02. Dio Holy Diver (Vertigo)
Heavy Metal
Shiny diamonds, shining like the eyes of a cat.
The Lowdown
After their less than amicable departure from Black Sabbath due to differences over the recording of the live Black Sabbath album
Live Evil. Vocalist Ronnie James Dio and drummer Vinnie Appice decided to put together their own band under the auspicious name of Dio, which certainly made sense given the huge popularity of Ronnie James Dio after his albums with both Rainbow and Black Sabbath, which had very much put him at the pinnacle of the metal world. Now in this review I’ll be referring to Dio as Ronnie James, as Dio here is actually the name of the band and not the vocalist that we all call him by. Similar confusion often took place with Alice Cooper’s early albums, where Alice Cooper was actually the name of the band and not the name of Vincent Furnier, but of course Alice Cooper soon became the name of just Vincent Furnier himself and everybody calls Ronnie James just Dio. The new Dio band would be complete with the recruiting of ex-Rainbow Jimmy Bain on bass and a little known Irish NWOBHM guitarist Vivian Campbell from Sweet Savage who completed the line-up. Now this must’ve seemed like a dream for a little known guitarist like Vivian Campbell who found himself in a band at world level, with three musicians that had featured in two of the biggest bands in the world, but on just one listen to this album you can see why he was chosen as he plays like a talented veteran. The album cover is one of my favourites from this time, which depicts the Devil with a whipchain in his hand whipping a priest to death in a swirling maelstrom with jagged mountains in the background. The album cover was extremely contemporary at this time, as thanks to home video in the early 1980s there were countless films available which had priests like this battling the powers of evil, just think the Omen and the Exorcist sequels amongst many others around this time.
Holy Diver opens much like the two previous Black Sabbath albums in a frenetic style on “Stand Up and Shout” then we go into the first of the album’s masterful tracks with “Holy Diver” with its then very contemporary ambient intro and the song moves along at a stellar pace, and it’s a pure mastercraft lesson in power singing, and in that area few could match Dio. A lot of the album is gelled together by the melodic hard rock riffery of songs like “Gypsy” and the wonderful “Caught in the Middle“ a real favourite of mine. The second masterful track is “Don’t Talk to Strangers” a fascinating combination between beauty and brawn, something a lot of bands do, but here Dio do it to the first degree. “Straight Through the Heart” is pure meat and drink material from the band and the album's lesser track might just be the more workmanlike "Invisible". The third masterful track here is the single "Rainbow in the Dark" and I'll admit my opinion here is down to the basic but hugely effective keyboard patches by Ronnie James himself. Album closer is "Shame on the Night" with its howling wolf intro it's the expected power album closer here by the band. Ronnie James conjures himself across the album's wonderful nine tracks and guitarist Vivian Campbell is equally there across these songs as well.
Holy Diver was not just a commercial giant of the metal world at this time, but is now recognized as an almost mythical metal album many years later and ranks as possibly the cream of Ronnie James’ illustrious career. I’d certainly rank it in his best three albums along with Black Sabbath’s
Mob Rules and Rainbow’s
Long Live Rock ‘n’ Roll, even though others out there would probably put Black Sabbath’s
Heaven and Hell and Rainbow’s
Rising above the two I’ve chosen as they’re even better known albums. Despite the brilliance of
Holy Diver, things would gradually go downhill for Ronnie James and Dio after this album, as they were never capable of reaching these brilliant heights again. Sure there are still good Dio albums that will feature on my lists here, but most of his later work would often find him trying to replicate
Holy Diver and failing to take on new musical concepts in a very fast changing metal world of the 1980s and 1990s. Overall
Holy Diver is one of the very best albums I’ve reviewed on here and my personal favourite of the year, even though the album in number one spot is there from a technical standpoint of excellence rather than being a real favourite. Finally in Spanish Dios means God and Dio’s chosen surname is just one letter short of that.
Ronnie James Dio- Vocals/Keyboards
Vivian Campbell- Guitar.
Jimmy Bain- Bass
Vinnie Appice- Drums
Production- Ronnie James Dio