The first two chapters of Graham Bonnet’s first authorized biography are now up on his site: http://www.grahambonnet.com/#!__authorised-book. The book is penned by Bonnet confidante Steve Wright. Thanks to Andy DiGelsomina for the news.

Graham Bonnet (born 23 December 1947) is an English rock vocalist and songwriter. He has recorded and performed as a solo artist and as a member of several hard rock and heavy metal bands including Rainbow, the Michael Schenker Group, Alcatrazz, and Impellitteri.

Graham Bonnet

GRAHAM BONNET

INTERVIEW AND PICTURES BY MARKO SYRJALA

Graham Bonnet is an English rock vocalist and songwriter who started his musician career already in the late 60’s with the band Marbles. Bonnet is best known about his brief career in Rainbow with whom he recorded classic album DOWN TO EARTH in 1979 and working with Michael Schenker Group on ASSAULT ATTACK in 1982. He has later on recorded and performed as a solo artist, leaded his own band Alcatrazz and worked on numerous projects including Moonstone Project, Anthem and Lyraka. Bonnet has been a regular visitor in Finland on the past ten years and this year made no exception here. I was able to catch with the man himself on late March in Helsinki and here are the results of our interesting discussion. Read on!

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BOB KULICK

INTERVIEW BY MARKO SYRJÄLÄ

ADDITIONAL QUESTIONS BY JOUKO VÄÄNÄNEN

Bob Kulick is an American guitarist and Grammy Award-winning record producer. If there was a “fifth member of KISS” award to be handed out, Bob would probably be the front-running recipient. Not only was he in the running to become the original lead guitarist for the band, but he has played as a session musician on ALIVE 2 and KISS KILLERS albums and Paul Stanley’s self-titled solo album. In the late 80’s he was a part of Stanley’s solo band. During the years, Kulick has appeared on several releases by Meat Loaf, as well as session work for Mark Farner, Diana Ross, Lou Reed and W.A.S.P. among others and has produced/played on countless heavy metal tribute albums. We had a pleasure to sit down with the man himself in November 2011 when he appeared as a special guest for his brother Bruce Kulick and John Corabi who did an acoustic performance at the KISS EXPO in Helsinki. The chat lasted almost two hours, so there’s  plenty of material to read, and for that reason this interview has been split in two pieces. Read On!

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BOB KULICK

INTERVIEW BY MARKO SYRJÄLÄ

ADDTIONAL QUESTIONS BY JOUKO VÄÄNÄNEN

Bob Kulick is an American guitarist and Grammy Award-winning record producer. If there was a “fifth member of KISS award to be handed out, Kulick would probably be the front-running recipient. Not only was he in the running to become the original lead guitarist for the band, but he has played as a session musician on ALIVE 2 and KISS KILLERS albums and Paul Stanley’s self-titled solo album. In the late 80’s he was a part of Stanley’s solo band.During the years, Kulick has appeared on several releases by Meat Loaf, as well as session work for Mark Farner, Diana Ross, Lou Reed and W.A.S.P. among others and has produced/played on countless heavy metal tribute albums. We had a pleasure to sit down with the man himself on last November when he appeared as a special guest for his brother Bruce Kulick and John Corabi who did an acoustic performance on KISS EXPO in Helsinki. The chat did last almost two hours, so there’s a plenty of material to read, and for that reason this interview has been split in two pieces. Read On!

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GREG SMITH

Current OVER THE RAINBOW/TED NUGENT bassist Greg Smith started his successful career in the early eighties when he first joined WENDY O’WILLIAMS’s recording and touring band. Later on he worked with such names as VINNIE MOORE, ALICE COOPER and JOE LYNN TURNER before he was asked to join to the very last incarnation of Ritchie Blackmore’s RAINBOW in 1994. Greg recorded RAINBOW’s last studio album STRANGER IN US ALL in 1995 with Ritchie, vocalist Doogie White, drummer John O’Reilly and keyboardist Paul Morris but after a couple of years the band disbanded. Later on Greg worked with BLUE OYSTER CULT, re-joined ALICE COOPER’s band before he decided to do something different, a Broadway musical called “Movin’ Out”. Next it was TED NUGENT who asked Greg to join his band and in addition to that Greg has lately been doing shows with DOKKEN, JOE LYNN TURNER and now with OVER THE RAINBOW.  OVER THE RAINBOW is a brand new band, formed by a group of former RAINBOW members:  Joe Lynn Turner, Tony Carey, Bobby Rondinelli, Greg and Richie Blackmore’s son Jurgen Blackmore on guitar.  OVER THE RAINBOW was playing at Swedenrock last June and then Greg was kind enough to give us the latest news as well as some other interesting stories about his past and future. Read on !! 

 INTERVIEW AND PICTURES BY MARKO SYRJÄLÄ

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Graham Bonnet

GRAHAM BONNET

INTERVIEW AND PICTURES BY MARKO SYRJALA

Transcription by Andy Osborn

Graham Bonnet was originally born in 1947 in England and he got his first touch of success in the music business in the late 60′s with his band Marbles. Graham released his first, self titled, solo album in 1977 which did quite well especially in Australia. After several solo albums, which included mostly cover songs, Graham was surprisingly chosen to replace Ronnie James Dio in Rainbow in 1980. The album DOWN TO EARTH was released later on the same year and it included massive hits “Since You’ve Been Gone” and “All Night Long”. Unfortunately Graham’s career in Rainbow didn’t last too long and he was soon replaced by Joe Lynn Turner. Graham released another solo album LINE UP in 1981 and it included another hit ‘Night Games’ which went into number 6# in UK charts. Graham replaced Gary Barden in MSG in 1982 and the band released the album ASSAULT ATTACK later in the same year. The album did pretty well but once again Graham’s career didn’t last too in this band either. He was fired after his disastrous performance in Sheffield in November 1982. Next Graham decided to form his own band which was called Alcatrazz. The original version of Alcatrazz included Graham, Jimmy Waldo, Gary Shea, Jan Avena and a young rising guitar hero named Yngwie Malmsteen. After two albums Yngwie was fired and he was then replaced by another future star Steve Vai who soon after decided to join David Lee Roth’s solo band. Alcatrazz was slowly disbanded in 1986 after four albums. Since then Graham has worked with such bands and names as; Blackthorne, Impellitteri, Forcefield, Anthem, Taz Taylor and Electric Zoo among others but he has also released a couple of solo albums, the latest being THE DAY I WENT MAD came out in 2001. Over the past few years Graham has done a lot of session work, worked with some of the bands mentioned above and been on tour both as a solo artist and as a band member. Graham did a brief co -headline tour in Finland with his old Rainbow colleague Joe Lynn Turner last August. It was then that I had a chance to sit down with Graham and get the latest news as well as some facts from the past from the man himself. Enjoy!

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Rock To The River Festival
Imatra, Finland
12 & 13 August 2006

Review and photos by Brat

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