Rainbow – Straight Between the Eyes: The Album That Deserved More?

Rainbow – Straight Between the Eyes: The Album That Deserved More? In this deep-dive discussion, we take a closer look at Rainbow’s 1982 album Straight Between the Eyes — a record that found the band pushing hard toward the American market while navigating a rapidly changing musical landscape. Ritchie Blackmore was determined to break Rainbow in the U.S., and the band committed heavily to that goal. Rather than simply sticking to the major concert markets, Rainbow toured extensively across America, even traveling by bus to reach smaller cities and venues. The strategy was all about building the band’s audience one market at a time. For vocalist Joe Lynn Turner, Straight Between the Eyes was his favorite Rainbow record. Yet there's an intriguing twist to the story: when Rainbow reunited years later, Blackmore didn't perform any songs from the album — including “Stone Cold,” which became Rainbow's biggest-charting U.S. hit. So what happened? Was Straight Between the Eyes simply caught in the wrong place at the wrong time? Did the emergence of MTV and the changing relationship between rock music and television alter the album's potential? Or were shifting musical trends in the early 1980s beginning to leave Rainbow's particular brand of melodic hard rock behind? And perhaps most importantly: was Straight Between the Eyes actually a victim of its era — or is its reputation as an overlooked Rainbow classic the result of history looking back differently than the marketplace did in 1982? We'll dig into the album, the songs, the band's American ambitions, the tour, Joe Lynn Turner's perspective, “Stone Cold,” MTV, the changing musical climate of the early '80s, and why Ritchie Blackmore ultimately left this chapter of Rainbow's history largely untouched during the reunion years. 🎸 Was Straight Between the Eyes Rainbow's missed opportunity? Let us know your thoughts in the comments! #Rainbow #RitchieBlackmore #JoeLynnTurner #StraightBetweenTheEyes #StoneCold #ClassicRock #HardRock #80sRock #DeepDive #RockHistory