Trollheart

Part IV: Fading colours

More members of the band departed before the release of the next album, three years later. In fact, everyone who had been in the original lineup left, leaving Ronnie with the job of finding replacements for Vinny Appice (who had helped him found Dio) and Jimmy Bain, as well as keyboard player Claude Schell. Craig Goldy, who had been brought in to replace Vivian Campbell for “Dream evil”, left soon after that album was finished and was replaced by Rowan Robertson, but he would only last for this album.

Lock up the wolves --- Dio --- 1990 (Reprise)


And again we run the familiar formula! Fast rocker to open in “Wild one”, then things slow down for the obligatory rock cruncher, this time it's “Born on the sun”, then for once the spell is broken as we remain rock crunchin' for “Hey angel”, heavy, pounding drums and a gravelly vocal from Ronnie, but it's still hard to see anything new, or indeed, progressive, about any of the songs here. Which is a pity, as they're all great in their own right, just a little too ... predicatable. “Between two hearts” opens with the chingling guitar seen in “Don't talk to strangers”, but in fairness it doesn't speed up as that track does, but stays heavy and slow, providing another surprise, and surprise is something I normally tend not to associate with Dio.

The album does contain the longest Dio composition ever, the title track, which comes in at a massive eight and a half minutes, and opens on proggy synth and keys, then guitars hammer in alongside drums and we get something more akin to “Stargazer” or “Gates of Babylon” from Rainbow than anything else. Incidentally, before any Dio know-it-all raises his or her hand and points out that the closing track on 2000's “Magica” is over eighteen minutes long, I should point out that I discount that, as it has no music and is essentially a long spoken monologue.

“Evil on Queen Street” has a very Black Sabbath feel to it --- more Ozzy era than Dio, truth be told --- and I'm starting to notice that this is a very slow, heavy, grinding album: I've hardly heard, since the opener, any fast rockers at all. At least the status quo is being challenged, which is a good thing always, but this is becoming very heavy going, almost like trudging through thick mud in flimsy sandals, and I'm beginning to feel bogged down.

And here comes a helping hand, at last! Now I'm climbing out of the mire as “Walk on water” rocks the speakers and kicks everything up the arse, finally. About damn time! Slow and crunchy and ponderous is all very well if you're listening to a sludge metal album, but the very least I expect out of Dio is to rock! Great guitar solo here from the new boy (who would soon be replaced) but we're soon back to the slow rock crunchers with “Twisted”, though there's a decent push as the album comes to a close with “Why are they watching me” rocking along nicely, and the powerful “My eyes”, with its often almost acoustic passages and its semi-medieval flavour harking back to Ronnie's days with Rainbow.

I don't think I can recall an album before or since by Dio which was so weighted on the side of slower, heavier, grinding power crunchers, and I think perhaps it's this that marks this album as a failure in my book: I miss the fast Dio rockers of the last few albums, and if this was an experiment to change the sound of the band (which I don't know) then it didn't work. Not for me, anyway.

After this, Dio basically broke up the band when invited by Geezer Butler to get back together with him and the guys in Black Sabbath. This explains the curious hiatus in Ronnie's involvement with Sabbath (ten years between albums) and is, I think, unique in heavy metal. I can't remember any vocalist working with a band, leaving and then coming back again so much later. Even Bruce Dickinson was only away from Maiden for seven years, even though that seemed like an eternity!

Dehumanizer --- Black Sabbath --- 1992 (IRS)


Would it be a good idea, this getting back together with Sabbath after so long? Would Ronnie take the band back to the heyday of “Heaven and Hell”, injecting some needed epic and progressive tones into their music, or would he, indeed, eschew the very themes that had mostly driven his own band, abandoning the fantasy themes to concentrate on more straight-ahead heavy metal? Well, there's no doubt that “Dehumanizer” (must assume they were targeting the American market, with the spelling) is a heavy album, so heavy it's almost thick and impenetrable. It's the Sabbath of old, really, sans Ozzy, and the opener “Computer god”, despite its attempt to drag the seventies metallers into the nineties really just comes across as someone, as Blackadder once opined, “stragetically shaving a monkey and forcing it into a suit”.

