Black Sabbath - Live Evil (40th Anniversary Edition) (4 CD, 2023) [FLAC]

Black Sabbath made a two-pronged comeback in 1980 and 1981 when Ronnie James Dio joined their ranks as their new lead singer for the platinum albums, Heaven And Hell and Mob Rules. On the 1982 Mob Rules U.S. tour, they decided to record shows to create the first official Black Sabbath live album. With material drawn evenly between songs written with Ronnie as well as older classics such as “War Pigs” and “Iron Man,” when Live Evil was released at the end of 1982, it represented an accurate and powerful memento of Black Sabbath Mk2 on their second world tour.

Rainbow - Long Live Rock 'n' Roll (1978) [SACD ISO]

Long Live Rock 'n' Roll may be singer Ronnie James Dio's last album with Rainbow, but at least he went out on a high note. While the material is not quite as strong as on the previous studio effort, Rising, Long Live Rock 'n' Roll maintains the momentum the band had built up. "Kill the King" had been previously heard on the live On Stage record, but here it sounds more fully realized. Also, the title track from the album stands as one of the best songs the band did, not to mention a noble sentiment. The chugging "L.A. Connection" is another highlight. As with all of their first four albums, this one was produced by Martin Birch (who produced everyone from Blue Öyster Cult to Wayne County), and he really knows how to get the best out of the band by this point. The result is that the songs couldn't sound any better, so even if some of the material isn't quite up to their best, the album is still very cohesive, steady, and, ultimately, satisfying. This would turn out to be the last great album Rainbow would ever make, although they did enjoy a great deal of chart success in the post-Dio era. 

 

Rainbow – Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow (1975/2014) [SACD ISO]

Perhaps the first example of “dragon rock” — a style perfected by bands like Iron Maiden and Dio in the early to mid-’80s — was Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow, a rather pretentious 1975 collection from the guitarist’s first post-Deep Purple project. Fittingly enough, a young Ronnie James Dio provides the goblin-like frontman presence required by the increasingly Baroque Blackmore. 

 

Paul Gilbert - The Dio Album (2023) [24-48]

Nobody sensible would argue with Paul Gilbert's credentials, or indeed his enormous talent. Whether raising the bar for heavy metal with the perennially underrated RACER-X, conquering soft rock radio with MR. BIG or simply being one of the most technically gifted and creative guitarists on the planet, he is a certified walking benchmark for six-string artistry. He is also still more than capable of a surprise or two. Rather than paying tribute to another legendary guitarist from the past, as is so often the case with projects like this, Gilbert has made the laudable move of exploring the greatest hits of Ronnie James Dio, thus revealing both excellent taste and a gently subversive streak. On "The Dio Album", he casually becomes the late vocalist, albeit playing those glorious melody lines on the guitar, with his customary virtuoso flair and an often-startling amount of aggression. In truth, it's a slightly bizarre idea that sits somewhere between outright genius and goofy novelty, but Gilbert plays with such joy that only the most insular and petulant DIO fans could possibly take exception to it.

01. Neon Knights

02. Kill The King

03. Stand Up And Shout

04. Country Girl

05. Man On The Silver Mountain

06. Holy Diver

07. Heaven And Hell

08. Long Live Rock 'N' Roll

09. Lady Evil

10. Don't Talk To Strangers

11. Starstruck

12. The Last In Line

DIO - Holy Diver (2022 Joe Barresi Remix) [24/96]

Holy Diver is the debut studio album by the American heavy metal band Dio, released in 1983. Vocalist Ronnie James Dio had just finished his first tenure in Black Sabbath, whose drummer, Vinny Appice, he took with him to put together his own band. The roster was completed by his former bandmate from Rainbow, Jimmy Bain, on bass and by the young guitarist Vivian Campbell, coming from the new wave of British heavy metal band Sweet Savage. The album was acclaimed by the music press and is the band's most successful effort. 

Ronnie James Dio - vocals, keyboards

Vivian Campbell - guitars

Jimmy Bain - bass

Vinnie Appice - drums

01. Stand Up and Shout (3:19)

02. Holy Diver (6:11)

03. Gypsy (3:53)

04. Caught in the Middle (4:51)

05. Don't Talk to Strangers (4:55)

06. Straight Through the Heart (4:47)

07. Invisible (6:15)

08. Rainbow in the Dark (4:32)

09. Shame on the Night (5:42)

Black Sabbath - Heaven and Hell (Deluxe Edition, Remastered) [1980/2022/FLAC]

BLACK SABBATH's Ozzy Osbourne-era undoubtedly changed rock music and expedited the rise of heavy metal with the landmark work they released in the early '70s. That lineup however had been running on empty with their last two albums. 1976's "Technical Ecstasy" and 1978's "Never Say Die" were solid rock albums with a few catchy songs here and there but were not befitting of what they had built with their previous records. Ozzy Osbourne's 1979 firing put an exclamation point on that decline. Ronnie James Dio's vocal energy and lyrical craftsmanship was the exact injection of life that was needed to guide BLACK SABBATH into the 1980's, and Rhino's new Deluxe Edition of "Heaven And Hell" celebrates over forty years of the record's legacy with its new remaster, released with a generous helping of bonus live tracks spotlighting the greatness of that short-but-legendary chapter of the BLACK SABBATH story.

Dio - Holy Diver (Super Deluxe Edition) (4 CD, 2022) [FLAC]

Holy Diver was a platinum-certified smash and one of the late singer-songwriter’s most groundbreaking achievements. Rhino revisits this epic metal moment on HOLY DIVER: SUPER DELUXE EDITION, available as a 4-CD boxed set. 

