{"id":7098,"date":"2012-10-09T00:00:18","date_gmt":"2012-10-09T00:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=7098"},"modified":"2013-06-01T14:36:02","modified_gmt":"2013-06-01T14:36:02","slug":"album-review-dio-the-very-beast-of-dio-vol-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-dio-the-very-beast-of-dio-vol-2\/","title":{"rendered":"DIO – The Very Beast Of Dio Vol. 2 (2012) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

DIO
The Very Beast Of Dio Vol. 2<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nNiji Entertainment (2012)<\/span>
Rating: 8.5\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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While a lot of attention has been focused on the posthumous release of much Dio material, this compilation is spotlighting the lesser known Dio material. That\u2019s a good thing, and that\u2019s precisely what I love about The Very Beast of Dio Vol. 2<\/em>. The band made some great albums after Strange Highways<\/em> (1993), and this compilation highlights them. It pulls material from Angry Machines<\/em> (1996), Magica<\/em> (2000), Killing The Dragon<\/em> (2002), and the final studio album Master Of The Moon<\/em> (2004). Additionally, it offers three bonus tracks of sorts. \u2018The Prisoner Of Paradise\u2019 was a Japanese release exclusive to Master Of The Moon<\/em>, \u2018Metal Will Never Die\u2019 is performed alongside David \u2018Rock\u2019 Feinstein (and originally from 2010 Feinstein solo album Bitten By The Beast<\/em>), and \u2018Electra\u2019 was intended for the Magica II<\/em> album that we will sadly never hear. <\/p>\n

While I won\u2019t claim the final four albums were Dio\u2019s finest hours, this compilation proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that there were many classic Dio moments throughout those years. \u2018Killing The Dragon\u2019 gets to the very heart of Dio\u2019s legacy, both musically and lyrically. Of the four, that album is my least favourite in the catalogue, but hearing the title track, \u2018Better In The Dark\u2019 and \u2018Push\u2019 are firm reminders that there were some absolutely great moments on it. I\u2019ll forget \u2018Along Comes A Spider\u2019 is represented here.<\/p>\n

Other highlights include the piano \/ vocal rarity of \u2018This is Your Life\u2019 from Angry Machines<\/em>. While some fans hate this song to this day, I love that it stands as a testament to the fact that Ronnie James Dio tried really hard to branch out and break the monotony in the 90s with his work with Tracy G. \u2018Feed My Head\u2019 and \u2018Fever Dreams\u2019 are included here as well, bringing us back to that classic Dio sound, that any heavy metal bastard from the 80s instantly recognises and respects. <\/p>\n

The two previously released bonus tracks are nice to have here. For those who are not collectors, it\u2019s really cool to hear them and have them on a reasonably priced compilation. \u2018Electra\u2019 is the track everyone was waiting for however. It\u2019s hard to say how it stacks up really without any context. Also, with the passing of the legend, can we really be objective about it? The bottom line is that it\u2019s a solid song that any Dio fan will enjoy. It definitely feels like it falls in line with the material from the first Magica<\/em> album, so you may want to use that as your measuring stick.<\/p>\n

While I\u2019m not, in general, a fan of compilations, this is a very, very good one. It highlights a much overlooked part of this legend\u2019s contribution to heavy metal. Best of all, it only gives you the good parts. If he had saved all these songs and they would have been released as one album posthumously, this would\u2019ve likely been hailed as a true return to form. <\/p>\n

Mark Fisher<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

DIOThe Very Beast Of Dio Vol. 2 Niji Entertainment (2012)Rating: 8.5\/10 While a lot of attention has been focused on the posthumous release of much Dio material, this compilation is spotlighting the lesser known Dio material. That\u2019s a good thing, and that\u2019s precisely what I love about The Very Beast of Dio Vol. 2. The […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[24,378],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-7098","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-album-ep-reviews","category-dio"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7098","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7098"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7098\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12050,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7098\/revisions\/12050"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7098"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7098"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7098"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}