It's a good song, no doubt, and there are elements of the old, “classic” Dio in there, but the boys have, since Ronnie's departure, reverted to their heavier, darker side, such as was seen on albums like “Parnoid” and “Volume 4”. Tony Iommi can still play a guitar as well as ever though, and he puts in some blistering solos. Ronnie was also reunited with the estranged co-founder of Dio here, as Vinny Appice occupies the drumstool, indeed bringing the whole thing full circle really. Geezer Butler is, well, Geezer Butler, and Ronnie of course is in powerful voice, but on the whole you have to wonder what the point of this “mini-reunion” was. It's not like they intended to stay together for any more than one album.

“After all (the dead)” has a lot of “Iron man” in it, with Ronnie even, perhaps unconsciously, emulating Ozzy's vocal style without the falsetto of course, while “TV crimes” gets things rocking in no uncertain fashion, but everything's back slow doomy and crushing with “Letters from Earth”, and Butler's bass figures heavily (in both senses of the word) on “Master of insanity”, then there's some welcome keyboard relief in “Time machine”, though it doesn't last. This is not a bad album, and I have to admit that post “Mob rules” I have heard nothing of Sabbath's catalogue, with the exception of the awful “Born again” (which in itself was pretty instrumental in my coming to the decision not to proceed any further with Sabbath after Ronnie left), so I can't say if this album is representative of their usual output during the nineties and beyond, but it all kind of goes by in something of a blur for me.

It's Ozzy revisited again for “Sins of the father”, again very heavy and with a lot of feedback, and you would definitely get the impression, whether accurate or not, that Ronnie was regretting his decision to hook up again with the boys from Sabbath, and was already thinking of getting Dio back together and composing songs for his forthcoming sixth album. Nevertheless, there's a rather lovely ballad --- what? No, you heard me: a ballad. A nice, almost acoustically driven slow song, which at least slams the brakes on for a few minutes. Okay, so it doesn't remain a ballad for too long, and “Too late” may be a prophetic title, but then, I don't actually hate this album: I just don't see the need for it. But for what it is it's quite enjoyable, if you like your metal at the grungier, crunchier end of the spectrum. Definitely making a bid for the shortest song title ever, “I” is a decent rocker and the album closes on a pretty appropriate Sabbath title, “Buried alive”.

So after briefly revisiting his past and dipping his toes once more in the steaming, murky waters of Black Sabbath's music, Ronnie decided it was time the world heard from Dio again. Trouble was, he had lost all of his original lineup. So he had to find replacements. Again. Would Vinny Appice be coaxed back into the band, having worked alongside Ronnie again? Seems he would, and Ronnie soon found able replacements for guitar keyboards and bass, thus leading to the release of his next Dio album.

Strange highways --- Dio --- 1993 (Reprise)


Deciding to go with a more straightforward approach lyrically, concentrating on modern issues rather than fantasy themes, Dio embarked on a three-album spree that would see them alienate many of their fans, who had grown used to the more progressive songs and themes used on previous albums, and indeed those who had followed Ronnie through Rainbow and Sabbath. The album kicks off solidly enough, certainly, with a good fast rocker, however the title could have caused some worry, though really “Jesus, Mary and the Holy Ghost” is hardly that much further than “Sacred heart” or indeed “Holy diver”, and Ronnie had courted, or at least attracted controversy from the outset, so should have been more than able to deal with it.

It's certainly a very metal start, then we're into the usual slow crumcher, though I think Ronnie was experiencing something of a hangover from his time with the boys from Sabbath, as this sounds more like it belongs on one of their albums than his. The title track then is another hard stomper, grinding along like the best of Sabbath and Dio combined, with an almost palpable sense of menace, then “Hollywood black” keeps it heavy and slow, like a low growl rippling through the album so far. New guitarist Tracy G seems to have fit right in, and though there's not at this moment a lot of keyboard work, new keysman Jeff Pilson is kept busy anyway, as he's doubling on bass, as Jimmy Bain did originally.

