Graham Bonnet - Graham Bonnet / No Bad Habits (Expanded Deluxe Edition) (2016)

• Although Graham Bonnet is quite rightly best known for fronting the melodic hard rock of Rainbow, MSG and Alcatrazz, his career goes back to the 1960s, and his initial breakthrough as part of The Marbles in 1968. His style and tastes were originally geared more towards pop and R&B orientated music, recording a number of obscure, but now highly collectable 45s in the early 1970s, before releasing his eponymous titled debut in 1977 for Ring O’Records.

• Kicking off with Bob Dylan’s ‘It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue’, 1977’s “Graham Bonnet” certainly draws upon some classic songwriters, with Goffin and King’s ‘Will You Love Me Tomorrow?’, a track briefly resurrected by Rainbow at the 1980 Monsters of Rock, Al Green’s ‘Tired Of Being Alone’ and ‘Goodnight And Goodmorning’, originally from Hall & Oates’ “Whole Oats” LP.

• Produced by Pip Williams and engineered by John Eden, both of whom are probably best known for their work with Status Quo, “Graham Bonnet” is augmented by no less than seven bonus tracks, including ‘Heroes On My Picture Wall’, the B-Side of ‘It’s All over Now, Baby Blue’.

• Wasting no time at all, his debut was followed up in 1978 by “No Bad Habits”, again produced by Pip Williams. Featuring the singles ‘Can’t Complain’ and the Bee Gee’s ‘Warm Ride’, the bonus tracks include ‘10/12 Observation’, the B-Side of ‘Warm Ride’, as well as a “disco” version of the track ‘Warm Ride’.

• The following year, Graham would be enlisted to join Ritchie Blackmore, Roger Glover, Don Airey and Cozy Powell in Rainbow, and that band’s commercial breakthrough album, “Down To Earth”. “Graham Bonnet” and “No Bad Habits” remain fitting testimonials to this singular artist’s progress as a singer and musician.

• Graham will be the subject of his first authorised biography this summer.