Neil Murray

Philip Neil Murray (born 27 August 1950) is a Scottish musician, best known as the former bassist of Whitesnake, Brian May band, Black Sabbath and Gary Moore.

His musical tastes were heavily influenced by the mid-1960s 'blues boom' bands and musicians, especially Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton and Jack Bruce, and later by Motown legend James Jamerson and Tim Bogert of Vanilla Fudge, Cactus and Beck, Bogert & Appice.

Murray moved to bass shortly before studying graphic design at the London College of Printing.

Originally a drummer who started playing bass in 1967, Murray formed his first band with school friends in 1967 (Slap Happy and the Dum-Dums).

During 1973, Neil briefly played in Gilgamesh, a jazz-fusion band led by Alan Gowen.

After his departure from Gilgamesh, Murray toured the US with Junior Hanson, following a recommendation from Jeff Beck's bass player Clive Chaman.

Hanson later became a member of Bob Marley & the Wailers under the name Junior Marvin.

Neil spent early 1974 supporting the album he recorded with them, Magic Dragon.

Murray's next gig came again through a recommendation from Clive Chaman, touring with Cozy Powell's Hammer in 1974 and 1975.

The line-up included keyboardist Don Airey and guitarist Bernie Marsden.

After Cozy Powell decided to fold Hammer, Murray and Airey joined a revamped version of the British progressive jazz-rock band Colosseum II.

The band's leader, drummer Jon Hiseman, had evolved the band's sound in preference for a rockier sound courtesy of Gary Moore's guitar.

After playing with Bernie Marsden in Cozy Powell's Hammer, Murray had played on a couple of tracks on Babe Ruth's 1975 album Stealing Home, prior to Marsden joining two members of Deep Purple in Paice Ashton Lord.

This line-up of Colosseum II lasted for the first 1976 album Strange New Flesh (a title suggested by Murray, being a snippet of the lyric from their cover of Joni Mitchell's Down To You).

Strange New Flesh was a little less intellectual than most of the jazz rock coming out of the UK.

It did not have the blackness of bands like Weather Report, but offered more accessible melodies and rock power than the more "intellectual" Canterbury fusion scene presented at the time.

Following months of touring Europe and the UK, Murray and vocalist Mike Starrs were fired, due to pressure from the record label Bronze Records, who soon after dropped Colosseum II altogether.

After Colosseum II, in 1976 Neil teamed up again with ex-Gilgamesh keyboardist Alan Gowen in National Health with whom he recorded a self-titled album in 1977.

Prior to recording that album, the band played with drummer Bill Bruford of Yes/King Crimson fame, who was followed by ex-Hatfield & the North drummer Pip Pyle.

In late 1977, ex-Deep Purple singer David Coverdale was auditioning drummers for his new band Whitesnake, which featured guitarists Micky Moody and Bernie Marsden.

Marsden invited Murray to help out with the process which led to him landing the gig together with drummer Dave Dowle.

Murray got the chance to work with Bruford again, playing on the rehearsals for Bruford's 1978 Feels Good to Me debut solo album, standing in for Jeff Berlin who was the actual bassist with the band (the LP cover read 'Thanks to Neil Murray: A bass player when I needed one').

Murray also deputised for Berlin on Bruford's Old Grey Whistle Test appearance in 1978.

During this performance he sports a long sleeve T-shirt saying 'More Bass', predating Saturday Night Live's "More Cowbell" by more than 20 years.

National Health's complex music and the lack of commercial success prompted Murray to investigate other musical avenues planted in the world of bands like Cream, Jeff Beck or John Mayall & the Bluesbreakers.

Deep Purple's Jon Lord joined in the summer of 1978 and, after recording Lovehunter in 1979, Dowle was replaced by Ian Paice (ex-Deep Purple).

From 1978 until late 1986, Murray helped make Whitesnake one of the most popular bands in Europe and Japan, and later America.

He recorded with Whitesnake ten albums: Live at Hammersmith (1978), Snakebite (1978), Trouble (1978), Love Hunter (1979), Ready an' Willing (1980), Live...In the Heart of the City (1980), Come an' Get It (1981), Saints & Sinners (1982), Slide It In (1984), and Whitesnake / 1987 (1987).

Murray's melodic basslines, influenced by Jack Bruce, Andy Fraser and even Jaco Pastorius, stand out from the rock bass-playing of the time.

He did numerous tours in the UK, Europe, Japan and played at Reading Festival in 1979 and 1980 and the Monsters of Rock festival at Castle Donington, England in 1981.

However, tours of the US opening for Jethro Tull in 1980 and Judas Priest in 1981 were not enough to match the band's success elsewhere.

In early 1982, after tense Saints & Sinners recording sessions, Coverdale decided on a complete shake-up of the band, management, publishing, and recording contracts.

There was a period of uncertainty as to who would be in the 'new' Whitesnake, though Cozy Powell was definitely coming in to replace Ian Paice.

Around this time, Paice and Murray had recorded Gary Moore's 1982 Corridors of Power album, and Paice had decided to join Moore.

Murray followed suit, and was replaced by Colin Hodgkinson.

Coverdale reshuffled the band as Bernie Marsden departed, replaced by Mel Galley, but Micky Moody and Jon Lord returned to the fold after initial uncertainty.

Soon after his departure, Murray briefly formed an outfit called Badlands (not to be confused with the American band featuring Jake E. Lee) behind Uriah Heep's John Sloman on vocals and future Thin Lizzy's John Sykes on guitars.

The band recorded some demos, played London's Marquee Club and shopped for a record deal, to no avail.

The band's music was hard rock and fitted the gap between a melodic band like Thin Lizzy, a blues influenced outfit like Whitesnake and a more straight-ahead AC/DC.

In 1982, Neil Murray and Ian Paice both joined Gary Moore for a very successful two years.