Line #93 Music/Rainbow


1	[[quoteright:320:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/3776.jpg]]
2	[[caption-width-right:320:''We believed we'd catch the rainbow...'']]
3	->''I'm a wheel, I'm a wheel, I can roll I can feel\
4	And you can't stop me turning\
5	'Cause I'm the sun, I'm the sun, I can move I can run\
6	But you'll never stop me burning\
7	Come down with fire\
8	Lift my spirit higher\
9	Someone's screaming my name\
10	Come and make me holy again.''
11	-->-- "Man on the Silver Mountain"
12
13	'''[[red:R]][[cinnamon:a]][[gold:i]][[green:n]][[blue:b]][[purple:o]][[pink:w]]''' is, to put it shortly, [[JustForFun/XMeetsY the lovechild]] of EverythingsBetterWithRainbows and ThePowerOfRock.
14
15	Actually, it is the solo project of former Music/DeepPurple guitarist Ritchie Blackmore. It initially started as a quick off-shoot project of Blackmore (backed by Elf, a band fronted by Music/RonnieJamesDio) because he wanted to record a cover of the Quatermass song "Black Sheep of the Family". After Blackmore left Deep Purple, the band became a full-time project.
16
17	In the mid-to-late '70s, Rainbow played {{Hard Rock}}, influenced by Blackmore's past in Purple and Dio's HeavyMithril interests. The Dio-era albums are considered an important influence for neoclassical metal and PowerMetal. The Blackmore-Dio partnership frayed over creative differences, with the former wanting adopt a more commercial sound, leading to the latter's departure to Music/BlackSabbath.
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19	A replacement vocalist was discovered in Graham Bonnet, who fronted the band's foray into a more AOR-ish style and netted their first hit single "Since You Been Gone" (a Russ Ballard cover). Bonnett left Rainbow to found Music/{{Alcatrazz}}, and was replaced by Joe Lynn Turner of Fandango fame for the rest of the band's 80s run. It had a reunion in the 90s, and another one in 2015.
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21	Not to be confused with the [[KoreanPopMusic K-Pop]] group of the same name.
22	----
23	!Discography:
24	* ''Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow'' (1975)
25	* ''Rising'' (1976)
26	* ''Long Live Rock 'n' Roll'' (1978)
27	* ''Down to Earth'' (1979)
28	* ''Difficult to Cure'' (1981)
29	** ''Jealous Lover'' (1981, EP)
30	* ''Straight Between the Eyes'' (1982)
31	* ''Bent Out of Shape'' (1983)
32	* ''Stranger in Us All'' (1995)
33	----
34	!!Tropes of Babylon:
35	* AlbumTitleDrop:
36	** For ''Straight Between the Eyes'' (from "Rock Fever"):
37	--->''44 calibre rock and roll\
38	Fever deep inside her\
39	Hits me straight between the eyes\
40	When she opens fire''
41	** "I see a rainbow rising" from "Stargazer" on ''Rising'' (also called ''Rainbow Rising'' because of that line and the way the title was written on the album cover).
42	** ''Stranger in Us All'' gets name-dropped on the track "Black Masquerade".
43	* AllForNothing: "Stargazer" deals with a wizard who enslaves several people to construct a tower for him, with which he hopes to begin flying. In the end, however, he falls to his death, making all the people's hard work pointless.
44	* ArenaRock: Mostly from ''Difficult to Cure'' onwards, though ''Down to Earth'' touched on it too.
45	* AudienceParticipationSong: "Long Live Rock 'n' Roll" has an audience sing-along portion in live performances.
46	* ControlFreak: Ritchie Blackmore, changing the line up whenever he felt like it. He especially seemed to dislike bassists and keyboardists. It also led to his legendarily adversarial relationship with Ronnie James Dio and ironically led to Dio becoming something of this himself due to his intense desire to never be controlled by anyone again.
47	* CulturalRebel: Graham Bonnet, the ''lead singer'' in a 70's hard rock band refused to have long hair, or dress in black, instead performing in his James Dean inspired short hair, sunglasses and white t-shirts. Reportedly, him sneaking away for a haircut ultimately led to his firing.
