It was my mate Andrew who first played me Rainbow Difficult To Cure one night when I stayed over at his. He told me that the guitarist had been in Deep Purple and that Rainbow were excellent, although not as good as Stryper and that I just WOULD NOT BELIEVE their best track was actually ‘a Beethoven cover’.
Young mind = blown.
Older mind = blowing raspberries^
I needed a good time Wednesday listen and this was provided yesterday by Rainbow Difficult To Cure and bloody hell it did the trick, loud parping rock capturing that exact moment where Mr Blackmore, for a few dollars more, led his band of hired tired hands up to the precipice where proper hard rock skirted the fearsome valley of AM radio mush. This 1981 offering walked a very difficult line, almost perfectly.
Headline personnel news was the hiring of Joe Lynn Turner to add his pipework to a bunch of readymade cuts* following Ritchie Blackmore’s decision to instigate a process of conscious uncoupling with Graham Bonnet. Personally I think the departure of the ever peripatetic Cozy Powell was far more impactful, his flashy, dashing style would have jarred with the more commercial direction here, the blameless Bob Rondinelli^^ fitting in a treat.
The Russ Ballard-penned ‘I Surrender’ was a heart-seeking missile aimed squarely at the big radio dial in the sky. It is as timeless and brilliant a slice of radio rock as anyone ever concocted and I unashamedly love the way Turner tames the song right from the off, by the time Don Airey adds his little plonky bits at the edges and Blackmore glides in I’m in AOR heaven.
Then comes the superbly bonkers brilliance of ‘Spotlight Kid’^*, with that utterly bizarre keyboard solo from Airey that half wrecks, half makes the entire song, very eighties; regardless Blackmore plays an absolute blinder here and the lyrics are the best on the LP. I love how they encapsulate the lived experience of an occasionally amusing music blogger:
Jokers and women they hang 'round your door They're all part of the scene Just like a junkie you've got to have more It's a pleasure machine
If you were looking for an underrated gem on Difficult To Cure, or in Rainbow’s discography for that matter, ‘No Release’ would be my call. There’s something pleasingly Zeppelin-shaped about the song’s structure and rhythm, without playing copycat. Turner excels again and the Queen-style breakdown mid-song is a pleasant surprise every time I hear it. Top draw.
As a connoisseur*^ of badly translated German I would be a fan of the instrumental ‘Vielleicht Das Nächste Mal (Maybe Next Time)’ even were it silent. It’s great though, corny and affecting as hell, just the sort of thing to soundtrack a compromised detective staring moodily out to sea in the end sequence of a low-budget continental TV series; in a good way.
There’s something great about the default Purple Rainbow boogie of ‘Can’t Happen Here’, again JLT really sells it as Airey plinks his plonkers and the Glover/Rondinelli rhythm section lock right in behind them. ‘Freedom Fighter’ isn’t a good song but it does contain some great low end guitaring from Blackmore, let’s leave it at that.
I am also a fan of the low-down blues-oogie of ‘Midtown Tunnel Vision’ although the lyrics really are a bit smelly the music is great.
Then it … I mean … just FFS Blackmore! Maybe ‘Difficult To Cure (Beethoven’s Ninth)’ is what happens if you have snorted far too much of your own ego for too many years and people are far too frightened to tell you that your last idea was shite. The beginning of it sounds like someone taking the piss out of Ralph McTell’s ‘The Streets Of London’.
Sorry Andrew.
Hubris aside Difficult To Cure is tremendous fun, as only really well played hard driving tuneful rock can be. Just surrender.
I really love the fact that the Hipgnosis originally offered the unsettling sleeve art for Difficult To Cure to Black Sabbath for Never Say Die three years earlier. I really couldn’t imagine them being switched now, given how iconic they both are.
1200 Down.
PS: what an excellent guitar solo, played by a man who really looks like he’d rather be at home painting his garage door:
^as befits jaded old fart.
*interestingly at a slightly higher pitch than was comfortably within his range.
^^a man I’ll swear I never heard of before yesterday, which is really weird for a nerdy rocker such as me.
^*I should stress that this song is absolutely no relation to the Captain Beefheart cut of the same name.
*^pretty sure that’s one of those fancy foreign words, possibly German.
