The Very Beast of Dio Vol. 2

Dio | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 9, 2012)
• Original Release Date: 2012
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Niji Entertainment
• ASIN: B008N5CH8C
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Music
• Average Customer Review: 4.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (19 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #40,705 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Track Listings

1. Killing the Dragon

2. Push

3. The Eyes

4. Along Comes A Spider

5. Better in the Dark

6. Fever Dreams

7. Black

8. Feed My Head

9. Shivers

10. Hunter of the Heart (Live)

11. One More for the Road

12. Lord of the Last Day

13. Electra (Bonus Track)

14. As Long As It's Not About Love

15. This is Your Life

16. Metal Will Never Die (Bonus Track)

17. Prisoner of Paradise (Bonus Track)

Editorial Reviews

2012 collection from the late, great Heavy Metal vocalist. Features 17 monster tracks including 'Killing The Dragon', 'Along Comes A Spider', 'They Eyes', 'Push', 'Metal Will Never Die' and many more.

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

32 of 34 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Contains last song Ronnie recorded, plus lots of other latter Dio era goodness October 9, 2012

By Joseph Siegler TOP 1000 REVIEWERVINE™ VOICE

Format:Audio CD

Ronnie James Dio has been gone just about two and a half years now. His last proper full album of material was the Heaven & Hell Black Sabbath album, "The Devil You Know" in 2009. The last proper studio album of Dio Band material was 2004′s "Master of the Moon". In that time, we've had several releases with Ronnie on them. Most of them when he was alive, some were not. Here's a rundown of Dio output since 2004...

* Master of the Moon (STUDIO ALBUM) - 2004, Dio
* Evil or Divine (Live Album) - 2005, Dio
* Holy Diver Live (Live Album) - 2006, Dio
* The Dio Years (Compilation w/ new Studio Tracks) - 2007, Black Sabbath
* Live At Hammersmith Odeon (Live Album) - 2007, Black Sabbath
* Live From Radio City Music Hall (Live Album) - 2007, Heaven & Hell/Black Sabbath
* The Rules of Hell (Compilation Box Set) - 2008, Black Sabbath
* The Devil You Know (STUDIO ALBUM) - 2009, Heaven & Hell/Black Sabbath
* Live at Donington UK 1983 & 1987 (Live Album) - 2010, Dio
* Neon Nights: 30 Years of Heaven & Hell - Live at Wacken (Live Album) - 2010, Heaven & Hell/Black Sabbath
* Ronnie James Dio Story: Mightier Than the Sword (Compilation) - 2011, Dio
* And Before Elf...There Were Elves (Compilation) - 2011, Elf/The Elves

So in the last 8 years, we've had two studio albums, six live albums, and four compilations (although one of these had three new studio tracks). So when I heard in the summer of 2012 we were getting yet another compilation, I groaned. I mean honestly, did we really need another one of these? I would promote it on the site like I promoted everything else, but I wasn't envisioning getting too terribly excited about it....
I requested a copy of it from Wendy's office, and one arrived. Spent some time with it over the last week, and I have to say I ended up enjoying this collection a lot. Mostly because I realized it's from his later studio Dio albums. There's a lot of material on these albums that have gotten overlooked because it's not "Rainbow in the Dark". Here's the full track listing...

1) Killing the Dragon (Killing the Dragon, 2002)
2) Push (Killing the Dragon, 2002)
3) The Eyes (Master of the Moon, 2004)
4) Along Comes a Spider (Killing the Dragon, 2002)
5) Better in the Dark (Killing the Dragon, 2002)
6) Fever Dreams (Magica, 2000)
7) Black (Angry Machines, 1996)
8) Feed My Head (Magica, 2000)
9) Shivers (Master of the Moon, 2004)
10) Hunter of the Heart (Live) (Inferno: The Last in Live, 1998)
11) One More for the Road (Master of the Moon, 2004)
12) Lord of the Last Day (Magica, 2000)
13) Electra (Magica II, Unreleased/2012)
14) As Long as It's Not About Love (Magica, 2000)
15) This Is Your Life (Angry Machines, 1996)
16) Metal Will Never Die (Bitten by The Beast (David Feinstein), 2010)
17) The Prisoner of Paradise (Master of the Moon JAPANESE, 2004)

Most of these tracks were released when Ronnie parted ways with long time label Warner Brothers, and as such, he bounced around to a few record labels for these albums. As such, promotion wasn't quite what it was before this. I know when I saw Ronnie on the Master of the Moon tour, he played a place that local bands played. Granted, when I saw him on the Strange Highways tour, he played a parking lot. Still, the latter Dio albums weren't always as easy to find in shops from what I noticed.

So it's quite good that these later albums have some light shined on them. There's some really great tracks on here. But it's not all about the compilation. There's a few gems and oddballs on here. Here's the "new" stuff.. (most isn't really "new" new, but new to most)...

1) The Prisoner of Paradise - This track comes from the final Dio studio album, Master of the Moon. However, this particular track was the track designated as being the "Japanese CD Exclusive" track. As with most tracks like this, the majority of fans never hear them outside of Japan. Oh sure, hardcores know about them, but the vast majority of fans tend to not track down rogue tracks like that, so this was good it was brought back.

2) Electra - This was a track recorded for the Magica II sessions. This was something that Ronnie was going to do - Magica II & III at the same time, and then he was allegedly going to retire when they were out. Then he got back together with Sabbath, and the activities released under the "Heaven & Hell" banner kept pushing off the Magica releases. Then Ronnie died, and nothing more would be done here. How much was actually recorded for the Magica II/III albums beyond this I'm not sure. But this completed studio track is a very cool inclusion. It was previously released on a box set that the Dio website sold exclusively there called "Tournado", but that was hyper limited edition, so this wider release is a better chance to get at this track.

