It's been a while since former Deep Purple guitarist Ritchie Blackmore has gone out and toured on his extensive rock and roll catalog.
Thanks to his work with Deep Purple and Rainbow, Blackmore is considered one of the forefathers of heavy metal. And now that the guitar great has stepped away from his Renaissance-style project with his wife, Blackmore's Night, he's gone and reformed the band he created alongside Ronnie James Dio in 1975.
But Dio is gone and Blackmore his a big name, which is why Deep Purple bassist Roger Glover doesn't understand why Blackmore doesn't go out as himself.
"I wish him luck," Glover said in an interview with AntiHero Magazine. "In a way, calling it Rainbow, I thought, he's got his own name. I would have thought he should have gone out as just Ritchie Blackmore and [have] some really great band."
Glover spoke carefully of his estranged former bandmate, so there's no mistake as to his feelings for Blackmore.
"I don't want to disparage him at all -- I'm a fan of Ritchie as much as anyone else is. He's a musician. I'm blown away that I got to work with such a musician."
Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow is playing a few shows in U.K. in June. You can find the dates here.
Meanwhile, Deep Purple is getting ready to release its 21st album, Infinite, on April 7. Glover once again indicated the band's upcoming tour might be its last.
"Sooner or later this will end," he said. "We don't know when, but we're putting ourselves and everyone else on notice that it is around the corner."
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