What a great write-up. I had this on cassette back in the day when I was buying up chunks of the Queen, Ultravox, Status Quo and Rainbow back catalogues from Woolworths. You once again sent me to the loft, amazingly some of those cassettes have survived the moves and culls, including DTC. And wow, it holds up! Almost all killer, in fact. Almost.
Like you I’m a card-carrying Dio-ite, I’d have loved to hear him belt Spotlight Kid or Midtown Tunnel Vision, or Eyes of the World and No Time to Lose off Down to Earth, but JLT is great here. He gets a raw deal I think, tarnished by his ill-advised Deep Purple stint, but does indeed sell this. I’ve even got a soft spot for the AOR smoothieness of Magic thanks to his vox. And the solos in Spotlight Kid are awesome, an aural depiction of the booze n” coke lifestyle of the song’s subject.
But. That instrumental. You know there’s an 11 minute version on their Finyl Vinyl live album just for you. That parking guitar tone, FFS. Thanks to Ritchie we know what Beethoven sounds like being sung by a duck being stretched.
Parping guitar tone. Damn autocorrect.
Thanks Tim. You made me nostalgic for Woolies then, the Carmarthen one used to stock a shelf of all those Fame reissues from the 80’s and I used to go in and paw the sleeves for hours wanting them.
I think JLT is an underrated chap and I can’t begrudge him a bit of AOR smoothness occasionally.
I am very happy you share my views on that instrumental too, I chuckled at the stretched duck. Be a great name for a wacky indie band from somewhere in Canada or Tadcaster.
I don’t think I’ve ever read a better description of Ritchie Blackmore’s resting Gordon Brown face as your PS
Thank you, I wonder if he ever actually raised a sweat on stage? or if he could wear the same clothes for the whole tour and make significant savings on laundry without being unhygienic. Win/Win, I say.
I went back and re-read what I wrote about this album and you stated that you had a Lego figure ready. I’m glad to finally see it.
Is that a Now Playing stand I see?
Also, I do see the D section of your collection and no Dio is visible.
I think we need to chat.
It is Bop, a recent edition. That’s because I keep my Dio collection in an iron-bound chest in a specially built (miniature) castle in my garden, its what he would have wanted.
I just assumed you started the Now Playing thing during your pre-teen years, and mere mortals were just now catching on.
Some time ago, while speaking at a conference, I decided to break the ice with a tale of 1537’s iron-bound chest. Let’s just say the thrown undergarments rained down upon me like a tsunami wave, and the throngs of previously civilized women rushing the stage caused the largest evacuation of a downtown area post 9/11.
Needless to say I am not welcome back in that conference centre, and may be banned from Vegas for life.
This one, SBTE and Bent Out of Shape are solid rock records. Turner had that voice built for the American market… Laughed at the ‘snorting of his own ego’. Yup that sums it up perfectly Joe!
Cheers Deke, I’ve never heard BOOS. This is a good LP, really good but it does miss some Dio muscle.
There’s a few tracks on this I don’t care much for, but the fun quotient (and enjoying winding people up) has led me to profess this as the best Rainbow album for many years. Although I maybe edge towards the later JLT albums now.
Actually I saw Bobby Rondinelli do a drum solo in a small club once and it was the single greatest live drumming I’ve ever witnessed. He’s awesome!
I just don’t know why I’d never seen the Bobmeister’s name before. I think it’s a mainstream media conspiracy.
Who was he that laying with? Or was it a solo drum tour for really hardcore Rondonelli fans?
It was called Rondofest. Just 4hrs of non-stop Rondorama, as us Rondheads like to call it.
The Ron and only.
I don’t know much about him really. I know he was in Rainbow and Sabbath for a bit. I think Eric Carr beat him to get the Kiss spot if I remember right. The band I saw him in was called The Lizards I think? Didn’t like them much but his drum solo was huuugggee. Pure attitude!
Mr Blackmore is a funny one, isn’t he? Part Nigel Tufnel, part Jeff Beck. Enjoyed reading this trawl through an LP I’ve seen in the bins plenty of times, but spent no more time with than it takes to appreciate Hipgnosis at their twisted best.
He’s a heavy dude, I’m not sure I’ve ever heard anyone ever say anything nice about him; his talent, yes; but him, never.
This era Rainbow had some great rock radio moments.
Discussed this a bit on Rock Daydream Nation when we tackled Bent Out of Shape!
I’ve never heard BOOS, in fact I don’t think I’ve ever seen a copy of it in the wild. Odd that.