Ritchie Blackmore Discography

Richard Hugh Blackmore, (born 14 April 19Blackmore was born in Weston-super-Mare, England, but moved to Heston, Middlesex at the age of two. He was 11 when he got his first guitar. His father bought it for him on certain conditions: "He said if I was going to play this thing, he was either going to have someone teach it to me properly, or he was going to smash me across the head with it. So I actually took the lessons for a year – classical lessons - and it got me on to the right footing, using all the fingers and the right strokes of the plectrum and the nonsense that goes with it."

He was influenced in his youth by early rockers like Hank Marvin and Gene Vincent, and later, country pickers like Chet Atkins. His playing improved and in the early 1960s he started out as a session player for Joe Meek`s music productions and performed in several bands. He was member of instrumental combo The Outlaws and backed Heinz (playing on his top ten hit "Just Like Eddie"), Screaming Lord Sutch, Glenda Collins and Boz among others. While working for Joe Meek, he got to know engineer Derek Lawrence, who would later produce Deep Purple`s first three albums. With organist Jon Lord he co-founded hard rock group Deep Purple in 1968, and continued to be a member of Deep Purple from 1968-1975 and again from 1984-1993.
Blackmore co-founded the hard rock group Deep Purple in 1968 with Rod Evans (vocals), Nick Simper (bass), Jon Lord (keyboards), and Ian Paice (drums). The band had a hit US single with its remake of the Joe South song "Hush". After three albums Evans and Simper were replaced by Ian Gillan (vocals) and Roger Glover (bass).

After Deep Purple, Blackmore formed the hard rock band Rainbow. The name of the band Rainbow was inspired by a Hollywood bar and grill called the Rainbow that catered to rock stars, groupies and rock enthusiasts. It was here that Blackmore spent his off time from Deep Purple and met vocalist Ronnie James Dio, whose band Elf had toured regularly as an opening act for Deep Purple.
In April 1984, it was announced on BBC Radio`s Friday Rock Show that the "Mark Two" line-up of Blackmore, Gillan, Glover, Lord, and Paice was reforming and recording new material. The band signed a deal with Polydor in Europe and Mercury in North America. The album Perfect Strangers was released in October 1984. A tour followed, starting in Perth, Australia and wound its way across the world and into Europe by the following summer. It was the highest-grossing group tour of the year. The UK homecoming proved mixed as they elected to play just one festival, `The Return of the Knebworth Fayre`, at Knebworth Park on June 22 1985. Despite poor weather conditions, an audience of 80,000 attended the show that also featured The Scorpions, Mama`s Boys and Meat Loaf amongst others.

In 1987, the line-up recorded and toured in support of the album, The House of Blue Light. A live album, Nobody`s Perfect was released in 1988. A new version of "Hush" was also released to mark the band`s twenty year anniversary. In 1989, Ian Gillan was fired from the band because of a poor working relationship with Blackmore. His replacement was former Rainbow vocalist Joe Lynn Turner. The new lineup recorded one album titled Slaves & Masters (1990). Blackmore and his bandmates were disappointed with the efforts of the album and tours.

Neither the album nor the tour were critically or commercially successful. Following its conclusion, Turner was fi

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