gothic sounding had the urge to go pull a sword out of stone. Featured Ritchie Blackmore one of my favorite guitar players and during its lifetime featured 4 vocalist, 5 bassist, 5 drummers, and 7 keyboardist. They went from gothic metal fronted band featuring Ronnie James Dio, to Graham Bonnet straddling the fence between pop metal to more traditional hard rock to era of radio friendly let me embrace my inner journey Joe Lynn Turner to the short lived Doogie White era in the mid 90's, which line up and album do you prefer and how do hold agaisnt up Deep Purple IYO?

I am a big fan of Ritchie Blackmore and think his work with Deep Purple was better than that of Rainbow. Ritchie was the boss in Rainbow and had the last word on all things, but with Deep Purple he was in a band and had one vote. With that being said, I will tell you that Rainbow put out some really good stuff. I too like all of the phases of Rainbow. With each new vocalist the sound and focus changed and that was interesting. I think that it is a toss up between Dio and Turner. They both had some really good songs. I wasn't a big fan of the whole medieval theme of the Dio era albums, but the music rocked.

To me the first lineup was best simply rawked with Dio!

Wargod48

good news are that new band called OVER THE RAINBOW will be touring over Russia in February and continues over EU maybe US later.

According to today's paper Roger Glover, current bassist for Deep Purple, formerly with Rainbow turns 63 today.

Rainbow is awesome!!! Long Live Rock and Roll is one of my top 20 fave albums of all time. I like all incarnations of the band, but the Dio years are imho the best.

My Dad turned me onto Rainbow, he saw them at a festival in Germany with Dio and became a fan. He said that was by far the loudest concert he ever saw.

He had the debut, Rising and Long Live Rock N Roll...we jammed all 3 one evening and I've been a fan ever since. Later on one of my friends turned me onto the post-Dio work which I also enjoy, but to me the first few albums are where it's at.

Great band. The first four albums with Dio are great. Rising has to be one of the greatest albums of all-time.

I think the most underated Rainbow is " Down to Earth". Poor Graham Bonnett had the task of not only replacing Ronnie James Dio, but had to help Ritchie Blackmore take Rainbow into a more commerical direction, which they would do more successfully with Joe Lynn Turner.

I felt " Down to Earth" was a great lost Rainbow album, where they tired to bridge the two worlds from what Rainbow was to what Rainbow where to become.

Great great band! I`m a fan of all their albums and styles..
No matter what direrction they took, the were always among the best imo.
Bonnett did agreat job on Down to Earth, still one of my favorite Rainbow albums..

I like the first 3 albums with Dio. After that, the stuff I heard didn't do a thing for me. I still have the double disc Greatest Hits, but I can't remember the last time I played disc 2 with the 80's material. All Night Long?

Their best song ever is "Stargazer".

Like echoed by others, the Dio years hold the best for me. I will go out on a limb here and say that Bonnets best singing (that I've heard) is on his Rainbow release. The Turner years were NOT APPRECIATED by me back in the day, but in hindsight, I see that for the style they performed in, it was very solid and good. Haven't heard the latest incarnation sorry to say.