 The collection comes with two versions of Holy Diver. The first is a new mix of the album made by Joe Barresi (Tool, Queens of the Stone Age, Slipknot). He used the original analog tapes to remix all nine tracks on the album. The second is a newly remastered version of the original 1983 mix. The Super Deluxe Edition also features unreleased live performances and outtakes, along with a selection of rarities from the era.

 

 

Dio - 5 Classic Albums (5 CD, 2017/FLAC)

 

1983 Holy Diver 

1984 The Last In Line 

1985 Sacred Heart 

1987 Dream Evil 

1990 Lock Up The Wolves 

Rainbow - The Polydor Years 1975-1986 (9 CD, 2007/FLAC)

 

1975 - Ritchie Blackmore's Rainbow (Remastered 2007)

1976 - Rising (Remastered 2007)

1977 - On Stage (Remastered 2007)

1978 - Long Live Rock 'N' Roll (Remastered 2007)

1979 - Down to Earth (Remastered 2007)

1981 - Difficult to Cure (Remastered 2007)

1982 - Straight Between the Eyes (Remastered 2007)

1983 - Bent Out of Shape (Remastered 2007)

1986 - Finyl Vinyl (Remastered 2007)

Dio - Great Box (4CD, 1991/FLAC)

Rare 1991 Japanese-only 38-track 4-CD boxed set including the albums 'Holy Diver', 'The Last In Line', 'Sacred Heart' & the exclusive 'Live Tracks'.

Rainbow - Deutschland Tournee 1976 (6 CD, 2006)

 

Deutschland Tournee 1976 is a 6-CD box-set released by the British hard rock band Rainbow in 2006, featuring live material from 3 concerts of the band's German tour of 1976, being Cologne on 25 September 1976, Düsseldorf on 27 September 1976, and Nürnberg on 28 September 1976. The complete set of 6 CDs was released only in Japan as a box-set. In Europe all three concerts would be released subsequently as separate double-CD sets, in jewel-cases, with the same track listings and CD timings.

"Over the Rainbow" was an introduction from the 1939 movie The Wizard of Oz that featured spoken line: "Toto, I've a feeling we're not in Kansas anymore. We must be over the rainbow!"

•     Ritchie Blackmore – guitar
•     Ronnie James Dio – lead vocals
•     Cozy Powell – drums, percussion
•     Jimmy Bain – bass
•     Tony Carey – keyboards

DIO - A Decade of DIO 1983-1993 (6 CD,2016/FLAC)

 If absence makes the heart grow fonder, then the hearts of Ronnie James Dio’s fans have surely been beating our of their chests since 2010, when the man who once fronted Elf, Rainbow, and Black Sabbath came to the end of a valiant battle and succumbed to stomach cancer. Beyond the aforementioned bands, of course, your man Ronnie also made a fair amount of music with his own band, the appropriately-named Dio, and in celebration of their decade-long reign within the Warner Brothers family as heavy metal heroes, we’ve put together a box set which includes newly remastered version of the six albums Dio released during the course of those 10 years.

• CD01 - Holy Diver (41:40)
• CD02 - Last in Line (41:32)
• CD03 - Sacred Heart (38:35)
• CD04 - Dream Evil (43:34)
• CD05 - Lock Up the Wolves (01:01:05)
• CD06 - Strange Highways (53:26)

Black Sabbath - Mob Rules (40th anniversary, 2 CD, 2021) [FLAC]

 

Mob Rules is the tenth studio album by English heavy metal band Black Sabbath, released in November 1981. It followed 1980's Heaven and Hell, it was the second album to feature lead singer Ronnie James Dio and the first with drummer Vinny Appice. Neither musician would appear on a Black Sabbath studio album again until the 1992 album Dehumanizer.

•     Ronnie James Dio – vocals
•     Tony Iommi – guitars
•     Geezer Butler – bass
•     Vinny Appice – drums

Additional performer

•     Geoff Nicholls – keyboards

Black Sabbath - The Rules of Hell [5 CD, 2008]

Deluxe 5-CD slipcase boxed set collects Black Sabbath's complete Dio-fronted catalog: Heaven And Hell, Mob Rules, Live Evil (2 CDs), and Dehumanizer. Each title was recently remastered for the first time ever and features extensive liner notes including new band interviews. Heaven And Hell (1980) is regarded as one of Sabbath's all-time best with its anthem tracks 'Neon Knights', 'Die Young' and the epic title track. Mob Rule's ('81) was the first Sabbath LP to feature Appice on drums (replacing Bill Ward), delivering high octane classics like 'Falling Off The Edge Of The World', 'Turn Up The Night' and 'The Sign Of The Southern Cross'. Live Evil, the group's 1982 double-live set, is an in-concert masterpiece and a testament to the raw power of Sabbath's Dio, Iommi, Butler, and Appice lineup on fourteen epic tracks. Dehumanizer ('92).

Dio - Evil Or Divine: Live In New York City 2003 [2021/FLAC]

 After the reawakening of Ronnie James Dio to a younger generation courtesy of his two-disc Rhino anthology Stand Up and Shout, the man remained alive and kicking for a year-and-a-half, sharing the road with fellow metal luminaries the Scorpions and Deep Purple. This collection of live recordings is the document of this tour, and it features the grand wizard of darkness in fine performing form, covering all of the well-known anthems like "Holy Diver" and "Heaven and Hell" and throwing in some choice new tunes for a balance of old and new. Dio heads will enjoy having this as a souvenir of the man's recent conquests in North America and Europe.