Seems there's to be no letting up on the slow, heavy crunchers, as “Evilution” (see what he did there?) takes the stage, and again I can hear Ozzy in the chorus: whether that's a conscious effort on Ronnie's part to poke fun at the Black Sabbath vocalist he replaced and is known not to have rated, or just an involuntary thing I don't know, but he's definitely taking a lot from his Sabbath-ical (!) --- sorry! --- from Dio and putting it into his music here. This could almost be a Black Sabbath album. Strange highways, indeed! There are at least some really weird and odd electronic sounds, presumably made by Pilson on the synth, which leavens out the thick heavy metal a little, and some siren sounds on the guitar from Tracy G do lighten the mood a little, but this is still pretty heavy stuff.

I'm not holding out too much hope that a song titled “Pain” is going to go anyway towards redressing the balance here between heavy, grinding metal crunchers and fast metal rockers, and indeed it would seem that hope would indeed have been in vain, as we're hit with basically the same sort of song again. I don't so much feel I'm listening to this album as being bludgeoned over the head with it, and that's not a feeling I enjoy. “One foot in the grave” is not, as some might expect, a musical tribute to Victor Meldrew, but is instead yet another heavy crunching doom-laden song that falls just this side of black metal really.

If I had to choose one word to describe this album, I think it would be monotonous. It's all so similar, at least thus far, and unrelentingly dark and grinding, that I find it tends to get me down. I don't like the way Ronnie growls and scowls at me from behind the mike, almost as if daring me not to listen. This is not what I've come to expect from Dio, and even the last two albums notwithstanding, this is the worst I've heard from him to date. I know of course that there's worse to come, as I have had the displeasure of sitting through the frankly awful “Angry machines”, which is the album he released after this, so sadly no respite on the horizon.

Unless this can change things? A nice little gentle guitar line and a relatively easy drumbeat looks like it might be introducing a ballad, of all things. Could it be? Well, “Give her the gun” starts off very promising, does kick into a harder rocker a little way in, and I don't think we're in ballad territory here after all, but it does release the almost incessant pressure that's been pushing me down since the album began. Well, since the second track anyway. So we head towards the end of the album, with “Blood from a stone” retaining the basic theme and rhythm the album has maintained throughout almost exclusively, until finally “Here's to you” kicks out the stays and Dio floor the pedal, a great fast rocker which takes us up to the closer. “Bring down the rain” though shows that Ronnie is unable to resist going back to the tried-and-trusted formula, slowing everything down for another rock cruncher which sets the seal on an album I personally don't like, and which alienated many of his fans, kickstarting a period that would last seven years before he would go back to the fantasy themes and melodies that had made him famous and earned him legions of fans.


Angry machines --- Dio --- 1996 (Mayhem)

With Scott Warren now on keys and Jeff Pilson concentrating on bass, Dio released their seventh studio album, which I personally regard as their worst. “Angry machines” made me angry! How could Ronnie have recorded such a sub-par album? I know he was trying to move away from his old image of wizards and elves etc., and had achieved a measure of distance from those themes with the last album, but this one just went over the top.

The signs are not good, right from the beginning, with a real Sabbath-style grinder, “Institutional man”, which is pretty hard going, but at least the tempo kicks up for “Don't tell the kids”, with a rocker in the vein of “I speed at night” and “Stand up and shout”, and a very decent guitar solo from Tracy G, though he gets a bit confused and messy on “Black”, which is just, well, terrible. Even Dio's singing grates on the nerves, and the idea in the song is so thin there is no way it can be expected to last even the three minutes plus that it runs for. Okay, maybe it's meant to sound mechanical and alien, but even so...

“Hunter of the heart” has at least a decent, atmospheric guitar intro and a sassy little bassline before it gets going, but unfortunately when it does it's nothing new, just the same old ideas rehashed and used till they're paper-thin. Good interplay between bass and guitar, and some driving drumming from Appice, but not really enough to hook your attention for any length of time. It's followed by the longest track, another Sabbath clone which runs for just over seven minutes. “Stay out of my mind” again recalls the vocal style of Ozzy, and I don't know why Ronnie was doing this, or if he even realised he was. There's a nice kind of blues idea to the guitar riff in it, which is good to hear, and to be completely fair, there's a lot more thought put into this than previous tracks, indeed, albums.

