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An essential metal DVD for every Rainbow maniac! This is the legendary show recorded live at Budokan, Tokyo (Japan) on March 14, 1984. It would be the last Rainbow concert featuring Joe Lynn Turner, Judas Priest and Rory Gallagher producer Roger Glover on bass, drummer Chuck Bürgi and the virtuoso keyboardist David Rosenthal on its line up. After that, as we all know, Blackmore and Glover returned to Deep Purple, but that’s another story…

The performance is amazing, in my opinion the best along with the Munich ’77 and the Monsters Of Rock ’80 (Donnington) shows. In this DVD you have the chance to enjoy live versions of the sometimes forgot classics “Fool For The Night”, “Stranded” and “Fire Dance”, form the underrated metal masterpiece “Bent Out Of Shape”. It would have been great that the set list also had included “Drinking With The Devil”, but unfortunately it didn’t. There are a lot of jams, improvisations and awesome solos. I specially highlight Bürgi and Rosenthal ones, which demonstrate that they’re as good players as Powell and Airey, respectively. The killer “Death Alley Driver”, “Spotlight Kid” and the legendary and epic version of “Difficult To Cure”, featuring an orchestra, sound better than the studio ones, showing the band’s virtuosity on stage. And about the “Man in Black”, what can I say?, an incredible performance filled with passion, charisma and speed, like always!

They’re only two bad points about this DVD. First of all, the sound quality. It’s not as brilliant as it should be, I mean the mix affects the final result a bit, unfortunately. In my opinion, Ritchie’s guitar should sound louder. Second, “Smoke On The Water” is cut, and that’s awful for an all time metal classic! You can’t even know if the song has really finished, because they put the credits at once.

But anyway, an excellent metal DVD. There are at least two versions of it. I own the 2008 Woodstock Tapes (a video corporation from Albany) edition, packaged in a “Super Jewel Box”, like Annihilator’s “Ten Years In Hell”. And I’ve to say I wasn’t disappointed at all, just the opposite! So I definitively recommend it!

1.Spotlight Kid
2.Miss Mistreated
3.I Surrender
4.Can't Happen Here
5.Catch The Rainbow
6.Power / Keyboard Solo
7.Street Of Dreams
8.Fool For The Night
9.Difficult To Cure
10.Guitar Improvisation
11.Drum Solo / Blues
12.Stranded
13.Death Alley Driver
14.Fire Dance
15.Maybe Next Time
16.All Night Long
17.Lazy
18.Since You've Been Gone
19.Smoke On The Water