Ordinarily, today would be my last
day off before heading back to work. Instead, I took next week off to recharge
my batteries. So far, it feels great. I’ve had drinks with friends, worked in a
fun game of Ultimate, played plenty of Arkham Horror with Sheila and generally
had a good time – and I’m just getting started.
Disc 625 is…. Rising
Artist: Rainbow
Year of Release: 1976
What’s up with the Cover? A giant fist rises
from the deep, clutching a rainbow. I love this album cover, which is exactly
as over the top as seventies rock albums should look.
How I Came To Know It: My friend Spence is an aficionado of all things
related to seventies hard rock. He put me on to the band “Rainbow” after he
told me that Ronnie James Dio was their lead singer for their first three
records. I bought their debut record, “Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow” first and
liked it – “Rising” was my next stop as I drilled through their collection.
How It Stacks Up: I have three of Rainbow’s albums, coinciding with
the only three where Dio is the lead singer. Of the three, “Rising” is pretty
awesome, but so is “Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow”. Those two albums are so
different that it really depends on what kind of mood I’m in in terms of which
one is better. Today I’m in a mood to put “Rising” second.
Rating: 3 stars but almost 4
The mid-seventies were a great
time for hard rock, and “Rising” is a good example of why that is; powerful,
innovative and not afraid to take chances.
The band’s debut, “Ritchie
Blackmore’s Rainbow” came out a year prior and was a mix of progressive rock
and Allman Brothers type blues riffs. “Rising” is very different. It is a lot
heavier, more akin to the late seventies metal that would follow it than the psychedelic
sixties that preceded it.
The album is anchored by the
prodigious talent of guitarist and band founder Ritchie Blackmore (of Deep
Purple fame) and Ronnie James Dio (of not-so-famous band “Elf”). Blackmore and
Dio share writing credits on all the songs, and for the most part I like the
result. The songs sound like a combination of the Deep Purple prog-psychadelia
and the operatic rock sensibilities that Dio would later bring to Black Sabbath
when he joined them a few years later.
Dio is blessed with one of the
great voices of rock, and on “Rising” he is allowed to soar and show off. Blackmore’s
guitar is restrained where it needs to be, but has a nice bluesy quality to it
that keeps the nerdy song topics from becoming too ridiculous.
As with Dio’s later career, many
of the songs seem to be right on the edge of being about something really
important, but you can never fully figure out just what he is going on about. Apparently
there is a “Tarot Woman” and at some
point we are invited to “Run With the
Wolf” but I can never figure out exactly why.
The album’s best song “Stargazer,” is at least recognizably
about something; a wizard that builds some massive tower in the desert, while
the people suffer around him. It isn’t clear why he does this, but I am given
to understand that wizards like to build towers in mysterious wastelands. It is
a thing. Even Dio admits:
“We build a tower of stone
With our flesh and bone
Just to see him fly
We don’t know why.”
Also, this song has at least three
killer riffs that build perfectly off one another throughout the eight and half
epic minutes of this track. If halfway through “Stargazer” you are not playing air guitar (or drums) then this type
of music is simply not for you. Go read about the Beatles. I happen to love songs
packed with power chords that are about fantastical landscapes, so I think it
is brilliant.
As you may have guessed, “Rising”
is decidedly not radio friendly. There are only six tracks, and two of them
are eight minute monsters (the other, “A
Light In the Black” is OK, but no “Stargazer”).
Don’t look for ballads on “Rising”
– this is an up-tempo record with a lot of fury. There is none more furious
than “Do You Close Your Eyes” which
sounds like an eighties metal song ten years ahead of its time. I love the
power guitar, and the thick crunchy sound. Unfortunately, the chorus founders a
bit with some questionable chord progressions that saps some of the song’s
energy. Also, the chorus “do you close
your eyes/when you’re making love” is a bit goofy. The song is clearly
about the singer’s girlfriend so…er…wouldn’t he know?
As is often the case with great
rock music, it takes two big egos warring with one another to make great songs,
and the tension between Blackmore and Dio’s styles is palpable on “Rising” but
that tension only makes it better.
Best tracks: Run With the Wolf, Stargazer
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