The Legend of Ronnie James Dio
Everyone has heard the story of Ronnie James Dio one way or another. Everyone knows this monster of a singer- songwriter is only around 5 foot 4 inches tall. Everyone knows he is from Courtland, a small farm town in upstate New York.
We have always heard many different ages for him, but the best guess is the man will turn 70 on July 10. You got that right, and it is un-freaking-believable!
The story has been circulating for over four decades about the mighty voice on the tiny man. This man is not a rock star or icon by luck, either. He has worked his tail off for as long as anyone can remember and found time in his 70 years to be educated beyond rock-and-roll background.
From the ’50s until the early ’70s, Ronnie worked in his own band, which evolved from The Vegas Kings (1957-58) to Ronnie and the Rumblers and Ronnie and the Red Caps (1958-61). From there he went on to Ronnie Dio and the Prophets (1961-67).
In 1967, Ronnie started to put together his biggest and best project, enlisting what would be a couple members of another band down the road. But from 1967 to 1970, they were known as The Electric Elves. In 1970 they shortened their name to just simply The Elves.
In 1970 Ronnie added the final parts of
the puzzle that would become his breakthrough, with cousin David
Feinstein on guitar, Gary Driscoll on drums and Mickey Lee Soule on
keyboards. Ronnie pulled bass and lead vocal duty for the band simply
known as Elf.
Writing, recording and touring nonstop with their
idols, Deep Purple, Elf started winning the world over one piece at a
time. It did eight world tours with Purple and established itself as a
force to be reckoned with. Then in February 1975, Elf became Ritchie
Blackmore’s Rainbow.
Everyone that was in Elf became part of Rainbow, except the guitarist, Steve Edwards. Feinstein had gone on to found The Rods . We all know about Rainbow, and that is a story for another day. Ronnie was in Rainbow until November 1978, through four releases.
Now
we come to the most important part of the Dio story, and a very vital
one as well to Black Sabbath. In May 1979, Tony Iommi called Dio and
the rest is history.
Here we are not going to talk about how it
came together and why it took so long to finally get in place, etc. We
are going to look at the effect it had and what it means to music today.
There is no singer in the world that has had more vocalists try to copy their style than RJD. From Elf, we had a guy who basically sang southern rock. In Rainbow, we heard that voice take on a completely different tone and aggression. Then once Sabbath was involved, yet again we see and hear a new Ronnie James Dio.
This is where the legend was really built in a big way. It was that monster voice and bigger than life lyrics that captured everyone. Let us not forget the way he took the classic Ozzy-era tunes and made them his own and made them stand out way beyond what they were before.
Here was a band
that was dead in the water. It had lost its album sales due to the lack
of good product in the later years of the Ozzy era. Live shows were
still OK, but Ozzy had started to forget lyrics, and was losing his
tone and his ability to stay in key. Ozzy also started missing shows,
which did not set well with Iommi and (FIRSTNAME) Butler.
The
writing team of Dio and Iommi was established instantly. “Heaven and
Hell,” released in 1980, received great critical acclaim as well as
huge fan support. This album re established a staggering champion and
established Dio as the new vocal piece to a band that had known only
the banshee scream of Osbourne for 10 years. It was Sabbath’s first
platinum release in years.
This
was also a new style of Sabbath that the fans had never seen before —
new strong song structures that were more thought out and had much
better appeal.
For people who were not fans of Rainbow (which did
not do great during Ronnie’s stint commercially), this guy came out of
nowhere. Who was this Dio guy and were his lungs made out of leather?
It seemed his voice could cut through steel and never ever showed any
sign of weakening.
As
if 1980 did not already have enough going on with the new wave of
British heavy metal, here comes the biggest British band of them all –
with an American in tow – and it was about to rule the world.
The album instantly became a worldwide hit, and the Sabbs found themselves on a relentless tour. People were going to the shows not wanting to hear “Paranoid,” but wanted new stuff such as “Neon Knights,” “Die Young” and “Heaven and Hell.” All people could do was think, “Wow, man, what is going to be next?”
Next was the song “The Mob Rules,” on the movie soundtrack to “Heavy Metal.” Well the question was answered instantly for fans … wow. Here was a song that absolutely pulverized everything on an album that one thought could not be done. So now what was the next question?
1981 saw the release of the album “Mob Rules.” Again Ronnie helped up the game a bit with Iommi and Butler in the writing department. Here was a release much more furious than the predecessor, bigger guitars, bigger production and a new drummer in Vinny Appice, who seemed to bring in a more vicious attack that even showed on older material in concerts.
Black
Sabbath had never been this evil before; it had never been this Black
of a Sabbath, and the little guy at front and center of the stage had
brought that. People were going out in droves to see this new Black
Sabbath. Again, “Mob Rules” went big and the numbers were incredible,
both in attendance and sold units in retail.
