u/AvailableBet8485

Don Airey worked with Whitesnake as a session guy in the late 80s to provide keyboards on the 1987 album and Slip Of The Tongue.

He was also a member of The Company Of Snakes (as well as that band's previous incarnation The Snakes), which was a project founded by Bernie Marsden and Micky Moody to celebrate the early Bluesy Hard Rock days of that band. The Company Of Snakes version of the band also featured Neil Murray on bass. He can be heard on the live album Live In Europe from 1999 (released as The Snakes) and the studio album Here They Go Again from 2001.

He has been a member of Deep Purple since 2002, replacing Jon Lord. Beside Purple, he also has a solo band with which he records music and tours. They play a mix of his solo material and songs from all the bands and projects he has been involved with over the decades.

He got his start in the Cozy Powell project Hammer. He then would join Powell in the Progressive Rock band Colosseum II before finally joining Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow in 1979, recording the albums Down To Earth and Difficult To Cure before leaving the band in 1981.

After that, he mostly worked as a session guy and live musician. In that position, he played on Black Sabbath's Never Say Die, Gary Moore's first three solo albums (Back on the Streets, Corridors Of Power and Dirty Fingers) and then rejoined him for several more albums later (Run For Cover, After The War and Still Got The Blues), Ozzy Osbourne's Blizzard Of Ozz and Bark At The Moon (he was also credited on the album Diary Of A Madman but didn't actually play on it just like Tommy Aldridge and Rudy Sarzo), Michael Schenker Group's The Michael Schenker Grouo, Judas Priest's Pain Killer, UFOs High Stakes & Dangerous Men and also a bunch of Cozy Powell solo albums in between these.

Before playing for Dio, Simon was a member of AC/DC from 1983 to 1989. He was replacing Phil Rudd who was having severe alcohol and drug problems as a result of not being able to cope with the death of his friend Bon Scott which led his relationship with Malcolm Young deteriorate to the point where they both got into physical altercations. He can be hear on the albums Fly On The Wall, Blow Up Your Video as well as the new compositions on the compilation Who Made Who which served as the soundtrack album to the Stephen King movie Maximum Overdrive.

In between his stints with Dio and after Dio passed away, he worked with bands and artists such as UFO, Rhino Bucket, John Norum, Tim "The Ripper" Owens, Geoff Tate's short-lived version of Queensryche as well as Geoff Tate's Operation: Mindcrime project.

Tracklist:

1. Feeding The Beast
2. Welcome To Life
3. Don't Care
4. Wait And See
5. Born With A Hammer
6. I.D.G.A.F.
7. End Of The Road
8. Triple Trouble
9. Invaders
10. Wonderland

Line-Up:

• Kai Hansen: Vocals, Guitars
• Eike Freese (Dark Age): Guitars
• Tim Hansen (Induction): Guitars
• Alexander Dietz (Heaven Shall Burn): Bass (article states he plays guitar, but he played bass on the Hansen & Friends album. So I presume that this is a mistake on Blabbermouth's part.)
• Dan Wilding (Carcass): Drums

https://blabbermouth.net/news/helloweens-kai-hansen-announces-new-solo-album-born-with-a-hammer?brid=YWdncwHZO7sKg0G7LlDUzcVU8QS1

It might also be their last one from the sound of it?

Edit: Update regarding the Edguy concert.

From the website of the ticketing company Eventim: "Das Konzert ist Teil einer letzten Serie von Shows und markiert den Beginn des letzten Kapitels einer der außergewöhnlichsten deutschen Metal-Geschichten der vergangenen drei Jahrzehnte."

Translation: "The concert is part of a last series of shows and marks the beginning of the last chapter of one of the most extraordinary German Metal stories of the last 3 decades". So it will be a series of gigs.

Craig Gruber was asked to join Elf as a bassist after the release of their debut album in 1973. He became on of the founding members of Rainbow and played on their debut album but was quickly dismissed alongside the other Rainbow instrumentalists as Ritchie Blackmore was unhappy with his funky bass playing.

