Craig Gruber, the original bass player for Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow, has died from prostate cancer at age 64.
Gruber’s first band was Elf, featuring lead singer Ronnie James Dio. He recorded three albums with Elf before joining the newly departed Deep Purple guitarist Blackmore’s Rainbow, also featuring Dio.
After the release of the first Rainbow album, Blackmore fired everyone except Dio. Gruber formed Bible Black with Elf and Rainbow drummer Gary Driscoll but the band disbanded when Driscoll was murdered.
Craig then joined Gary Moore and played on the ‘We Want Moore’ album.
Recently Gruber had been planned an Elf reunion despite the deaths of Dio and Driscoll. In some bizarre way, that original Elf line-up has now reunited.
——————————————————————————————————————————————
Never miss a story! Get your free Noise11.com daily music news email alert. Subscribe to the Noise11 Music Newsletter here
Listen to the Noise11 Music News channel now at iHeartRadio
Follow Noise11.com on Facebook and Twitter