There's a really quite cool strings section about halfway through, which gives way to an extended hard guitar section, and it works very well in not only filling out the song but in upping the tension and maintaining the suspense. I'd have to say, given what else I've heard on this album, this would be the standout. Could be the one decent track on the whole thing, the exception to the rule. Certainly a whole lot better than “Big sister”, which follows in its wake, its inferiority only underlining how good Dio could be when he wanted to be, but how he often --- at least, here --- took the path of least resistance and ended up with substandard songs.

The only good thing about “Double Monday” is that it's the shortest track on the album, just under three minutes, then “Golden rules” opens with the nursery rhyme “Twinkle, twinkle, little star”; sadly that's about the only good part of it, as it's largely unremarkable. “Dying in America” has at least a bit more heart about it, with some powerful grungy guitar and a pretty good solo, then we close --- and it's nowhere too soon --- on “This is your life”, which certainly surprises, turning out to be a piano ballad, with beautiful strings arrangement. I would probably go so far as to say this is close to Dio's best ballad, even notwithstanding “All the fools sailed away” from “Dream evil”. It's the more frustrating that it comes at the end of a really disappointing and sub-par album, still regarded by me at any rate as his worst ever. At least though it leaves you with a more tolerable taste in your mouth, and you're left humming a decent tune at the end.

The first proper live Dio album then comes during the tour for this album, released in 1998. Oddly, but thankfully, there is little of the “Angry machines” album on it, and it consists mostly of music from the debut “Holy diver” and “The last in line”, along with some Black Sabbath material from Ronnie's time with them, and a few Rainbow tracks. It's a double album, and therefore more representative of the full Dio catalogue, and yet, it is quite restricted.

Inferno: last in live --- Dio --- 1998 (Mayhem)


I suppose the fact that only two tracks off “Angry machines” are featured on this live outing is telling: Ronnie obviously realised that the album had not sold well and was not going down well generally with the fans, so he fell back on his standards and classics, the crowd-pleasers. So you get “Holy diver”, “Don't talk to strangers”, “We rock”, “Rainbow in the dark” as well as “Heaven and Hell”, “Long live rock and roll” and a medley composed of “Catch the rainbow” and Blackmore's old Deep Purple song “Mistreated”, but generally speaking the expected batch of songs. There's also one track off “Strange highways”, but that's about it.

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Part V: Dio resurgent
Two more years would pass before Ronnie would return to the studio, to start work on what would be his eighth Dio album, and the first that reverted back to the old fantasy themes, moving away from the more modern ideas expressed through the last two studio albums, which had generally proven unpalatable to many Dio fans, and led to sliding record sales. For this album, Craig Goldy would return, to replace the departed Tracy G, and Jimmy Bain would again take up the bass duties.

Magica --- Dio --- 2000 (Spitfire)


With a new label, and disappointing record sales for both “Strange highways” and his most recent album, “Angry machines”, Ronnie decided it was time for a change. The new, science-fiction themed lyrics had not really worked, and the whole sound of the band was in danger of descending into a bad parody of Black Sabbath, so Ronnie declared this album would be a concept album, follow a storyline, and be much more progressive metal than previous albums. With some past members returning, it became one of Dio's most successful later albums, and was largely seen as their comeback.

It opens with a computer voice intoning the introduction, less than a minute which goes under the name of “Discovery”, then keyboards and heavy guitar usher in “Magica theme”, and right away you're punching the air and exclaiming YESSS! THIS is what Dio is all about, and it's great to hear them finally getting back to basics and giving us something to anticipate. Great guitar intro from the returning Craig Goldy, then “Lord of the last day” gets all heavy and grungy again, but with more keyboard backup this time to keep it from getting too bogged down, while “Fever dreams” has a lot more energy and excitement about it, and low, humming synth is used to very dramatic effect while Goldy channels Gilmour on “The Wall” before “Turn to stone” gets going.

No, it's not the old ELO song, fool! A good upbeat rocker, with Ronnie sounding more on song than he has for years in my opinion. The computer voice seems to link the songs, making comments and reports at the end of some of them, and “Feed my head” is preceded by one such, and is itself a powerful but mid-paced rocker, with some more great solos from Goldy and not so much of the keyboard work this time. “Eriel” follows something the same line, the deeper, muddier tone of slow songs from previous albums somehow lightened this time around, mostly by some fine keyboard work courtesy of Scott Warren.

