Master Of The Metal

No doubt about it, I'm a huge fan of Ronnie James Dio. To my ears, the man hasn't released a bad Metal album. Elf was a little hit or miss, but Rainbow, Black Sabbath and Heaven & Hell, plus his work with the Dio band... from 1975 until his untimely death in 2010, the man was flawless.

I first heard Dio when a friend's older brother threw in a cassette of Last In Line when he drove us to school one morning back in 1984. While I had already been on a steady diet of Hard Rock from bands like AC/DC and Motley Crue, and was starting transition to more Metal like Iron Maiden and Judas Priest, I couldn't help but be blown away by the intensity and power of the album's opening song We Rock. I was instantly hooked, and in the weeks that followed, I soon had a vinyl copy of Last In Line for myself. I rocked alongside Dio through Sacred Heart and Dream Evil, but by the time Lock Up The Wolves was released in 1990, I was starting to find a new love...Hardcore.

Hardcore quickly became an obsession with me. It consumed me, and soon it was the only kind of music that I would listen to. Anything I previously listened to paled in comparison. I held fast to this belief for the next 15 years, rarely giving any time to music styles outside of hardcore and punk.

Around 2004, I came up with this crazy idea to listen to my entire music collection...in chronological order by the year the album was released. It took me over two years to complete, but I had a blast listening to, and rediscovering, the music from my youth. Both Metal and Hardcore could live side by side in my world. I soon found myself searching Napster and then WinMX...filling in holes for the past 10 to 15 years of Metal that I had ignored. Dio was one of those bands. While it took me a little while to fully warm up to some of his later albums like Lock Up The Wolves and Angry Machines, I discovered that I would come to appreciate Dio's last couple of albums, Killing the Dragon and Master Of The Moon, almost as much as his classic 80's albums.

As part of my March Metal Madness, it should come as no surprise that Dio was a staple in my early 80's Metal playlist. I was cruisin' around on ebay, and found Master of the Moon on vinyl...US seller listed with a Buy It Now price...once again, I didn't hesitate and bought it. Back in 2004, major record labels were still pretty much considering vinyl a dead format. Yet, they would occasionally press small runs of vinyl, typically for overseas markets.

Master of the Moon was pressed on vinyl in Germany. I've read that only 500 were pressed on black vinyl, plus another 500 as a picture disc. The packaging is pretty slim for this one...no lyric insert or anything, but it is still cool to own the vinyl for this because the album cover is pure metal awesomeness.