Advantages: Its Dio! Its many of his songs on one wonderful CD Disadvantages: Cover art is poor
This is an excellent compilation of the best of Dio between 1983-1993.
Dio, (full name Ronnie James Dio) if you didnt know, was the frontman for Rainbow (one of them, they have had a few) and Black Sabbath (he did the album Heaven and Hell, among others - and in my opinion is better than Ozzy) He eventually became the leading man and namesake of the ultimate band that is Dio, launching into the scene with "Holy diver", and it`s no surprise that the first five songs on this compilation are pulled (well, the same as, these ones are live) from that album. If you are a Tenacious D fan, you will have heard Dio's name mentioned a few times, including the song all about how he has rocked for too long, and its time to pass the torch. You also would have seen him in their recent film 'Pick of Destiny'
This compilation has songs from six ...
Advantages: Brash, confident, powerful, melodic Disadvantages: A little over the top
Holy Diver came out in 1983 and is the first album by Dio, whose main man Ronnie James Dio was previously in Black Sabbath, and before that in Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow.
For a first album by a band this is really a pretty good effort. Lyrically and musically it sounds perhaps not dissimilar to Iron Maiden, with themes of fantasy and spirituality being interwoven with the music. Musically it also sounds like a more Americanised New Wave of British Heavy Metal effort. There are some very good, melodic tracks such as "Don't Talk to Strangers" and "Rainbow in the Dark" and no bad tracks at all.
If you like old-style melodic metal then this album is well worth getting. Granted, it is a bit overblown and cheesey, but all Dio albums are to one extent or another, and really it's part of the band's charm. There is a lot of posturing ...
Advantages: Up there with the best of Dio Disadvantages: Er..
The wee magician is back with a lavishly packaged CD including "The Story Of Magica", a fold-out A3 size page containing the closely typed tale of the alien explorers who land on the planet Blessing. And on it goes, but I must confess I haven't quite got round to reading it all.
"Discovery", a robotically spoken intro leads into the "Magica Theme" before we get to the first track proper, "Lord Of The Last Day". This leads seamlessly into "Fever Dreams", a track which was on one of those Classic Rock freebies a few months back. These two are real throwbacks to Dio's glory days of "Holy Diver" and "Last In Line". Great Stuff.
"Turn To Stone" strangely doesn't appear on the insert, but carries on the good work before that damn robot intervenes again. "Feed My Head" gets things underway again with its cheery chorus of "All is lost ...
nicks 29.06.2000
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