He actually started off with an Irish band called Skid Row ─ not to be confused with the American band of the same name ─ and then he played with Thin Lizzy for several years. Then, somewhere during his solo career after leaving Thin Lizzy, he joined a prog-rock/jazz-rock band called Colosseum II, and from there he would then endeavor into hard rock and metal during the 1980s. He only really picked up the blues in the 1990s.