Empty Rooms

This is a song with which everyone who has ever had a broken romance will identify. Although he could shred with the best of them, "Empty Rooms" is basically a slow bluesy type track, and is widely regarded as Moore's greatest guitar solo. It was co-written in 1984 with keyboard player/guitarist Neil Carter, who said the vocal track was originally laid down by Glenn Hughes - one-time bass player with Deep Purple - but this "obviously never made it out of the studio". Of the track itself, Carter said "I always joke that song has bought my house, but I suppose it probably has over the years!"

"Empty Rooms" was released as a single in both 7-inch and 12-inch formats, although the radio edit really doesn't do it justice. Gary Moore died suddenly in Spain on February 6, 2011 aged only 58, leaving more than a mere room empty, but also leaving us many fine live recordings of this rock classic.

In Happy Together, an interview with Gary Moore and Phil Lynott by Derek Oliver published in a May 1985 issue of Kerrang!, Moore said of this song, it is "very personal. It wasn't written because I felt sorry for myself, it was something I went through at one time - something that everyone goes through at one stage or another."