History & Biography Mr. Joseph Arthur Mark Linquito was born on the second of August of 1951 in Hackensack, central New Jersey, USA. He was musically gifted and began learning the accordion and then guitar. He has stated that seeing Grand Funk Railroad at Madison Square Garden in New York City provided the impetus to become a singer. His high school band featured ‘Joe’ on both the mike and guitars. The band prophetically performed covers of Deep Purple songs.
After a successful period in the band Fandango the rechristened Joe Lynn Turner joined Rainbow in 1981 as a replacement for Graham Bonnett. Coincidentally, years later Joe Lynn Turner’s band would tour with Alcatrazz, the band of his predecessor in Rainbow, Graham Bonnet. Years later Turner and Bonnet would also tour jointly in Europe. He recorded Difficult To Cure, Straight Between The Eyes and Bent Out Of Shape albums with Ritchie Blackmore and Rainbow and is credited with giving the band much commercial acceptance. With Blackmore disbanding Rainbow and regrouping with Deep Purple the singer would begin his solo career, which has since included many detours through Yngwie Malmsteen, Brazen Abbot and even Deep Purple’s disdained Slaves And Masters album of 1990. He was also considered for the vacant Foreigner vocalist slot after his departure from Rainbow. Turner can also be heard on an Icarus Witch album, A Mr. Big album, Riot’s The Privilege Of Power album on the song Killer, worked with Lee Aaron as well as Eddie Ojeda’s Axes 2 Axes album. The new Blackmore/Turner collaboration lasted only album. A series of solo album followed. Under Cover and Under Cover 2 are cover albums full of songs originally performed by the likes of UFO, The Beatles and Jimi Hendrix. Live In Germany’s song list features mostly Rainbow songs.
In recent years Turner has sometimes been involved with Classic Rock Cares, a project to help underprivileged children. Turner joined Over The Rainbow in 2008, a Rainbow covers band featuring former Rainbow Personnel keyboardist Tony Carey, drummer Bobby Rondinelli and drummer Greg Smith. Interestingly, the band featured the younger Blackmore, Jürgen Blackmore on guitar. Alcatrazz with Graham Bonnet, Joe Lynn Turner and Doogie White were touring Japan in September of 2010 as Voices Of Rainbow. The former Rainbow singers’ bands would perform in Tokyo, Nagoya and Osaka.
Joe Lynn Turner visited Mayor Mustafa Akaydin of Antalya Turkey in August of 2010 to solicit support for an international music festival he plans to organize in the city. He reportedly received a positive response. Frontiers also signed Rated X (formerly Legacy X) in 2014. In 2016, Cleopatra Records was issuing a vintage and unreleased live set by former Rainbow singer entitled Street Of Dreams - Boston 1985. It was recorded when Turner was touring in support of his debut solo album Rescue You and featured several Rainbow songs. Turner’s work towards being a member of a reformed Rainbow was repulsed by guitarist Ritchie Blackmore as the band reformed without any other previous members. Joe Lynn Turner’s The Sessions will be released on October 7th through Deadline Music. The album contains Cover versions like AC/DC's Back In Black, The Doors' Riders On The Storm to Queen's Fat Bottomed Girls. Several guests were Michael Schenker, Phil Collen and Brad Gillis (Night Ranger). Joe Lynn Turner canceled planned tour dates following a heart attack in April 2018. He was taken to a hospital in Belarus. The man’s Sunstorm project released its The Road To Hell album through Frontiers in June.
Mascot issued Joe Lynn Turner’s Belly Of The Beast album on October 28th 2022. Peter Tägtgren (Hypocrisy) produced. The two men met during a private performance at the birthday party of Turner’s brother. Turner dropped his wig for his publicity photographs for the first time. He had suffered from alopecia areata, which was a type of hair loss, since his teenage years. The singer joined the Prague Philharmonic Orchestra at the Vienna State Opera in Vienna, Austria in August for an event called Rock The Opera. The singer performed live without his wig at Rock Orchestra Fest in Minsk, Belarus on June 8th 2023. After admitting to wearing a wig over the years due to alopecia in 2022, this was the first time Turner appeared naturally. The man also performed in Russia in 2023. The singer used Bulgarian act Axat for a six-date tour of the country using the Rock & Roll Forever monicker in 2023. The man performed songs by Deep Purple and Rainbow. Joe Lynn Turner was part of the The Rock Legends 2025 tour.
Reviews JOE LYNN TURNER - LIVE IN GERMANY - FRONTIERS/BLISTERING 
What can one say about Joe Lynn Turner who has fronted Rainbow, Deep Purple and Yngwie Malmsteen with his trademark shoulder-length do and sunglasses without coming across as repetitious? Turner has gone back to the well many times before with his cover version albums and various other projects. Live In Germany is more legitimate given how the songs are mostly ones he had been involved with originally. With the bulk of the album focused on Rainbow (Death Alley Driver, I Surrender, Power, etc.) Turner throws in a couple of his own songs and then strangely covers Deep Purple’s Burn to perfection to close the set. Burn is a barnstormer and the singer mimics Coverdale and Hughes perfectly. The rest of the songs are hallowed hard rock territory, which is why the dominance of keyboards over the guitar is slightly harrowing. Hearing the guitar performance on Blood Red Sky, for example, makes one wonder why the guitars were not given the predominance that Ritchie Blackmore’s songs deserve. Still, this is Turner and crew and no song is denigrated. In fact, the wailer is still in top form and barely anyone could have performed these 30-year old tunes this well even today. - Sheila Wes Det
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