Blackmore tried Gruber out again in 1977 after Jimmy Bain was thrown out of the band but he still didn't like Craig's playing style so he wasn't asked to rejoin the band.

After leaving Rainbow, he worked as a session guy at the Record Plant in Los Angeles.

When Dio left Rainbow and joined Sabbath, he brought in Gruber as a session guy after Geezer Butler temporarily left the band to deal with the divorce from his first wife. Gruber co-wrote the song Die Young (although he is uncredited on the album) and recorded all the bass parts. But once Geezer returned to the band, Grubers parts were scrapped and re-recorded and Gruber was let go.

After his short stint with Sabbath, he founded the band Bible Black alongside his former Elf/Rainbow bandmate Gary Driscoll and former musical singer Jeff Fenholt. According to Wikipedia, they independently recorded two albums in the early 80s. But I can't find those for the life of me. All that appears to be available of their material nowadays are 2 compilation albums. During that time, he was also a short-lived member of The Rods, the band founded by former Elf guitarist and Ronnie's cousin David Feinstein.

He then wound up in Gary Moore's live band in 1984 during the tour in support of the album "Victims Of The Future". He can be heard on the live album "We Want Moore!". He also wrote the song Blinder which was used for a single. He left Moore's band as he was dissatisfied with his sideman status. After that, he re-joined The Rods and played bass on their 1986 album "Heavier Than Thou". He left the band and the music industry in 1987.

He resurfaced in the early 2010s with a band named ED3N which also featured his former Bible Black bandmate Jeff Fenholt and former Manowar guitarist David Shankle. They never released any music and Craig passed away on May 5th 2015 at the age of 63.

Steve Vai took started taking guitar lessons from Joe Satriani in 1973 when he was in high school and played in many local bands. After graduating, he attended Berklee College of Music in Boston. While at Barklee, he started working for Frank Zappa as transcriptionist. And in the middle of his fourth semester, he moved to California to work full-time for Zappa as a session and live guitarist.

He moved on from Zappa in 1983 and recorded his first solo album "Flex-Able" throughout 1983. The album arrived in record shops in January of 1984. In June of that year, he joined Alcatrazz to replace fellow guitar virtuoso Yngwie Malmsteen who left after a physical alteration with frontman Graham Bonnet which Malmsteen claims started after Bonnet tempered with Malmsteen's amp during a guitar solo.

They recorded the album "Disturbing The Piece" which was released in February of 1985 and featured the lead single "God Blessed Video" which would later be featured in the soundtrack of GTA Vice City. He quit that band in 1986 to join David Lee Roth's solo band. He played on the albums "Eat 'Em and Smile" in 1986 and "Skyscraper" in 1988 and departed Roth's band in 1989 to focus on his solo career.

Vai first caught David Coverdale's attention when he appeared in the movie Crossroads in 1986 as guitarist Jack Butler who soled his soul to the devil in return for his superb guitar skills. Coverdale was unfamiliar with any of his other work and asked him to join Whitesnake just based on his performance in the movie. Coverdale needed a guitar player to record Whitesnake's upcoming album "Slip Of The Tongue" after Adrian Vandenberg got sidelined by a wrist injury.

He recorded his part for the album in the same home studio in which he was working on his next studio album "Passion And Warfare" and joined Whitesnake under the condition that he gets to perform some of the songs from the album on tour with the band to promote the solo album.

Slip Of The Tongue was released in early November of 1989 and despite selling well and getting certified Platinum by the RIAA in early January of 1990, it performed below expectations compared to the previous record which would go on to be certified Platinum 8 times. Behind the scenes there was a lot of turmoil and conflicts between Coverdale and the record label as well as Coverdales relationship with Tawny Kitaen falling apart. During that tome, Coverdale also became disillusioned with fame and the rock star life.

After a massive world tour in support of the album that started in February of 1990 and ended in late November of the same year with a show at the Nippon Budokan in Tokyo, Coverdale decided to disband the band and take a break. Vai would go on to focus on his solo career.