“Challis” is a real uptempo metal rocker in the style of “classic” Dio, with great guitar solos, Ronnie singing his heart out and smooth keyboard fills from Warren. It's followed by a heavy guitar-led ballad, “As long as it's not about love”, then an almost Irish jig opens “Losing my insanity”, with some flutes and fiddles before the song bops along at a fine pace, with a lot of energy and enthusiasm. Things continue well with “Otherworld”, very dramatic, ominous and with some fine strings or possibly synthesiser strings, till we run into “Magica (reprise)”, less than two minutes long but some of the best music on this album since “Magica theme”, and it's followed by “Lord of the last day (reprise)”, another short track but I would have preferred the previous one to have been the closer.

Technically, neither are the last track, as that's eighteen minutes plus of Ronnie relating the story of Magica, with no music, and it's called “Magica story”, but as there's no music to speak of it's not really worth including in the review here, but worth listening to if you didn't get the idea of the concept behind the album, and also interesting to hear Ronnie's voice when he's not singing.

Like many bands, and indeed, many rock bands, Dio's lineup constantly shifted and changed, and after some differences of opinion between he and Goldy, the guitarist left the band (again) and was replaced for their ninth album with Doug Aldritch.

Killing the dragon --- Dio --- 2002 (Spitfire)


Continuing the return to form that had been seen on “Magica”, Dio produced what I consider to be one of their best later albums, right up there with “Holy diver”. Keyboards again feature heavily in the mix, and this time Ronnie takes elements from the ideas that informed “Angry machines” and successfully melds them with the older themes like those from “Magica” and Rainbow's “Rising”, to create what was pretty much the best of both worlds on his penultimate studio album. The opener, and title track, leaves you in no doubt as to what to expect, and new guitarist Aldritch is eager to prove his chops, racking off solo after solo.

Then, just when you think he's going back to the old formula, with another heavy cruncher as the second track, “Along comes a spider” rocks along at a good pace, a real bopper, with some really sharp guitar riffs and powerful drumming, then “Scream” is a heavy cruncher, but more along the lines of “Egypt” or “The last in line” than some of the really heavier tracks that characterised some of the more recent albums. Then we're off and blazing again with another fast rocker --- something that has been missing from the last few Dio albums --- with “Better in the dark”, featuring some blistering fretwork from Aldritch.

That familiar “Kashmir” sound returns for the simply titled “Rock and roll”, really punchy and anthemic, a real powerhouse, then “Push” kicks everything back up into high gear as it hurtles along, followed by “Guilty”, which keeps up the pressure, a little less frenetic and a little more grungy admittedly, but still a great song. “Throw away the children” is a big, heavy, crunching pounder sung with a lot of passion and fervour by Ronnie, with a superb guitar solo in the middle, and following in the footsteps of Pink Floyd and Richard Marx, Ronnie enlists the aid of a children's choir on the chorus, giving the song added impact.

“Before the fall” gets things rocking again, with a really proggy keyboard solo by Scott Warren that recalls the heyday of Rainbow, and “Cold feet” closes the album well on a mid-paced rocker with a very catchy hook, the underlying and overpowering message here: Dio are back!



Master of the moon --- Dio --- 2004 (Sanctuary)


To have been followed, in due course, by volume two, and three, of “Magica”, this was in the end the final album released by Dio. It marked the return of Craig Goldy on guitar, as well as Jeff Pilson on bass, this being the first time the two had played together on a Dio album. It opens with the prophetic “One more for the road”, a fast hard rocker that continues the return to form seen on “Killing the dragon”, with another slow cruncher following in the shape of the title track, with some grinding guitar from Goldy, bringing us into “The end of the world”, another hard cruncher with some deep, throaty bass from the returning Pilson. “Shivers” is a more mid-paced hard rocker, while things slow down for the intro to “The man who would be king”, then it ramps up on the back of Scott Warren's powerful organ, probably the first I've heard his keyboards on this album up to now.

