The Skegness screecher has had a more colourful career than most realise, and across two CDs and a DVD of videos this collection proves it. It opens with The Marbles’ 1968 Bee Gees-penned top-five ballad Only One Woman, but Bonnet told reporters it was “a bit boring”, upsetting Barry Gibb, and The Marbles were lost. He did some acting, sang jingles, had an Australian hit with Dylan’s It’s All Over Now, Baby Blue. Implausibly, he fell back into the Gibbs’ good books and was handed Warm Ride, a disco outtake from Saturday Night Fever and another Aussie smash.
Offered the choice of replacing Brian Connolly in The Sweet or Dio in Rainbow, he went with Ritchie Blackmore, enjoying his golden moments on Since You Been Gone and All Night Long, headlining Donington. He restlessly moved on via limp solo hit Night Games, before joining Michael Schenker Group… for one gig, where he drunkenly exposed himself. He escaped into Alcatrazz, with Yngwie Malmsteen and later Steve Vai, and on to various hard rock projects, remaining big in Japan. Most rungs on this raucous roller-coaster are represented here, though the live or recent versions of those big Rainbow bangers are not the ones you’d choose.