3) Metal Will Never Die - Now this one is probably the most interesting track on the album. Why? Because it's supposedly the final song that Ronnie EVER recorded before he died. One of Ronnie's old friends and bandmates from WAY back was David "Rock" Feinstein. Ronnie recorded this song as a favor for him, and it turned out to be legendary because if it's status as "last". The track was originally released on the album "Bitten By The Beast" in 2010. While that was put out by Niji, I'd wager the majority of fans never heard the track. This will probably be a bit more widespread than that, so hopefully it will get some attention for David's album.

The remainder of the tracks all appeared on some other Dio album between 1996 and 2004. There's a ton of good stuff on there. The liner notes on the CD have a page with a story by Eddie Trunk about these latter tracks, and he shares the same opinion as me. Lots of good, mostly overlooked material here.

Normally I don't advocate compilations a whole lot. Your hardcore Dio fan will likely have most of these tracks anyway. But if you're someone who never checked out the Dio material after the first few albums in the 80′s, or are interested in the three tracks I highlighted above, I urge you to check this out. Read more ›

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars A Great Follow Up From The First Volume & An Honorable Tribute To A Metal Legend October 19, 2012

By That Metal Guy

Format:Audio CD

Since the untimely passing of the great Ronnie James Dio, we have seen numerous releases and re-issues of some of his classic albums from his early beginnings, to the Sabbath years, and his amazing solo career. Of all those releases, this album, the Very Beast of Dio Vol. 2 has been the most vital purchase for me personally. For starters, it contains the last song Ronnie sang in 2010 for David Feinstein's project, 'Metal Will Never Die'. Also included is the song 'Electra', which was supposed to be on Magica II and the Japanese bonus track for Master of the Moon, 'Prisoner of Paradise'. The other reason, is that I had not heard many of Dio's later offerings, so this was the perfect starting place for me. All the tracks are solid and can proudly stand up to Dio's classic canon. 'This Is Your Life' is quite powerful, just Dio and piano with some outstanding, empowering lyrics. If your a newer or fan of Dio's more popular works or maybe just missed the boat like I did on the later stuff, you should branch out and give this album a shot, you will not regret it in the least, a great companion to 'The Very Best of' or 'Anthology'. Long live rock 'n' roll and long live Ronnie Jame Dio!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Dio's Latter Day "Beast" October 16, 2012

By megatallicadiozzhalen

Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase

This is an outstanding collection of Dio's last 4 albums (Angry Machines, Magica, Killing the Dragon, and Master of the Moon) plus 3 excellent bonus tracks. I'm a huge Dio fan, and like all 10 of his solo albums, but it's nice to have his latter era greatest hits all on one disc. Throw this and "Beast of Vol.1" in the car and it's a great way to jam out to some Dio.
There are some songs I would have liked to have seen on here that aren't, but that's always going to be the case with greatest hits albums from artists that have so many awesome songs. All in all, this is a very good album, and when you throw in "Electra" and the hard hitting "Metal Will Never Die," this album is well worth the price of admission. I highly recommend it!

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Smart Song Selection + Bonuses October 16, 2012

By A Customer

Format:Audio CD|Amazon Verified Purchase

While a proper 2 disc set of his Reprise albums from "Holy Diver" through "Strange Highways" is definitely called for (Rhino issued the one disc 16-track "The Very Beast Of") in the meantime Niji Entertainment made a smart business decision to do it's own compilation of the Dio albums from "Angry Machines" through "Master Of The Moon" and called it "The Very Beast Of, Vol. 2". The four studio albums and 1 live album released during this period received less distribution than the Reprise years so they are not and were not as easy to find as the major label period. In terms of quality I feel they hold up equally as well. In my opinion Dio never made even a mediocre album. Even the critically-lambasted "Angry Machines" is great and needs to be revisited. Only two choice cuts are found here ("Black" & "This Is Your Life"), while a third, "Hunter Of The Heart", is a the live version from "Inferno: The Last In Live". These are the best songs from the album but there's still great tracks to be found on that LP. The next three Dio studio LPs get represented thusly, "Magica" (4 tracks), "Killing The Dragon" (4 tracks) and "Master Of The Moon" (3 tracks) and, again, they were pretty much the best choices (the title cut to "Master Of The Moon" is a gem that didn't fit I guess). While more cuts from these four great LPs could have been included Niji decided to fill out the compilation with some hard-to-find tracks. This is where they sort of dropped the ball.... While "Prisoner Of Paradise" (Japan-only bonus cut from "Moon"), "Metal Will Never Die" (Dio's song found on a David Feinstein's solo album "Bitten By The Beast") and the single "Electra" (from the "Tournado" box set and allegedly from the planned "Magica ll" album that never happened) are all great additions they left off the ferocious "God Hates Heavy Metal" (Japan-only bonus track to "Angry Machines") and "The Code" (Dio's vocal on The Rods' CD "Vengeance"), which would have really sold this set. As it is it feels incomplete. Three out of the five recent (or 6 if you could the "Annica" instrumental from Japan-only "Magica") tracks not found on proper Dio albums. I already have all 17 songs on here so it doesn't matter to me but I'm just saying...nevertheless, grading this set as a whole for what *IS* included it is five stars all the way and an essential purchase for a casual fan and Dio collector.

(Those whiney "one star" reviews are ludicrous and unnecessary. This 17 song set has a price range of $7.99 to $13.99 and even if you bought this for the three "bonus tracks" it is still worth it!!!. It's BECAUSE of illegal downloading or used to be making cassettes or burning discs for friends that independent labels make decisions like this. Not the other way around) Read more ›