Skid Row persevered, however, eventually opening a show for Moore's heroes Peter Green and Fleetwood Mac, and made such an impression on the veteran group that Green personally requested their manager help secure Skid Row a recording contract with CBS (in addition, Green sold Moore one of his most-used guitars, a maple 1959 Gibson Les Paul Standard, which would become Moore's primary instrument). After relocating to Dublin later in the decade, Moore joined a local rock group called Skid Row, which featured a young singer by the name of Phil Lynott, who would soon leave the group to double up on bass and form Thin Lizzy. His output in the 21st century was surprisingly prodigious and included blues-heavy outings like 2001's Back to the Blues, 2007's Close as You Get, and 2008's Bad for You Baby, his last studio outing prior to his unexpected death in early 2011.īorn on April 4, 1952, in Belfast, Moore became interested in guitar during the '60s upon discovering such blues-rock masters as Eric Clapton, Jimi Hendrix, and perhaps his biggest influence of all, Fleetwood Mac's Peter Green. Taking influence from early heroes like Peter Green (Moore's primary guitar was sold to him by Green) and Eric Clapton, it became his most successful solo release, and although he continued to experiment with other genres, Moore remained largely in blues mode for the duration of his career. Tiring of the commercial demands of hard rock, he reconnected with his blues roots on the 1990 standout Still Got the Blues. Moore's success never translated to the U.S., though he earned a significant fan base, particularly in Europe. As a solo artist, he scored a surprise hit with 1978's bluesy 'Parisienne Walkways' before transitioning into heavy metal and hard rock throughout the '80s. A native of Belfast, Moore came up in the same Northern Irish scene as Phil Lynott and he served as Thin Lizzy's guitarist several times during the band's original run in the 1970s and early '80s. One of rock's more underrated guitarists, Gary Moore's eclectic career traversed blues, heavy metal, progressive rock, and jazz fusion and, in addition to finding success as a solo act, he was associated with numerous different bands, most notably Thin Lizzy.

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