Hard 20 |
Dio"Master Of The Moon" Dio...the myth, the man, the band, the legend...has returned with a brand new album. This time, the lineup consists of old Dio crony Craig Goldy returning on guitar, Jeff Pilson (ex-Dokken) on bass, Simon Wright (ex-AC/DC) on drums, keysman Scott Warren, and of course The Man Himself on vox. Quite an impressive lineup! The same can be said for the album, which continues in the vein of the previous Dio album, "Killing The Dragon", which is basically the classic Dio style along the lines of "Dream Evil", but a bit heavier. I don't think there's any way Dio could ever make a bad album, especially when he has musicians like Goldy, Wright, and Pilson backing him up. Ronnie's voice is as great and powerful as ever! He serves up the usual, belting out in the good old Dio style we've come to know and love since his Rainbow days. His voice shows no signs of faltering. Hard to believe the man is pushing 60! The band also does a great job, and everything is brilliantly played, sung, and written, as a Dio album is expected to be. The lyrics are also the usual Dio thing-D&D fantasy inspired fare, poetic and mystical, although I didn't hear the word "rainbow" mentioned once! Surprise, surprsie! We have come to expect nothing short of the best from Ronnie James and company, and this album is a brilliant piece of work, straying none too far from the classic, melodic metal sound Dio is known for. A good as this album is, I did, however, have one problem with it-the slow songs are a few too many in number. The bulk of the songs on "Master Of The Moon" are slower paced numbers in the vein of "Egypt (The Chains Are On)", "All The Fools Sailed Away", and "Rock And Roll". There's certainly nothing wrong with songs like this, but they dominate the album, and we need a few more "We Rock"'s and "I Speed At Night"'s on here. These slower songs include the title track, "End Of The World", "Shivers", "The Man Who Would Be King" (I could be wrong, but this song appears to be in protest of the Iraq war), "The Eyes" and "In Dreams". While these are good songs, there's just a few too many in this style on the album. Now there are a few rockers on here, like the opening track "One More For The Road" (a classic Dio tune if I ever heard one! Great way to kick off the album!), "Death By Love", and "Living The Lie", but we need more to balance things out! This is Dio! This is rock and roll! We need to put the pedal to the metal more often, like on all Dio's previous albums! This is the first one I've heard where the slow songs were a bit overabudant! Aside from that, however, Ronnie and the gang have given us another great album! Horns up to the man who invented horns up! Don't be last in line for this one! |