Heaven and Hell, Helsinki 2007

[Beyond]

June 10th 2007, Helsinki - Finland.

I just had to go and watch the Heaven and Hell tour when thay came to Finland, actually they played two gigs here, both in Tampere and Helsinki.

Although I like more the music of Dio (the band) and Dio's Rainbow material than his Black Sabbath stuff it was a real pleasure to get to finally see Ronnie live for the first time. Dio has been to Finlad before, but I havn't had the opportunity to go to his shows at an earlier point.

The supporting act "Machine Men".. hmm.. not really to my liking, the first 30 seconds or so it sounded like Iron Maiden and Bruce Dickinson, but after that I really don't know what to say about them. Either the guys aren't really good enough for a bigger stage or their sound was just screwed up at the mixingboard. I personally feel that the lyrics and vocals of a song is what either makes the song work or not, therefore by making the vocals too laid back and not prominent enough I usually get the feeling a band is trying to hide something. Exceptions being something like Yngwie Malmsten, Stevie Vai and so on, where an instrument being played is "the thing".

But on to the real show.

Eventhough this was a setup of legends it has to be said, that once Ronnie enters the stage everybody else gets put in the shadows (no wonder Ritchie Blackmore had "problems" with RJD). Ronnie just takes hold of the audience and never ever lets go. The energy, the passion and the love for his music really shows and he takes time to talk to the audience between songs (but perhaps in just a little too rapid tempo for foreigners who aren't native in english, but that also shows how enthusiastic he is about what he is doing).

Winnie Appice was on fire behind the drum, and I really liked his solo, awesome stuff. Not the worlds fastest drumsolo, but very accurate, precise and driving.

The songs they played are about the same as in the other shows mentioned here so no need to go into that, only one thing to say about this gig:

Ronnie James Dio is the King of the World.

[holly]

Ronnie James Dio the king of the world?????????

No no no no.....

The GOD of the universe

[Beyond]

[kittenhasclawz]

It was so good.....