Rainbow - "Rising" Deluxe Edition CD Review (Universal)

On March 22nd, Polydor will issue a 2CD deluxe edition of Rainbow's second album Rising (1976). Rising is phenomenal album but, unfortunately, this deluxe edition adds little to its legacy.

I've got a friend who is a huge Beatles fan and he was ecstatic after finding a bootleg at a street fair with 30+ takes of "Strawberry Fields". I listened to the disc once with him and, for the most part, the takes all sounded very similar yet my friend "studied" this disc and could tell you which take had an extra second of guitar solo, where there was an extra drum beat and where Ringo was passing gas (only kidding on this last one). I feel like the Deluxe Edition of Rising offers similar fare as you have three complete takes of the Rising album and they all sound similar.

Disc One contains the "New York mix" and the "Los Angeles mix" of the album and they sound almost exactly the same. Between the two versions, the tracks differ only a few seconds in length so I couldn't hear any differences when playing each mix through sequentially. In comparing the individual tracks, you can hear that different instruments are brighter in each of the mixes but it still appears to be the same take of the song. As an aside, I've heard for years about the longer keyboard intro in "Tarot Woman" on the UK version of Rising. If all that everyone had been talking about is the ~8 second difference between where the guitars kick on on the "Los Angeles mix" vs. the "New York mix", you are missing little.

Disc Two contains the "Rough Mix" of Rising along with one live rehearsal track. I'm assuming that the "Rough Mix" tracks are the same Cozy Powell tracks that have been floating around as a bootleg for the last few years. There are some notably difference in the "Rough Mix" which include a keyboard into to "Stargazer" and a longer outro to "Run With The Wolf". All-in-all, the total running time is about a minute longer than either of the two mixes on Disc One. The last track is a live rehearsal of "Stargazer". While of bootleg quality (though decent sounding), it would have been nice to have included more tracks from this rehearsal as Disc Two is only 43 minutes. (Note: when the Rising Deluxe Edition was originally announced, a tour rehearsal version of a "A Light in the Black" was planned for inclusion but was obviously dropped from the final release).

Given the large volume of quality bootlegs (both live and tour rehearsals) from this era, I had hoped for better from this Deluxe Edition. Newcomers are better off sticking with the single disc version (which is available new for under $5 on Amazon) and there is no compelling reason for long-time fans to upgrade.



Links:
Ritchie Blackmore

Rainbow - "Down to Earth" Deluxe Edition CD Review

This Tuesday, Polydor is reissuing Rainbow's fourth disc Down to Earth (originally released in 1979) in a two-CD deluxe edition.

For anyone not familiar with this disc, this was a transitional album for Rainbow as the only hold-over from the Dio-era was drummer Cozy Powell. Replacing Ronnie James Dio as Ritchie Blackmore's songwriting partner was x-Deep Purple bassist Roger Glover and Graham Bonnet took over on vocals. This disc finds the band abandoning the sword & sorcery epic rock of the Dio-era and moving in a more commercial direction. The eight songs on the original disc show the band fitting into the British blues-based, FM-radio sound that was popular at this time and a good point of comparison is Bad Company's Desolation Angels. This disc spawned two singles "Since You Been Gone" and "All Night Long" which were consistent staples in Rainbow's setlist in the years that followed.

Jumping into the reissue, the original album (Disc 1) is fleshed out by two b-sides: "Bad Girl" (b-side of "Since You Been Gone") and "Weiss Heim" (a stellar instrumental which is the b-side of "All Night Long"). Disc 2 is comprised of twelve tracks (~60 minutes) of instrumental versions and outtakes from Down to Earth. The instrumentals are somewhat of a mixed bag for me as, while some of the instruments are higher in the mix than on the finished songs, there aren't any significant differences other than the lack of vocals. The two outtakes "Spark Don't Mean a Fire" and "Ain't A Lot of Love in the Heart of Me" are interesting as they are, respectively, early versions of "No Time To Lose" and "Love's No Friend" with different lyrics. The Cozy Powell mix of "All Night Long" is somewhat of a throw-away as it sounds like a monitor-mix of the song with loud drums and backing vocals and muted lead vocals.

While this set seems a labor of love, I'm hard pressed to say that this reissue is worth its $24.20 price point (current price on Amazon). New copies of the original disc are selling for less than $5.00 on Amazon so one is essentially paying the balance for the fourteen bonus tracks. The "problem" is that the instrumentals are likely of interest only to die-hard fans but these same fans more than likely have eight of these tracks on the "Down to Earth Rough Mixes" bootleg that has been in circulation for years. What's left are just the two b-sides, the two early versions, and a "new" instrumental version of "Ain't A Lot of Love in the Heart of Me" (which sounds like just like the completed version). I would have been happier if the Castle Donington show (where Rainbow headlined the first Monsters of Rock festival) or the soundboard recording of the Denver, CO show from Nov. '79 had been included as bonus tracks. At minimum, "Set Me Free" (from the "Down to Earth Rough Mixes" bootleg) could have easily been included as part of this set.

Links:
Ritchie Blackmore