48	* CoverVersion: "Black Sheep of the Family" (Quatermass), "Still I'm Sad" (Music/TheYardbirds), and "Since You Been Gone" (Russ Ballard).
49	** And if you were wondering, "I Surrender" by Russ Ballard was written by him for Rainbow, so it doesn't really count as a cover since they were the first to perform it.
50	* DisproportionateRetribution: Ritchie Blackmore was once scolded by Don Airey for playing behind his amps after breaking a string. His response was to knock the other over and proceed to pummel him, leading to a larger brawl involving Ritchie, Don, and Cozy Powell. Added onto later when Don was apparently left outside in the rain.
51	** Another instance involved bassist Mark Clarke, who was fired early on in the recording sessions for the ''Long Live Rock & Roll'' record for playing bass with his fingers instead of using a pick. Blackmore would play a lot of the bass parts himself, with Bob Daisley (best known for his work with Music/OzzyOsbourne) handling the rest.
52	* DroitDuSeigneur: Implied in "Sixteenth Century Greensleeves", where a tyrant kidnaps women from his domain to his tower, sparking a popular rebellion.
53	* EarlyBirdCameo: Of a sort. Current keyboardist for Music/DeepPurple Don Airey was a member of this band prior to joining Purple. There was a bit of personnel overlap (namely with Roger Glover) and even song overlap (Rainbow sometimes would play "Lazy" or "Smoke On The Water" onstage, which Purple does currently).
54	* EpicInstrumentalOpener: In concert, "Lost in Hollywood" would get an instrumental opening tacked on.
55	* EpicRocking: "Stargazer", "A Light in the Black", and "Rainbow Eyes" are all over seven minutes long. "Eyes of the World" is nearly that long as well.
56	** Their live shows during the Dio era count as well, they'd stretch most of the songs out to over 10 minutes.
57	** In the Bonnet era, "Lost in Hollywood" ended up stretched to over 20 minutes long most nights, with an instrumental opening tacked on and instrumental breaks for Ritchie, Don and Cozy.
58	* EverythingsBetterWithRainbows: Not only the band name, but a lot of the Dio-era lyrics have rainbows in them too.
59	* GenreShift: "If You Don't Like Rock 'n' Roll" on ''Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow''. For this song the album suddenly goes from Hard Rock / Proto-Metal to old school Rock and Roll with Music/LittleRichard esque piano riffs.
60	** Also post-Dio era.
61	* HeavyMeta: "If You Don't Like Rock 'n' Roll" and "Long Live Rock 'n' Roll".
62	* HeavyMithril: Dio-era Rainbow, though not the earliest instance of the trope, was important to the development of fantasy metal away from hippie-themed fare like Music/LedZeppelin's Tolkien-inspired folk-rock songs or Music/UriahHeep's psychedelia. Dio's fantasy lyrics set to Blackmore's guitarwork paved way for a more aggressive, fist-pumping sound that's remained the dominant aesthetic in fantasy metal since then.
63	* HereWeGoAgain: "Stargazer" is about a wizard who enslaves people to build him a tower from which he can fly to reach a star in the sky, only for him to fall and die in the attempt. The following song, "A Light in the Black" (the album closer), is about the despair of one of the wizard's slaves, who laments all the years lost on the pointless task. However, during the song's BigRockEnding:
64	-->''Look to the sky\
65	There, in the sky'\
66	I see a star!''
67	* {{Homage}}: The "Can't Let You Go" video is an homage to the silent film ''Film/TheCabinetOfDrCaligari'', with Ritchie Blackmore as Caligari and singer Joe Lynn Turner as Cesare.
68	* IAmTheBand: Ritchie Blackmore's tendency towards this caused strife both in this band and in ''every other band he ever played with.'' Ironically enough, many people remember Rainbow for Music/RonnieJamesDio's vocals and charismatic stage presence as much as Blackmore's guitar (Ronnie was even [[RevolvingDoorBand the only other member to stay]] in between the debut album and ''Rising'').
