Review Summary: Dio left us, but at least he went with a bang.
A.E.Housman’s poem,
To An Athlete Dying Young, brings up an interesting question: is it better to die young and strong, or old and feeble. The titular hero of this poem dies just after setting a record, and Housman argues that the timing of this unfortunate event is perfect, and the boy was “smart” to die so young. While Housman’s opinion is slightly extreme, he certainly raises valid points. Never will the either the athlete or his fans need to see or experience his decline from power, never will he be a pathetic shadow of his former self. Instead, he will have been at the front of the pack when he died, and the rest of the world will remember him as a hero, not as a worthless, frail parody of past glory.
Ronnie James Dio, one of the most respected metal singers of the past century, found himself in a situation quite similar to that of the aforementioned athlete. Soon before he lost his battle with stomach cancer, he released an album with members of his former band, Black Sabbath. This album,
The Devil You Know, was not only his strongest release in almost two decades, but was also one of the most powerful metal opuses in recent memory. It proved that even at such ages, Dio and company could play with a vigor unmatched by most nascent, youthful bands.
The Devil You Know shows Dio’s “new” band, Heaven And Hell, striking a very impressive balance: they manage to write music that is both familiar to longtime fans of Dio or Black Sabbath, and yet the album is wonderfully fresh and never seems like a rehash of the band’s past successes. The members of Heaven and Hell are also able to cooperate with ease. In place of past scandals about the volumes of individual instruments is a compromise, where each of the performers are given many chances to shine.
The Devil You Know contains some of guitarist Tony Iommi’s most crushing and corrosive riffs, as evidenced by the slow, grinding
Follow The Tears or the lightning fast, paranoid
Eating The Cannibals. His solos are melodic and soulful, and yet technically impressive. Iommi manages to play with such finesse that even the hardest of leads seem easy when he performs.
Dio, the vocalist, also offers a marvelous performance, which happens to be his strongest in many, many years. His voice is strong, muscular, and yet also melodic and musical. He refrains from mindlessly shouting, and instead sings with such skill that one quickly forgets that the vocalist is almost seventy years of age.
However, the album has one glaring flaw: the lyrics. As always, Dio tells tails of dragons and magic, but some songs feature incredibly trite and cliche lines.
Eating The Cannibals is indubitably the worst offender, and
Rock And Roll Angel is a close second. It should be noted that many other songs, such as
Bible Black, contain exquisitely-written lyrics.
In the end,
The Devil You Know is a success. This is not only because it is the strongest Dio-related release of almost twenty years, but because one can unashamedly and unwaveringly say that it is a fantastic album. Essential.