It's very much in the vein of “Egypt”, a slow, stomping beat that plods on like a golem, but with some great melodic ideas. Some unwelcome vocoder work as “The eyes” begins, and unfortunately it continues through the track, giving the unsettling idea of a rock track mixed with pop or dance. Yeah, I hate vocoders. Good song though: another slow one, very heavy but so far I find this album lacking the immediacy and spontonaeity of “Killing the dragon”. The guys do a passable “Iron Maiden chant” at the end of this song though, which is fun to hear.

Things finally speed up again for “Living the lie”, but then it's back to the rock crunchers for “I am”, marching along with fierce determination until “Death by love” presses down hard on the pedal again and the Dio machine goes rocketing off for one last time, Ronnie namechecking a few older songs in this one, album titles too. We end then on a metal cruncher, growling guitars and thumping bass taking “In dreams” to its position as the last ever Dio track recorded, and the album closes strongly enough.

For the final Dio album I find this a little lacking. Of course, Ronnie had no idea he would not get to record another after this, but it is a pity that it doesn't provide a stronger, more representative example of the music Dio could produce, and as a swansong --- even if unintended --- by the band, it's a little weak.

After the release of “Killing the dragon” the band went on tour, and from that tour came two live albums, a year apart. In 2005 they released “Evil or divine: live in New York City”, which pretty much essentially reproduces the tracklist on the “Inferno” live album, with the addition of a few tracks off the last album and one off “Magica”, and a few bits and pieces here and there.

Evil or divine: Live in New York City --- Dio --- 2005 (Spitfire)


Of far more interest was “Holy Diver live”, released the following year. On this album, the band performed the entire album “Holy diver” in sequence, and the second disc of the live set was basically taken up by mostly Rainbow and Sabbath material Ronnie recorded while with them, such as “Sign of the southern cross” and of course “Heaven and Hell” from Sabbath, as well as “Tarot woman” and “Gates of Babylon” from his Rainbow days.

Holy Diver Live --- Dio --- 2006 (Eagle)


At least there are no medleys with Rainbow songs this time, but you would still wonder why the only songs he took from the Black Sabbath era (or, at least, were included on the album) were those two, as there were better songs he could have chosen. Nevertheless, this basically is the last live Dio album, other than one which would be released in 2010 but recorded in the late eighties.


Ronnie then linked up again with Black Sabbath members Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler, and reunited with his former Dio/Sabbath bandmate Vinny Appice once again. The four entered the studio in 2007 to work on their first project together since 1992, a compilation of the work of Ronnie with Black Sabbath. While I normally don't take note of compilations, this one is worth looking at as it features three new songs which were essentially the first ones written by the new band which would come out of this collaboration, and result in a full album and tour.

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Part VI: The last in line

Black Sabbath: the Dio years --- Black Sabbath --- 2007 (Rhino)


As I say, this album is only noteworthy for its inclusion of three new tracks, featured below, and also for being the springboard for the new band, Heaven and Hell, which would emerge from these sessions. Other than that, it's a standard compilation, which I generally do not review.



The devil you know --- Heaven and Hell --- 2009 (Roadrunner)


After the perhaps unexpected success of the new tracks recorded for the retrospective album, Iommi, Butler and Appice decided to broaden their project and entered the studio to record their first album, which would ultimately be not only their last, but also the last studio work Ronnie would produce before his untimely death. As the guys were still in Sabbath at the time, the new band was christened Heaven and Hell, and they released what would be their only album, “The devil you know”, to worldwide acclaim.

The album starts off quite Black Sabbath-heavy, with “Atom and evil” (see what they did there?) with some fine guitar as ever from Tony Iommi, and Vinny Appice sounding happy to be back in the fold, as it were. One year before his death, Ronnie's voice sounds as strong as ever on this, his last studio recording. “Fear” takes things up a gear slighty, a bit faster, a bit more of Dio the band shining through, then “Bible black” is a nice little gentle almost acoustic intro, with some lovely soft guitar from Iommi, and Ronnie on the keyboards, but about a minute and a half in it stops pretending and reveals itself to be a heavy mid-paced rocker with the guitar cranking up several notches and the powerful drumming of Appice thundering in.

