Dio, The Last in Line (1984)

What’s the most amazing part of The Last in Line? I don’t know. How about the fact that it hit just a year after Dio debuted with Holy Diver in 1983? How about the fact that side A has the title-track and side B closes with “Egypt (The Chains are On)” — two blueprints for what we think of today as epic metal? How about the whole goddamn thing? It’s all pretty amazing.

You have to figure Ronnie James Dio knew he had something special in the band behind him at this point. After releasing and touring on Holy Diver, to go back into the studio with guitarist Vivian Campbell (the two would later have a vicious falling out), bassist Jimmy Bain (who as I understand it had a vicious drug problem), drummer Vinny Appice (who, perhaps viciously, was never Bill Ward) and keyboardist Claude Schnell (who had a vicious mustache) and come out with these results, it boggles the mind. Aside from being not at all how the industry works today — they’d tour Holy Diver for at least 18 months if not two full years to pay label debt, and it wouldn’t be on Warner Bros. — just to have those two albums back-to-back as your debut and sophomore outings. Granted, by then Dio had already been in Elf, Rainbow and Black Sabbath, and he came to the band bearing his name with a bit of clout behind him, but still, wow. The power of this material, the rawness of “I Speed at Night,” the unabashed commercial play of “Mystery” and the irony-free grandeur of the aforementioned epics. It’s not a moment that could ever come again, and while there are many carrying on the legacy of this approach, I’ll gladly put The Last in Line up against anything that came after it in the last 30 years, including by Dio.

To that end, we all know how it worked out. This version of the Dio band had one more record in it — 1985’s Sacred Heart — and by the time they got around to 1987’s Dream Evil, it was Craig Goldy on guitar, Vivian Campbell to join Def Leppard several years later. Sacred Heart was a worthy third in the trilogy, but metal was changing by ’87, the ascent of MTV and glam well underway, and after 1990’s Lock up the Wolves, Dio would be back in Black Sabbath for 1992’s Dehumanizer before releasing Strange Highways in 1993 and arguably hitting his nadir with the Dio band in 1996’s Angry Machines. I’d argue that 2000’s Magica and the subsequent and final two Dio studio albums, 2002’s Killing the Dragon and 2004’s Master of the Moon, represented a strong return to form — particularly the last two after the concept record — but no question that part of the appeal was the “return” aspect, Dio and company playing both to his strengths as a singer and the expectations of an audience looking for the classic style. Still, it worked.

Not to bring down the room, but Dio‘s death in 2010 cut short both his reunion with Black Sabbath in Heaven and Hell and the chance for any further Dio studio output. There have been a couple live records, collections, and this year a tribute CD was released with I don’t even know who and does it even really matter on it, but as the legacy continues to be mined — and no doubt it will for a long while to come — the earliest Dio albums remain untouchable and unflinching in the face of passing years, carved in marble as much as they are cast in steel.

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Yeah, I know I closed out with Rainbow like three weeks ago. What, it’s too much Dio? No such thing.

On Monday, I’ll have my top 30 of 2014 posted. Unless I run into some gotta-post-it-this-second news, which happened twice this week, it will likely be my only post of the day. After that, Tuesday maybe, depending on time, a countdown of the 10 best debuts of the year, and somewhere before 2015 hits, a list of the best EPs and singles. Time to get all this stuff out there. The music industry essentially takes off for the next two weeks, but I’m sure there will be fest updates and things of that sort to post on as well. Still, I want to use the time to wrap up the year and give this stuff the attention it deserves, because 2014 had a few genuine landmarks.

Also on Tuesday, look out for the year-end podcast. I know it’ll be at least three hours long. I might go four if I’m feeling inspired and have the time between travel and all that, but either way, it’ll include a lot of stuff on my best of list and probably more than that, but it will all kick ass, so stay tuned. I’ve got a terrible-in-terms-of-how-much-time-it’s-going-to-take-but-probably-the-way-to-go idea for what to do New Years Week as well, but more on that later.

Oh, and somewhere in there, I’m gonna try to review Slomatics too. Ha.

