The former Rainbow singer Ronnie Romero recently appeared on The Metal Voice podcast and talked about the best aspect of being in Ritchie Blackmore’s inner circle. He explained the differences by saying:
“It is a huge difference. And that, for me, was probably the most enjoyable thing of working with Ritchie. Because in the end, you are on the stage and you play songs, and you are in the ‘Rainbow band’ and all this stuff, and that’s great. And there were another 7-8 singers who did the same thing before – counting the Rainbow singers, Deep Purple, and all this stuff. There were a lot of singers working with him.”
Ronnie also gave insight into what they did after shows where he got the see the non-performative side of Blackmore. He added:
“To be with him having a beer after dinner and talking about UFOs or whatever that was the topic that night — until 3:00 in the morning. And sometimes, he’s taking the guitar, and we’re just singing whatever — from The Beatles, Queen, Deep Purple, Rainbow, whatever it comes to that moment. And that was probably the most enjoyable thing. It is great.”
The singer also compared Ritchie’s ‘public’ character to the one he knew behind closed doors. Ronnie continued:
“Obviously, all of this ‘character’ that people know from Ritchie – like he’s a tough guy and he’s a difficult person and all that stuff – is how you see him outside the circle. And in my opinion, there’s a character, and he behaved that way to keep the people away. Which is very understandable in the way that there is a lot of people trying to get in the circle. So, it’s totally understandable. But when you are ‘in,’ he is a very nice guy, is very loyal, is very cool. He treats you really well.”
You can watch Ronnie Romero’s interview with The Metal Voice below.
