Early Ronnie James Dio

[Trane]

It's the voices that irritate me. AFAIC, Dio and Farlowe both ruined every band they were ever in. Livgren and Morse don't factor in because I've heard very little of either - strictly by choice.

OK, I gotcha

[Rarebird]

Think of Scorcese's early 90's movie about JC...

Or those friggin' would)be djihaddist and those Danish cartoons they'd never ever seen... they were told they existed and that sufficed.

Or those protesting The satanic verses, without having read the book.

I prefer Dio over Chris Farlowe, but I don't mind Chris Farlowe in Coloseum.

[dropforge]

[JeffCarney]

Compared to Ronnie, Ozzy's on autopilot.

Much as I admire Dio, I would disagree. Unless you're talking like 2016 Ozzy versus 1980 Dio, I think Ozzy had a slightly more impressive gift for vocal melody during his peak. While I can't imagine Osbourne singing "Neon Knights" or "Stargazer," nor can I imagine Dio coming up with stuff like "The Writ" or "Spiral Architect."

Also, Dio has an approach which does trace to Blues and Gospel. Brilliantly crafted into his own thing and eventually merged with the attack of Heavy Metal, but Osbourne came up with a style that somehow had knowledge of the Blues while moving further and further away from that overt influence. And let's not even get started on how high Osbourne could holler. Some of those '74 and '75 shows where he is singing stuff like "Sabbra Cadabra" sounds like it is coming from the other side of reality.

Part of Dio's legacy is Elf. He was singing "War Pigs" then and flirting with the future, but Elf were largely a Stones-like Boogie/R&R band. Dio sang his ass off on those records, but those albums are really not much. I also find the first Rainbow album vastly overrated. It's very good, but keeping in mind that albums like Physical Graffiti and Sabotage were coming out around this time, Blackmore and Dio were not truly ready for prime time just yet. Understandable as that was their debut, but both had been around. Rising was where it came together. But even here you have stuff like "Do You Close Your Eyes" which is just pretty standard dribble. The Dio and Iommi team was magic. And H&H and MR represent not only Ronnie's vocal peak but artistic and songwriting peak, IMO. But while I'm not much into Ozzy's solo career, could we say he was on "autopilot" during this period? I couldn't. I think his vocals on those first two albums of his were astonishing and further made it apparent that the timbre of his voice was almost impossible to even replicate. Dio had hundreds of guys ripping him off. Not many singers could sound like Osbourne.

Dio is certainly more technically gifted, but so is Al Dimeola more technically adept than Jimi Hendrix. Does that mean Hendrix was on autopilot? Don't think so ...

[Gruno]

Compared to Ronnie, Ozzy's on autopilot.

So very true!! Dio was a God and such a powerful vocalist!

[JeffCarney]

Feeling no need to "cut down" Ozzy Osbourne in order to "prop up" Ronnie James Dio, let me just add that, IMO, there has never been a more brilliant vocalist than Ronnie.

[davis]

I used to have all his doo-wop stuff but when I thinned out my bootleg heard, it did not make the cut

[zravkapt]

Not related to his early stuff but apparently he's still doing shows:

http://pitchfork.com/news/67354-ronn...our-next-year/