I hope you have a great and safe weekend as we move to and through the darkest days of the year. Please check out the radio stream and feel free to share all about your seasonal affective disorder with the forum. We’re all here for each other.

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Black Sabbath, Mob Rules (1981)

It’s been a quick four years since the passing of Ronnie James Dio. One of heavy metal’s most principle figures, an inimitable voice that continues to ring out a righteousness that the entire genre in its wake has aspired to, Dio succumbed to stomach cancer on May 16, 2010. From The Vegas Kings through Elf, Rainbow, Black Sabbath, Dio and, finally, Heaven and Hell, his was a legacy a lifetime in the making. He was there at metal’s birth, and as a frontman and the architect of some of its most landmark moments — from Rainbow‘s Long Live Rock and Roll to Black Sabbath‘s Dehumanizer — he was human, had his ups and downs, but was as close to a god as anyone singing in a rock and roll band ever could. Truly larger than life, as the inspiration he continues to spark proves every day.

Though at the time of his death he was talking about getting back with the Dio band and creating the second and third parts of what would have made a trilogy out of the narrative to the 2000 concept album, Magica, his last studio-recorded output was Heaven and Hell’s The Devil You Know (review here), which reunited him with Black Sabbath‘s Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Vinny Appice. They toured on that album, were a stately live act, and did justice to the Dio-fronted Sabbath more than I think anyone could have anticipated. Thinking about hearing them play “Falling off the Edge of the World” from 1981’s Mob Rules, I still get a chill up my spine.

That song, the penultimate on the Mob Rules before the epilogue of “Over and Over,” is just one of the factors making the album so essential. The follow-up to Sabbath‘s 1980 debut with Dio in the vocalist role replacing Ozzy Osbourne, Heaven and Hell, it built on that record stylistically, whether it was Iommi making another toss-off single into a landmark opener with “Turn up the Night,” or the bizarre sway of “Country Girl,” the epic “Sign of the Southern Cross” or the sing-along in the making “Slipping Away,” Mob Rules was an album that ingrained itself on heavy metal’s consciousness, and its reverberations continue to be felt. Through his work, timeless, Ronnie James Dio remains vital and very much present. Here. We may never get another Dio album — posthumous live releases, collections and tributes notwithstanding — or another tour, but Dio‘s catalog is a canon that generations to come will explore and grow to love, just as generations have done for the last 40-plus years.

Enjoy.

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Quick week, but I guess that’ll happen without a Monday. I was driving back north from being in New Jersey last weekend. Didn’t hear any complaints and wouldn’t really expect to, but in case anyone was wondering what was up, that was it. Pretty rare at his point that I’ll take a whole day off between Monday and Friday, but every now and then it’s unavoidable. Believe me, as I sat in the seemingly eternal traffic of I-95 North, the compulsion was there.

Heading out to see Swans in Boston tomorrow, which I’m very much looking forward to. I’ve been battling in my head back and forth which show I’m more excited for, them or Fu Manchu, but I think it’s a different appeal either way. That Fu show is on Tuesday, and I’ll have a review on Wednesday. Next Friday, Negative Reaction come north. They’re always a good time as well, and it’s been a minute at this point, so I’m looking forward to that too. Doesn’t look like there’s much of a way to lose.

Well, changing up the radio adds modus seems to have fallen flat at least in terms of the immediate response, but I’ll keep it going for a bit anyway, see if anything catches on. Can’t really judge anything by its first day, especially on a Friday. Was grateful to see the Fu Manchu review getting shared around. Hey, it’s the internet. I don’t get a lot of comments, so I take what I can get in terms of judging a response. If that’s Facebook likes for the time being, then until something else comes along, so be it. I appreciate it all, each one, everything. Thanks to everybody who downloaded the podcast as well. It’s been a while since I was able to do one of those, and I was glad to see there were still a few people interested.

There’s more stuff next week I’d like to plug, but it’s late and I’d rather just let the Sabbath ride out. I hope you have a great and safe weekend. Please check out the forum and radio stream.

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