DIO
Dream Evil – Deluxe Edition
Universal 2013
My second favourite Dio album is the latest to get the deluxe treatment. In case you’re wondering “The Last In Line” is my favourite, as I always found the production on “Holy Diver” to be too brittle. Plus, “The Last In Line” had much better songs. But this runs it a close second, even if it is overlooked in the Dio canon of works. Which is a shame, as it has one of the best ever Dio songs in the shape of ‘I Could Have Been A Dreamer’, and three others that stand tall in his legacy – ‘Sunset Superman’, ‘All The Fools Sailed Away’ and ‘Naked In The Rain’. Even the other songs never slip to filler, and ever since I got my first copy, on cassette, at the open air market on Strutton Ground, this has been a favourite.
It was the the first Dio album to feature former Rough Cutt guitarist Craig Goldy, alhough he did appear on ‘Time To Burn’ on the “Intermission” EP and was the last to feature drummer Vinny Appice until the 1994 album “Strange Highways”. Now I’ve always found that Goldy has a tendency to overplay, but he is suitably restrained on this album, and it remains the best thing he’s ever done.
This new 2 CD deluxe edition comes with a bonus disc containing, oddly enough, ‘Hide In The Rainbow’ from the Dio EP, and sensibly enough the single edit of ‘I Could Have Been A Dreamer’. But, here comes your warning. The other bonus tracks, three through thirteen are actually Disc 2 of the “Live at Donington 83/87” which came out back in 2010. So, if you bought that you’ll have to think long and hard about this one. There is, apparently, a booklet with notes by Malcolm Dome, but as this was a digital review copy, I can’t pass comment on that. If for some strange reason you don’t have a copy of “Dream Evil”, then you really need to sort yourself out. However, it’s a collection filler only, if you have this on CD alongside the “Live at Donington 83/87” collection.
The Rocker - The Artist Formerly Known As Zeitgeist. TAFKAZ 
Leave a comment