Great bass intro from Geezer Butler to “Double the pain”, and it's another mid-paced rockin' headbanger, while “Rock and roll angel” is a bit more stately in its pace, but no less heavy, with a really nice little guitar solo from Iommi, and another really lovely classical guitar outro, then we're into “The turn of the screw”, which romps along nicely on hard riffing guitar and steady bass. Listening to this now, it's hard to understand or indeed accept that we're listening to a man who would be dead the following year. There's certainly no outward signs of the illness that would take Ronnie from us in just under one year.

The guys all seem to be gelling well on this album too, all having a good time, and there's no indication of any discomfort or in-fighting, although original Sabbath drummer Bill Ward did turn down the invitation to participate, leaving the door open for Appice to return. “Eating the cannibals” flies along on rails of rock and metal, and is great fun, then Ronnie's ominous organ chords provide the backdrop for Iommi's snarling guitar to open “Follow the tears”, a hard rock cruncher with real bite and a very Sabbath sound.

As the album approaches its end, things gets rocking in no uncertain fashion with “Neverwhere”, recalling the best of early Dio, Ronnie's voice in full flight, Iommi's guitar blazing like a comet, and the final studio song recorded and released by Ronnie James Dio is again strangely prophetic, and perhaps says a lot about his attitude to life, and even death. A very appropriate title, “Breaking into Heaven” is a heavy, pounding, grinding closer worthy of the most classic Black Sabbath, a final, defiant punch of the air with a spiked fist, almost as if Ronnie is proclaiming and promising that he won't go down easy, won't let go of life without one hell of a fight.

After the tour to promote Heaven and Hell in May, Ronnie was diagnosed with stomach cancer, the treatment for which put paid to both the rest of the tour and his plans for the next Dio album, which was to be “Magica II” as well as another Heaven and Hell album intended for 2010. Ronnie fought the cancer, with his wife Wendy by his side every step of the way and well-wishers from the world of rock and heavy metal praying and hoping for his recovery, but he sadly lost his battle with the disease, two years ago today.

There was one more album to be released --- well, two --- both posthumously. One was a live album recorded on the “Holy diver” and “Dream evil” tours, and was released six months after Ronnie's death. The other was a live album compiled from the Heaven and Hell tour of 2009 and released the same month, November 2010. But as these were both released after Ronnie's death I prefer not to feature them, seeing “The devil you know” as the final album to feature this remarkable musician.


Ronald James Padavona, whom the world had come to know and respect as Ronnie James Dio, died with his wife by his side May 16 2010 at 7:45 AM CDT at his home. At the memorial service held for him, former Dio and Black Sabbath personnel attended, with some giving performances and a video documentary chronicling Ronnie's life running on a huge video screen. On his passing, Ronnie's wife Wendy set up the Ronnie James Dio Stand Up And Shout Cancer Fund, to research a cure for this horrible malignancy that plagues the human race even in the 21st century. To date, over half a million US dollars has been raised.

Like many other a rock musician gone before him, Ronnie left behind not only a legion of fans, and new bands inspired by his music, but a huge catalogue to stand testimony to his time on this Earth, including ten studio and five live albums with his own band, three with Black Sabbath and three with Rainbow, as well as three with Elf and one with Heaven and Hell. During his time he played with some of the greats, eventually rising to their level so that he could, at the end, stand proudly shoulder to shoulder with these men who had carved their own place in music history.

A rocker, a singer, an innovator, a kind-hearted human being, a dreamer, a tireless worker and perfectionist, and an inspiration for generations of rockers who came after him, Ronnie James Dio certainly gave the best years of his life to rock and roll. He was one of a kind, and perhaps it is to the greatest writer the planet has produced that we should leave the final word:

”He was a man, take him for all in all. I shall not look upon his like again.”

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

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Following in the famous footsteps of his late father, this is Julian Lennon, with a great song entitled “Saltwater”.

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Trollheart

Donna Summer, 1948-2012


Just like to add my regrets and condolences on the passing of one of disco's finest divas. Donna Summer died today after a long battle with cancer. May she rest in peace.

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

The worm is also responsible for letting a day slip by without featuring his daily tune! Oh dear! Trollheart would probably fire the worm, if he did in fact pay him! Anyway, this is Texas, with a great song called “Say what you want”. Today's selection up next!

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018

Trollheart

There's something the worm likes about this weird little chart-topper from M/A/R/R/S...

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Trollheart: Signature-free since April 2018