by Pat Neville

After nearly four years without a studio album, this writer’s favorite singer of all time offers a dark tale of another dimension, in the form of a concept album, called Magica. Dio has certainly taken his brand of rock and roll to new and unimaginable heights on this one. To simply refer to Magica as another heavy metal record trying to rekindle the energy that dominated 80’s rock would be a great discredit to it and the man who created it. Ronnie has done a wonderful job of avoiding the cliché “rockers and ballads” formula that you can find on most hard rock recordings. What happens on Magica is more like a soundscape, with tastefully layered sounds and tonalities, resulting in an effect that makes the individual tracks flow into each other. The listener can really get a sense of the direction that each of the songs go in and how each piece is a continuation of the story. The story begins long ago on the planet of Blessing, where good wizards rule the spells of the Book of Magica for the benefit of all. It tells of an evil insurrection that took the good people’s spirits to propel evil. Subsequently, the hero of the story has his spirit taken and his son casts a spell from the book to save Blessing. It is quite a long tale, and makes for interesting reading. The story is included in the packaging and is also recited by Ronnie himself at the end of the CD, but the songs themselves are really what set the atmosphere and intensity of the story.

The lineup of musicians on this incarnation of the band Dio should be familiar to fans of the band, because they were all on former Dio albums. Drummer Simon Wright played on 1990’s Lock Up the Wolves. Guitarist Craig Goldy was on 1987’s Dream Evil, as was bassist Jimmy Bain. Bain also appeared on Sacred Heart(1985), The Last in Line(1984), Holy Diver(1983), and was in Rainbow with Ronnie for the album Rising(1976). There is no doubt that these players are seasoned professionals, and their years of experience show up well in the recordings. They all play with incredible confidence and creativity, and pretentiousness is totally non-existent. As for Ronnie Dio’s performance, his voice sounds better than ever and I was amazed at his ability to arrange the songs of Magica, adding interesting sounds and textures to the production. This is why the record stands up to and gets better after repeated listenings. For example, many of the tracks contain an orchestra or compelling keyboard sounds that make the recording sound fuller without sounding “overproduced.” The song “Discovery” has some great orchestra sounds. Ronnie adds a beautiful Gregorian chant section on “Lord of the Last Day” and a Baroque chorus on “Eriel.” I thought “Losing My Insanity” was interesting because it starts out as a kind of pastoral folk tune and repeats the theme when the distorted guitar comes in. Now don’t think that Dio has gone too progressive, though, because tracks like “Fever Dreams” and “Challis” could easily find their place on Holy Diver. Those tracks embody the groove of that groundbreaking metal Dio created years ago. Likewise, “Otherworld” has that cool dark oddness of later albums like Angry Machines.

It is amazing to me that Ronnie James Dio, 57, has been making great rock and roll music for 43 years. He is Cortland, NY’s most famous son. Born Ronald Padavonna, his first band was The Vegas Kings in 1957 and cut his first single in 1958 with Ronnie Dio and the Red Caps. In 1961 Ronnie Dio and the Prophets were born and they recorded nine singles throughout the early and mid-60’s. A live LP was recorded in 1963 called Dio at Domino’s, which is now City Limits in Cortland. Later in The Prophets’ existence, Ronnie’s cousin Dave Feinstein joined the band. Feinstein would later enjoy much success as leader of heavy metal heroes The Rods. In 1967 Dio and Feinstein formed The Electric Elves (later shortened to The Elves), which included drummer Gary Driscoll, and recorded three singles. In 1970 Dio, Driscoll, and Feinstein regrouped the band with pianist Micky Lee Soule following a tragic car accident that killed guitarist Nick Pantas. This foursome proved to be the winning combination and in 1972 impressed Deep Purple’s Roger Glover and Ian Paice enough to get them hooked up with an album on Epic Records. By this time the band name was shortened to Elf, which is also the title of their first album. Elf is my favorite band ever. Billed as “The Greatest Little Rock and Roll Band in the World,” they toured with Deep Purple. Feinstein left the band in 1973, but the band continued on with Steve Edwards on guitar and Craig Gruber on bass. Dio had played bass as well as sung, but stepped out to be exclusively the lead vocalist. The band recorded L.A./59 in 1974 and toured with Deep Purple more. Elf then got an offer from Richie Blackmore, Deep Purple’s guitarist, to be the back-up band on his solo album. The band decided to fire Steve Edwards after recording their last album Trying to Burn the Sun and be in Blackmore’s band. Trying to Burn the Sun was, incidentally, the first album where Ronnie James Dio used his middle name. The band recorded an album in 1975 called Richie Blackmore’s Rainbow. Within months Blackmore fired the entire band except Dio. Dio continued in Rainbow until 1978. In 1979 he took up an offer to replace Ozzy Osbourne in Black Sabbath. He continued until 1982 when he decided to put his own band together with drummer Vinnie Appice. This, of course, was the band Dio, complete with the logo that says “devil” if you look at it upside down. The 1980’s were extremely good to Ronnie. He sold more albums than ever and had an amazing fan base. The band changed lineups throughout the decade, by 1990 evolving a sound, while full of talent, became less of a hard and raw edge. After another one-album stint with Black Sabbath in 1992, Dio was put back together. This time he had a new guitarist and bassist and the sound was decidedly heavier. Strange Highways(1993) and Angry Machines(1996) marked a more 90’s kind of sound for the band. A double live album, Inferno, was released in 1998. Now we are in the sixth decade that Ronnie James Dio has been creating music, and Magica seems to embody the influence and spirit that Ronnie has always achieved. All of the elements that make Ronnie Dio a great musician and magician are simultaneously chewed up, mixed together and spit back out at you in Magica. Right On!! Thanks to Bill Dallaire, Gary McCracken, and Bobcat for giving me the opportunity to write this article. Long Live Rock and Roll!!!