Blackmore took over Elf and dismissed guitarist David Feinstein. With the remaining members of Elf, he wrote and recorded Rainbow's first LP, Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow. The lineup consisted of:
Ronnie James Dio - Vocals
Ritchie Blackmore - Guitar
Craig Gruber - Bass
Mickey Lee Soule - Keyboards
Gary Driscoll - Drums
The first LP introduced a style known as "Drago Rock" in which the heavy instrumental parts were combined with lyrics of fantasy. Dio has stuck with this style of lyrics throughout his career. Blackmore and Dio both were into medieval fantasy and baroque style music, so this combination fit together quite well on this LP. Dio presented himself as a goblin-like frontman, and with Blackmore wrote several dark-sounding tracks, including "Man on a Silver Mountain" (the first hit from the album), "Sixteenth Century Greensleeves", "Catch the Rainbow" , "Black Sheep of the Family" and the acoustic-like track "Temple of the King." They added an FM-AOR type track in "If You Don't Like Rock N Roll" which, although a good rocking song, strayed away from the dark lyrics of the rest of the album.
By the time the album was released, Blackmore and Dio had replaced the rest of the band. The new lineup consisted of:
Ronnie James Dio - Vocals
Ritchie Blackmore - Guitar
Jimmy Bain - Bass
Tony Carey - Keyboards
Cozy Powell - Drums
This displayed a pattern that would continue through the rest of Rainbow's history. Blackmore would remain the only constant member, as others came and went in a revolving-door fashion similar to that of Deep Purple.
The lineup listed above entered the studio in February, 1976 to record the Rising LP. "Rising" became known as one of the great "dragon-rock" records of all time; in fact, readers of the magazine Kerrang voted it the greatest heavy-metal album of all time.
The album consisted of only six tracks, all composed by Blackmore and Dio. They all were fantasy-oriented - the titles included "Tarot Woman", "Stargazer", "Starstruck" and "A Light in the Black." After recording this album, the band headed out on a major world-wide tour, including a sold-out European leg on which they recorded a live LP, "On Stage."
"On Stage" was an outstanding live album. Blackmore kept with the Deep Purple tradition of recording few songs, but having long, extended versions of the songs they played. This included a 15-minute version of "Catch the Rainbow", an 11-minute medley of "Man on the Silver Mountain" and "Starstruck" with an instrumental known simply as "Blues" stuffed in between. It also included a 13-minute version of "Mistreated" from Deep Purple's "Burn" LP, and it opened with an unknown number called "Kill the King" which would show on their next studio effort.
When the next studio album, "Long Live Rock N Roll" came out in 1978, Jimmy Bain and Tony Carey had been replaced. Rainbow's lineup now consisted of:
Ronnie James Dio - Vocals
Ritchie Blackmore - Guitar
Bob Daisley - Bass
David Stone - Keyboards
Cozy Powell - Drums
As with the previous LP's. "Long Live Rock N Roll" consisted of several tracks with the mystic lyrics, including the aforementioned "Kill the King", "Lady of the Lake", "Gates of Babylon" and "Rainbow Eyes." It also included the title track, which became an AOR standard. Blackmore was impressed by the success of this song as a single, so he decided he wanted to take the band in a more mainstream rock direction, with more standardized lyrics. He asked Dio to start writing more mainstream lyrics, an idea of which Dio wanted no part. Blackmore then made it clear that Rainbow was his band, and that they would write and record as he directed.
Ronnie James Dio then took an opportunity made to order for him. Following a long history of alcohol abuse, vocalist Ozzy Osbourne had finally been fired from Black Sabbath. Sabbath leader/guitarist Tony Iommi offered the now-vacant frontman slot to Dio. Dio, realizing that he could continue to write his mystic-style lyrics in this new position, accepted. Rainbow was left temporarily without a vocalist.
This didn't last for long. Former Marbles vocalist Graham Bonnett was recruited as Dio's replacement. Bob Daisley was also gone, replaced by Blackmore's former Deep Purple cohort Roger Glover. David Stone also left, to be replaced by Don Airey. Rainbow's lineup now included:
Graham Bonnet - Vocals
Ritchie Blackmore - Guitar
Roger Glover - Bass
Don Airey - Keyboards
Cozy Powell - Vocals
This lineup recorded the "Down to Earth" LP in 1979. There were no mystical "dragon rock" numbers on this LP; they had been replaced by a mainstream commercial AOR radio-friendly style. This initially seemed to work, since the two singles from this LP, "All Night Long" and "Since You've Been Gone" (which was composed by Russ Ballard) proved to be two of the band's bigger hit singles. However, the album as a whole didn't sell well, and Bonnet was definitely not the performer that Dio had been. Bonnet performed one concert with Rainbow, at the first Castle Donnington Monsters of Rock festival, and it was such a disaster that he was fired immediately afterwards.
Rainbow was once again without a vocalist, so blackmore hired American singer Joe Lynn Turner, along with new drummer Bobby Rondinelli. Rainbow's new lineup included:
Joe Lynn Turner - Vocals
Ritchie Blackmore - Guitar
Roger Glover - Bass
Don Airey - Keyboards
Bobby Rondinelli - Drums
This lineup debuted with 1981's "Difficult to Cure", which was Rainbow's second attempt at a mainstream rock LP. This started off well, as they released "I Surrender", another pop-metal anthem written by Russ Ballard, who had written "Since You've Been Gone" for the "Down to Earth" LP. Blackmore and Airey co-operated on two instrumentals; one, the title track, "Difficult to Cure" was a hard rock take on Beethoven's 9th symphony, and worked fairly well. The other, Vielleicht das Nachste Mal (Maybe Next Time) not very memorable.
After "Difficult to Cure", Don Airey departed from Rainbow to join the Ozzy Osbourne band. Airey had performed with Ozzy previously as a guest keyboardist on Black Sabbath's "Never Say Die" LP in 1978. Airey's replacement was David Rosenthal. This gave Rainbow the following lineup:
Joe Lynn Turner - Vocals
Ritchie Blackmore - Guitar
Roger Glover - Bass
David Rosenthal - Keyboards
Bobby Rondinelli - Drums
This lineup recorded the LP "Straight Between the Eyes" in 1982, which included the radio classics "Death Alley Driver" and "Stone Cold." This was followed by a world tour, on which one of the shows was filmed for the home video release "Alive Between the Eyes."
For the next (and, it turned out, last) LP (at least for awhile) Rondinelli left, to be replaced by Chuck Burgi on drums. Now Rainbow consisted of:
Joe Lynn Turner - Vocals
Ritchie Blackmore - Guitar
Roger Glover - Bass
David Rosenthal - Keyboards
Chuck Burgi - Drums
The LP was entitled "Bent Out of Shape" and included the hit single "Street of Dreams." It was a very well-written and well-produced. That being said, it didn't sell very well, and Blackmore and Glover, finally realizing that they had done all that they could do with Rainbow, decided to try a reunion of Deep Purple Mk 2.
