DIO

Interview with Matthew Honey

I can still remember seeing Ronnie James Dio shrouded in dry ice on the stage of the Hammersmith Odeon whilst Tony Iommi belted out the Sabbath classics behind him, a huge grin creeping acrosss his face every now and again, so I was more than pleased to speak to Ronnie about the latest Dio release "Angry Machines".

How would you describe what this album sounds like, compared to your previous releases?
What we tried to do with this one was get out of the 80's sound. I think we were all trying to compete with effects, if the drums didn't sound as big as John Bonham played them it didn't work, we were all competing with these great sounds, double guitars, double voices. The first couple of Dio albums were done very much live. The drums you heard were the drums you got, nothing was added, no double guitars. That's what we wanted to do this time, that's the kind of music that's being made these days, very in your face.

Yes, the album sounds very 90's, which was why I was surprised by the album cover, it doesn't seem to fit with the music.
I think it does (chuckling), I guess I would have to say that. I think it does because the album is so different from what we've done before. There is no mystery, magic, dragons or rainbows. There is a song called 'Big Sister' that is a very Orwellian thing. I've just changed it round because I think women are going to be the controllers and the dominant force. There's a song called 'Institutional Man' which is as modern as it gets. The whole attitude I was trying to prevail on this one was one of realism; we are in a world that is rapidly being populated by computers and humanity is being reduced to being the creator of the computer that is going to take over the situation.

You mentioned the move away from the fantasy/science fiction lyrical style. Was that difficult or did it come naturally?
No it was easy. It was perhaps easier than going the other way. Especially if you do something so many times, you tend to be standing in place and recreating it over and over again There are only so many ways you can say "I love you" or "The dragon was slain by the knight" I consider this to be a more lyrically observational album, before it was a lot more escapist, especially the fantasy end of it That was 0K because the world was not a very good place to live in then either. It's an even worse place to live in now, with AIDS, over population, Bosnia, the Middle East, drive by shootings in America, racism, unemployment. Young people have no chance of receiving an education to get them a job because the only jobs left are McDonalds and Burgerking. I could have tried to put in a message to try and solve a few problems but I don't think I could have done that, so I wanted to do it from a more observational standpoint

You seem to be confronting it head on. Has anything happened to make you do that?
Just being disgruntled at what I see in the world, especially being someone who has generally made music for younger people, it is them that I feel sorry for. I have at least lived part of my life without the kinds of problems that face them. We seem to be rushing towards some kind of destruction and that bothers me very muchs so I need to talk about that.

You mentioned writing for younger people. I noticed that you first made an album way back in 1963. You have obviously been doing this for a long time.
A hell of a long time. Too damn long I think sometimes .

What keeps you going, what makes you fired up?
It's always the music and the people you make music for.It's never been a case of wanting to be something special, as I've never thought of myself as that. I've always wanted to be a group person. Most of this has been forced on me, to be Ronnie James Dio. I only ever wanted to be the bass player never the singer or writer. Sometimes in life we are cut out to do things we don't want to do and that has become my lot in life. But it has always been working with other people, the musicians, and then the people who appreciate what I have done, the audience, fans. I have always felt a responsibility to them. Writing a lot of escapist material before was for the younger people. I know when I was a young person I needed some form of escape The young sometimes need someone to speak for them. After aIl, I have had a stage, whether it be a CD, record or the stage that I play from. l've always tried to do that for people and have had a lot of lonely people gravitate to me, probably because of that escapist message. I guess the song that I wrote that typified it the most was 'Rainbow In The Dark'. That and 'Rock N Roll Children'. They are the songs that people mention to me the most. I get comments like "Thank you for writing that song, it got me through bad times. My friend had committed suicide, or my Mum was ill and I realised what you are saying and we are all rainbows in the dark etc. etc. That was very important to me and I continued to write that way. After a while, you begin to make the same statement over and over again, and you begin to lose your edge. Which is why I wanted to do the music that I am doing now. But the joy has just been making the music and being successful enough to continue to do it.

When I first played the album I thought, Oh it sounds a bit grungey...
Yes, other people have said that.

Having played it over and over again, it's not.
No, it's not.

But aren't you worried people are going to jump to that conclusion?
No, not at all. As you say, it's not that, it was never in my mind at all. One of the things that possibly made it sound like that was the fact that we used a baritone guitar on three of the tracks. Nowadays it's the wont to tune the guitar down two or three stops. We didn't do that, we used a baritone guitar, which is between a bass and a guitar, in some cases it adds that to it. Plus we added a lot of time changes We went where we wanted to go to, where we felt we needed to go to and there is perhaps a direct correlation between that and the kind of music that being made today. Traditionally I think we were always afraid to lose that 1,2,3,4 steady beat. The younger bands, some of them grunge bands, have changed the styles the tradition, and allowed us to be able to do that. I learn from what is going on around me, you should never be too old or too set in your ways.

You sound like you enjoyed yourself singing on the album!
I did, very much. I made a conscious effort this time to get back to way I used to be. More the Rainbow attitude or early Dio and first Sabbath album. Instead of spitting out the lyrics I tried to write a lot more melodically, which gave me the chance to sing. And that after all is my joy, to sing and use my voice as the instrument it is. It did giveme a lot of pleasure, plus I love the people that I work with l've never been happier working with musicians than I have with Tracy, Vinnie and Jeff. They give me great joy and hopefully I do the same for them But we are a band, we approach it together, we all have the same attitudes and when you do that you have to have a good time doing it. Besides that, If you are unhappy, you make bad music, you just do. I had a good time.

