Fires At Midnight Arkansas

Fires At Midnight

Blackmore's Night

SPV / Steamhammer Records, 2001

REVIEW BY: Duke Egbert

ORIGINALLY PUBLISHED: 09/06/2001

I admit, this is not what I expected from Ritchie Blackmore.

Blackmore, the former front man of Deep Purple and Rainbow, hashad a career stretching over thirty years. He was the musical voicebehind rock classics "Smoke On The Water" and "Hush", has workedwith hard rock icons like Ronnie James Dio, David Coverdale, andIan Gillan, and is in many ways the Kevin Bacon of rock and roll.(Everybody's six degrees or less from Blackmore, I swear.)

So what in the name of Richard Wagner's ghost is he doingplaying Germanic-tinged renaissance music combined with almostprogressive rock? Has the world turned upside down? Has RitchieBlackmore mellowed out? Hey, when the music is this amusing, whothe hell cares?

Blackmore calls Blackmore's Night the most satisfying thing he'sever done, and I have to admit one thing; it sure sounds like he'shaving fun on their latest release, Fires At Midnight. Blackmore's Night is a romp across thecenturies, a madrigal-and-mosh-pit-melange that despite the oddnessof the concept really works. (When I first looked at this CD, Isaid it would either really suck or be really, really fun. I'mpleased it was the latter.)