This really helped
the Rainbow family as well. People were going back into the stores to
buy Ronnie’s previous bands’ releases to see what he used to do before
breathing this life into the Sabbs.
In
1982 the band decided to record the “Mob Rules” tour live and put it
out along with the old classics. Featured on this release would be new
classics from “The Mob Rules,” such as “Voodoo,” “Mob Rules” and “Sign
of the Southern Cross,” along with “Neon Knights,” “Heaven and Hell”
and the ever-popular “Children of the Sea.” Sabbath’s old classics were
played as well, and fans got to hear them coming from the new king of
the band. The people loved it.
One minor problem though:
The band broke up. Blame it on pressure, blame it on anything you would
like but Dio and Appice went one way and Iommi and Butler another. We
did get three releases of pure brilliance from the Dio-era Sabbath of
the 1980s.
Sabbath had not seen anything like it since 1974 and
they would not see anything like it again until 1992. Dio, on the other
hand, established the band Dio and sold millions of records, continuing
to play the old Sabb faves he had helped create.
He carried on, as did Sabbath with mainly just Iommi, the only remaining original guy, with FIRSTNAME Geezer in and out through the rest of the ’80s. Sabbath tried to find a singer that could bring back that glory and they did have Ray Gillen, who was always brilliant. Then it had the B-rate version of Dio in Tony Martin, if he was even that good. While Sabbath was faltering, Dio was not and the sales and touring showed it in a big way.
Then the unthinkable happened.
Geezer showed up for a Dio show in Minneapolis and played bass on “Neon Knights” and they were off and running again. The hatchet had been semi-buried and they entered into writing for “Dehumanizer,” another kick-your-teeth-down-your-throat release.
For Sabbath, it was like 1983 didn’t happen at all. Back were Iommi, Dio, Butler and Appice, picking up right where they left off. Again, Dio saved Sabbath. This is not a case that Ronnie James Dio is so great, but a case of a right combination of people making one monster of a band.
The common denominator is Dio — the missing element both times that he entered the band. OK, so he is that great!!!!!
There were still problems among the main three of DIO, Iommi and Butler, but it worked on the album and it worked as a live act again. New classics emerged such as “I”, “Computer God,” “After All the Dead” and the “Wayne’s World” movie track “Time Machine.”
This time, Dio brought with him a huge following from the Dio band that made the Sabbath following even bigger and stronger. New fans that had never witnessed this lineup because they were too young at the time, got to see the true masters at work. The shows were high energy with a bigger Dio Sabbath-era split than that of the Ozzy era.
This lineup and band could not be stopped — except by Ozzy and money. The story has two sides to it and if you look through the Internet, you can find both sides.
All
I can say is that Ozzy is not to blame, as much as lack of
communication is for this brief stint. This reunion went from October
1991 to November 1992, but man, it again left you knowing why Dio was
the shot in the ass that Sabbath needed, and now that he was gone again
Sabbath would flounder until the reunion with Ozzy.
It is fitting
to say that Sabbath put Dio on top of the world in 1980, but it is
equally as fitting to say that Dio did the same for them on not one,
not two but three different occasions. Enter 2006 and the emergence of
Black, um, Heaven and Hell Sabbath.
Back again is Ronnie and Vinny under a new name, but we all know who it
is. This time, however, it was all about the Dio era; as it should be.
The man that put the stamp on a generation with his leather lungs,
gut-wrenching power vocals and, when needed, his beautiful touch as
well. With the Dio years (a best of) came three new songs that showed
everyone that these guys are not even close to being done. Then a world
tour too. Are you kidding me?
The cool thing about this is that it is all Dio material with Sabbath, and that was the coolest ever. You would expect to see a bunch of old guys in attendance, but there were kids everywhere wanting to see the thing they had heard about for 15 years from friends, dads, moms and other music fans. They were not disappointed.
Ozzy returned to Sabbath for reunion shows in 1997 and that lasted for a few years, but it just was not good. Ozzy having voice problems and pitch problems, making the shows really hard to enjoy. Not to mention the fact that every year, the tuning went lower and lower to compensate for his voice loss.
Again, Dio steps in and shoots the relic in the ass with a shot of power and they are off and running again. We are heading into July 2009, and the band is off on another world tour, supporting a new release in “The Devil You Know,” and who knows when it will stop.
When it will stop is not the question any longer. There is no real question, to be honest. That question has been answered time and time again and very loudly: RONNIE JAMES DIO IS THE VOICE OF BLACK SABBATH, or whatever else it could be called.
Every time Dio has entered the game with Sabbath, it has won and won big. Tony and Geezer, along with Vinny, are extremely talented people but at the end of the DAY, if the head ELF is not involved then there is no BLACK for the Sabbath, there is no Heaven and Hell and there definitely is no VOODOO for the MOB.