69	* InCaseYouForgotWhoWroteIt: The title of the first album, as it was meant to be a solo side product. The band itself was alternatively billed as "Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow" or "Blackmore's Rainbow" for about three years before shortening to the common, short name. Since the reunion in the 2010s, the band's official name has changed back to containing Blackmore's full name.
70	* {{Instrumentals}}: "Still I'm Sad" (sometimes performed with vocals during live-concerts), "Vielleicht das nachste Mal (Maybe Next Time)", "Difficult to Cure", "Weiss Heim", "Anybody There?" and "Snowman".
71	* JerkAss: Ritchie Blackmore was up to his usual, firing band members at the drop of a hat and generally treating them badly.
72	** Keyboardists especially got the short end of the stick this time around. Tony Carey was psychologically tormented by Ritchie (occasionally helped out by other bandmates).
73	* LeadBassist: Roger Glover. Ritchie Blackmore brought in his old Music/DeepPurple bandmate to help write songs after Dio's departure and Ritchie's desire to conquer America (the three Dio-era albums sold poorly there despite tremendous critical acclaim). Glover would be the longest-tenured bandmember next to Blackmore himself, as well as writing and producing.
74	* LighterAndSofter: Ritchie Blackmore was hell-bent on cracking the US charts, so the band adopted a pop rock / AOR oriented sound after the three Dio-fronted albums.
75	* LoonyFan: "Starstruck" is about one.
76	* NewSoundAlbum: ''Difficult to Cure'' introduced the more commercial AOR sound for the '80s.
77	* NobodyLovesTheBassist: Every bassist NOT named Roger Glover.
78	* OlderThanTheyLook: Don Airey was actually 31 when he joined the band. He looked like [[https://i0.wp.com/68.media.tumblr.com/64d9acbd2219020b4f24860967df8073/tumblr_optxoaJ2ov1r9tvl8o4_1280.gif?w=605 this]].
79	* OminousPipeOrgan: David Rosenthal's intro to "Can't Let You Go".
80	* PowerMetal: Along with Music/{{Queen}}, Music/UriahHeep and Music/{{Thor}} they're one of the {{UrExample}}s.
81	* RevolvingDoorBand: Only Ritchie Blackmore himself and Roger Glover lasted more than three albums.
82	* RockMeAmadeus: ''Difficult to Cure's'' title-track is an arrangement of Beethoven's Ninth.
83	* RockersSmashGuitars: In a rare inversion, the guitar smashed the rocker on one gig. Ritchie Blackmore threw his guitar up in the air, it hit the ceiling and fell down, breaking his finger.
84	* {{Sampling}}: "Difficult to Cure" ends with a sample of Oliver Hardy's (of Creator/LaurelAndHardy fame) laughter.
85	* SelfBackingVocalist: Used by Dio in a lot of the early songs. Perhaps most noticeable on "The Temple of the King", where the chorus features two Dios singing harmonies at equal volume.
86	* StarCrossedLovers: "Catch the Rainbow" is about a beautiful but impossible romance, hence the title. Dio identified the protagonists as a stablehand and a noble lady having a tryst in the stables ("a bed of straw") at night.
87	* SurprisinglyGentleSong: "Catch the Rainbow" and "Rainbow Eyes". The latter even has Dio singing in a soft croon as opposed to his usual aggressive vocal style.
88	* TitleOnlyChorus: "Long Live Rock 'n' Roll".
89	* TruckDriversGearChange: "Tarot Woman" goes from G minor to A minor for the final verse.
90	* UrExample: Much like [[Music/RonnieJamesDio Dio's]] later solo work, ''Rising'' and ''Long Live Rock 'n' Roll'' are sometimes considered to be this for PowerMetal, specifically the song "Stargazer" on the former record. To some extent, ''Rising'' is also an example for ProgressiveMetal, particularly side two, which runs for nearly seventeen minutes, contains only two songs (each at least eight minutes long), and serves as a sort of mini-concept album[=/=]RockOpera; Music/DreamTheater has covered "Stargazer", in case that's any indication.

Context Music / Rainbow