You've played in a lot of bands with a lot of great guitarists. Apart from your present band, who has been your favourite to play with?
I think Tony lommi is my favourite to play with. I enjoyed playing with Ritchie, he is the master technician, the master soloist, but Tony has so much to give in the way of riffs and as a rhythm guitar player which is wonderful for a vocalist, one who creates melody because he gives me basicness to deal with, whereas Ritchie is a bit more pointed. The things he played were the things you had to emulate at times because his melody roots were so strong. That's very evident of the things I've done with him and of the things he's done in Deep Purple as well, where vocalist has to follow what Ritchie has written. Tony gave me lot more freedom. He was my favourite.

Are all your bridges burnt, would you ever work with Ritchie Blackmore and Tony Iommi again, or do you look to the future?
We tried it once again with Sabbath, that accomplished what we wanted to do, we had only made two studio albums, 'Heaven and Hell' and 'Mob Rules', plus the one live album and I think we felt that after 12 years apart we hadn't accomplished what we needed to. which was to try one more time. I think we all felt that it wasn't going to be a one off, it was going to go on forever and we were going to go off gracefully and die in Sabbath, but that didn't happen and no, that will never happen again. We made a good album, at least we didn't get back together and do a reunion thing like a lot of people these days. I don't include Kiss in that because I think it was very important for them to do that so that people's children can see what their Mums and Dads were talking about when they mention this incredible make up band with a great show. I have no time for people who get back together for what it can earn them.

In the case of Rainbow and Ritchie we have grown much too far apart. I think Ritchie has stayed on one level and continues to make the same kind of music over and over again. I am a much more experiment person and I think for us to get back together would not be productive for either of us. Although there has always been talk of it. In fact, we will be playing a couple of shows in America with Dio on the same stage as Rainbow and I can tell you there will be no meeting of the minds or meeting of the musicians at that time. Again, being realistic, the answer is no to that.

'Don't Tell The Kids', can you tell us what that song is about?
The song is about people's attitudes in a divorce. We don't involve our children in life crisis situations. Divorce is a life crisis. Most of the time the man and the woman just beat each other around the head and don't include the children. Children see things so clearly, without the trappings of growing up and if we only asked our children, if the two people in the song asked their children, what they think, the answer would probably be "you two have no chance of getting along, you probably never did and certainly never will so why don't you just end the relationship, make life easier for both of you and certainly for us". The phrase "Out of the mouths of babes sometimes come gems" is certainly very true. So it was meant as a very sarcastic title, don't tell the kids, they have no experience.

In 'Stay Out of my Mind' there is a great bridge in the middle.
Yes, the neo-classical thing.

Was there a point to it or is it there for pleasure?
It was just there for pleasure, some things you do musically seem correct, they seem as if they need to be there and that particular song because it is so strange in itself I felt needed to have that neo-classical orchestrated part in the middle of it. I also wanted to make the album as different and startling as possible and I think it succeeds in that particular place.

How about 'Hunter of the Heart?
'Hunter of the Heart' is one of the more traditional pieces on the album. It goes to where it goes. It's about the gigolo attitude, the man or woman who preys on the weakened soul, the weakened heart and takes severe advantage along the way, leaving a trail of brokenness.

'Double Monday', is that about having a really bad day?
Exactly I liked the play on words. Everyone says what a bad day Monday is, and I thought Double Monday has to be the worst.

One thing I liked about the new album, it is your band. You're the star of the show, yet you give the music time to unfold. You don't sing over everything. Is that because you started out as a musician and became a vocalist?
I think that is probably a great part of it, but I don't think of myself as the star of the shows or any show I've been involved in. Music is made by the collective and the collective contribute just as much in the writing as I do on this album. My job is to be the singer and sing when I'm supposed to and shut up when I'm supposed to, thereby giving the others a chance to be heard and create. I think I give more latitude to drummers than anyone else making this type of music and if there is space to breathe our drummer Vinnie will fill it up. I think a lot of people will say it is too busy but anybody who has that expertise and deserves to be heard should be heard. That's my attitude, we are a band, four people. I do my job when I'm supposed to, they do theirs when they are supposed to. It just makes us all very happy and it works.

Do you have any other side projects?
I have done a guest spot on an album by the band Dog Eat Dog, they called me if I would come and perform with them on the track called 'Play Games'. The album is all about sports which is a love of mine so that was a nice level playing ground for us - sorry about the play on sports. But they asked me, they are a band unlike anything I've ever done before and it was a great chance to rub shoulders with young wusicians who play very well and who don't take themselves too seriously, that's what I liked about them, they write things with humour. I thought this as a great opportunity to learn something from them. They also know a lot about the history of music, they had always been Dio fans, Kiss fans, Ozzy fans, PurpIe fans, which I think is very important and so I agreed to do it and I had a great time. That's the only side project I have ever done. And probably the only one I will ever do.

So Dio is going to be your future?
As long as I can be accepted, yes it will be.

This interview is taken from Hard Roxx November 1996, issue 15.