Customer Reviews
Live evil rocks
It just always seem to be and always was. It is hard to think of time when Black Sabbath was Ozzyless. With Ozzy's departure in the 80's, the band went on with new singer Ronnie James Dio. Even though, most people tend to gloss over the Dio years. The band made some of its best music and Dio's presence seem to rejuvenate Sabbath. One can hear this on Live Evil.
This CD in the Sabbath catalogue is highly underappreciated. The songs on this CD are the perfect hybrid between the Ozzy years and the Dio years. I am not going to say that Dio is going to make you forget Ozzy on such Sabbath classics as Paranoid, Iron Man , or Children of the Grave. However, he does an admirable job. The songs from the Dio era are center stage here. One could make the point that Dio's songs are some of best music Sabbath ever made. The hot tracks are Heaven and Hell with The Sign of the Southern Cross thrown in for good measure. Another gem is Children of Sea.
Even though this album will not make you forget Ozzy. It will at least Make you appreciate the Mark II or Dio version of Black Sabbath a little more. Remember the mob rules and Ozzy drools.
Not as good as it could have been; 3.5 stars
The lineup included original members Geezer Butler and Tony Iommi on bass and guitar respectively, along with drummer Vinny Appice and singer Ronnie James Dio. After years of putting it off Black Sabbath finally got around to recording a proper live album on the 1982 Mob Rules tour. Hidden backstage was keyboardist Geoff Nichols.
On the positive side, the band positively smokes. Vinny Appice and Geezer Butler make for a thunderous rhythm section that keeps everything glued together, Tony Iommi plays his patented brand of doomy guitar with power and precision, and Ronnie James Dio's lungs of steel are displayed here in their full glory. The Dio-era songs are particularly well done and some of them are superior to the studio versions, most notably the extended version of "Voodoo". The versions of Ozzy-era tunes are a bit of a mixed bag. Dio doesn't bother trying to emulate Osbourne's stilted, chantlike vocal style and as a result some of the songs come out sounding a bit odd. I don't think many would argue that Dio is a better singer than Osbourne, but his interpretations of songs like "N. I. B. " and "Paranoid" seem a bit over the top. On others he blows Ozzy straight out of the water, most notably "Black Sabbath", "Iron Man", and "War Pigs".
Now the negatives. The biggest let-down on the album is the partial version of "Sign Of The Southern Cross", which is played as a sort of medley with "Heaven And Hell". For one thing I hate medleys and would rather hear fewer songs than have songs chopped to pieces, and for another not including the full version of "Sign Of The Southern Cross" (Sabbath's best song ever) is a crime. The unaccompanied guitar and drum solos are also a drag. Message to rock musicians everywhere: unaccompanied solos sound bad. Please just stop. Play another song instead. I'm a musician myself and I flatly refuse to take a solo spot. My final caveat regarding this album is the sound. Iommi and Butler decided to save money and produce the thing themselves, resulting in a muddy sounding mix.
These concerns aside, it's a good live album featuring killer performances of classic songs, and hearing Dio sing "Black Sabbath" is worth the price of admission by itself. Check it out.
after 25 years we finally get the record straight...
Walmart is selling a version which includes a bonus DVD called "Hangin' with Heaven and Hell" which features none other than Ronnie James Dio, Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler reminiscing about the past and while at it, TRASHING THIS record, "Live Evil", claiming that it was a crappy, studio doctored album and that they hate it. Indeed, in the midst of the renewed interest for this era in the history of the greatest metal band ever, we finally get to the bottom of it all: once again, the Mk II lineup of Sabbath is roaming this earth (under the not-so original moniker of Heaven & Hell) and to celebrate this event, we got a compilation called "The Dio Years". Is that a supposed to be funny? Because I, particularly, don't find it amusing AT ALL!!
Despite what the guys have to say about this record now, I have to say for the record that I, for one, love it 'cos the performances are great: Dio is simply superb (sure, a little over the top and operatic at times, but he's the greatest heavy metal voice ever), Tony takes extended time in the spotlight during the "Heaven & Hell" medley and solo spot, Geezer is solid and ground shaking and Vinny Appice leads the charge with a potent kick. The song selection is also adequate. The only possible complaint that I might voice is about the production and the overall sound, which is a little muddier than I would've liked (no wonder they had so many arguments while mixing it. . . ), but the performances really make up for that. My personal favorites are the bone crunching versions of "The Mob Rules", "Children of the Sea", "N. I. B", "Neon Knights" and "War Pigs", but I truly enjoy the album in full. Now, there are a couple of things that have been said about this album, by critics and fans over the years, that I feel compelled to address:
- There are currently two versions (sort of. . . ) of this record: the original two-disc and the reissued single disc. The difference in playing time is of about 3 minutes (the original clocking in at about 83 minutes, the single clocking at 80) and the edits were made to the between songs RJD's chatter. So it is not a huge, dramatic loss. . . but if you're finicky about such things, you better stick to the Warner two-disc release.
- It has been said that the album relies too heavily on the Dio material at the expense of the classic Ozzy material. I really don't see how anyone can say that: out of the 14 songs included, 7 are from the Dio era and 7 seven from the Ozzy era, including the instrumental intro (E5150) and outro (Fluff). If anything, I would say that the record is TOO short!!! And it only includes 2 "full" songs (in addition to the intro and a medley that included a bit of "Sign of the Southern Cross") from "The Mob Rules", the album they were supporting on this tour. Now, the upcoming "Live at the Hammersmith Odeon" is going to address that by including previously unreleased versions of "Country Girl" and "Slipping Away", but it is a limited production CD!!! What the hell is the deal with that, anyway???
-the split of the band: we've all heard the stories about it for years. . . the legend about Dio sneaking into the studio to raise his vocals, Tony's "little Hitler" remark about Ronnie, etc. . . by reading interviews with all of them over the years, I've been able to cross check references and piece together some of the puzzle: the engineer/producer they were working with at the time was a drunk, and that affected work on the album, and this person started the story about the after hours studio escapades (whether these were real or not, I don't know). But in the end, night prowling or not, I'm convinced that the breakup would've happened sooner or later, and it all comes down to one thing: egos. Remember boys and girls: as much as Ozzy was the singer and frontman for Sabbath, Tony was the true leader of the band, and he grew used to having a singer that he could use as a doormat to walk all over. But when Dio arrived. . . well, let's just say he was not about to be pushed around. . . I know this much: regardless of the reasons behind the split, it was a huge loss from a musical point of view and a plain, damned shame!!! I loved this version of Sabbath, and even though I love the original Sabbath as well, I feel that the Dio Sabbath has ultimately had a more profound, lasting impression on me. And when they reunited a decade later for "Dehumanizer", things just weren't the same anymore (even though I LOVE that record as well. . . )
Bottom Line: this is a decent, if not perfect, live document from the Dio era Sabbath. Sure, Ozzy loyalists now have "Reunion" and "Past Lives" to choose from, but I can't help but thinking that Dio fans still don't have a definitive live album from this incarnation of the band. Maybe "Live at the Hammersmith" will solve that, but its very limited availability means that most of us will have to make do with this instead. If you like Sabbath, disregard what you might hear about this record (even if the band itself is saying it. . . ) and get it: I honestly think that you won't be disappointed. In fact, the only reason why I rate this CD 4 and not 5 stars is because I think it could've been longer and because I hate this was this lineup's swan song. . .
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. You can see a complete list of all Black Sabbath discography, or go back to the Black Sabbath tabs
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