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The Passing of Ronnie James Dio

Once again we are reminded of our mortality as a million metal hearts break with the sad news of the passing of the metal god Ronnie James Dio. The news has come as a shock to the majority of Dio’s fans around the world. Diagnosed with cancer late last year Ronnie seemed to be very optimistic about kicking the cancers ass, we all were optimistic even after the cancellation of the Heaven and Hell summer dates, we all hoped that the dragon would be slayed and we would have many years of music ahead. Unfortunatly on the 16^th of May Ronnie James Dio lost his fight and a hole has been left in the world of metal and rock that can never be filled. Leading bands Elf, Rainbow and deep purple, shaking the globe with Black Sabbath and Heaven and Hell, Ronnie James Dio was a vocalist like no other. With his small stature Dio commanded every stage he stood on with a vocal style unique, loud and melodic that made him a giant even over the largest crowds.  Dio’s vocal style could not be compared to anyone and would never be matched. His lyrics about mysticism brought the listener on journeys to faraway lands far, far away from the bullshit of everyday life. The man all of us will recognise as the one who gave us metal heads the devils horns that we salute to each of our metal breathern. Our very own salute to each that shall always remain to the metal community.

Ronnie James Dio will be missed forever by all metal heads around the globe, not a conversation about metal vocalists will pass without his name ranking in the top 10. A legend and an inspiration to many and to generations yet to come. Unfortunately I never got to see Dio live, I taught this year as special guests to Iron Maiden I would see the mighty Heaven and Hell, alas it was not to be. It is a fine tribute that Dio should go out with such a fantastic and critically acclaimed album as “The Devil you Know” but all his work shall be remembered as masterpieces of unique style which was his own. Our condolences go out to Wendy Ronnie’s wife and all the musicians Ronnie James Dio has ever worked with in his long and outstanding career. The world has lost a legend that can never me matched or equalled, the void will never be filled but the legacy of Ronnie James Dio shall never be forgotten.

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Blaze Bayley Interview 06/03/10

On Saturday March 6^th I had the pleasure of interviewing Blaze Bayley in Dublin, now as you know I’ve done some interviews in my time, I’ve met some legends but as I prepare for the interview with the man himself it suddenly hits me, I’m about to sit down and chat with Blaze Bayley. I’m saying this so you realise if I come across as a bit of a fan, well, that’s because I am a big fan of Blaze’s work! From Iron Maiden to Blaze and now the band under the name Blaze Bayley it has to be said he has done some cracking work. To me “The man who would not die” was one of the best metal albums of 2008 and this year’s follow up “Promise and Terror” not only continues on in excellence, but live, these songs are powerful! What also struck a chord with us all who sat around the table was that Blaze Bayley is one of the most down to earth and genuine people you can meet. Now that’s not just my opinion!!! Our good friend Tubbs from the Motorhead road crew sat with us, he’s been all over the world, met them, all our favourite’s, from some of the biggest bands ever, but it seems that Blaze Bayley is down here on the same level as us metalheads, by just being a true metalhead himself!

Usually when you do an interview with a band you might get the usual 15 minutes or so but with Blaze giving us a good hour of his time the only way to do the interview justice is to transcribe the whole thing, almost word for word, so that hopefully you get a sense of what it was like on the night,

Edisson: Blaze Bayley welcome to Dublin and how the hell are you?

Blaze: Glad to be in Dublin after such a long time, it’s been really difficult to get these gigs organised because of all the problems that I’ve had, were really glad that were finally here and really, really, looking forward to the show, we’ve got some big surprises for the show tonight, as you know we try to change the set every night, everywhere we go we try and add a few different songs but tonight we’ve added all the songs, it’s going to be the longest set of the tour here tonight in Dublin, because of it taking so long to come here and because of all the cancellations. If you have an original ticket from one of the cancelled show’s you can bring it to the merchandiser here and you can get any item from the merchandise stall up to the value of the ticket. I just want to say a big thank you to the fans for sticking with us and for supporting us even though it’s been such a long time since we’ve been here. So were hoping, touch wood, that from now on with every album Dublin will be on that tour.

Edisson: I think just by that alone people are going to be sorry they didn’t make it tonight.

Blaze: Well we’ve always had our problems, even in Wolfsbane, I forget the name of the promoter now, but he did a lot of the big tours here at that time, we said we wanted to do a tour of Ireland, because we wanted to tour in Ireland like we did in Scotland at the time, so Belfast went great, then I think it was Kerry and a few other ones that went great we got to Dublin and the venue had been moved, it had been moved the night before so we went to the new venue and said we were the band playing here tonight, the owner just turns around and say “there’ll be no gig here tonight lads, this place is a gay club tonight” (everyone burst into hysterics) and that was supposed to be our first headline gig in Dublin. We came back a few years later though and played the Baggott, that went great, we stayed in Barry’s hotel which is just around from the Gresham, one of the poshest hotels, the manager we had at the time, fantastic manager dose slayer, he got trapped in the hotel with a flight at 7 o clock and he couldn’t get out of his room, he had to climb out the balcony and try to scale down, he had to escape from Barry’s hotel. And the furniture, fucking hell, Actually if the antiques road show ever come over take ‘em to Barry’s hotel and they’ll be like, “fuckin’ hell what a find”, there’s none of this fitted stuff it was all bare old furniture that someone would have in their house, it was unbelievable. We went to the bar, asked what time do you finished serving and he said “When you’re finished drinking well close” It was great, you know I always remember those things, they were great. And one of the best gigs, ever, ever was when we supported Iron maiden, right here in Dublin with wolfsbane. Even that was a problem to get to. I flew in, because I saved up all my money, me and my girlfriend managed to get a flight from Birmingham to Dublin, got to the gig, no problem at all the gig was sold out!

Edisson: Was that the fear of the dark tour?

Blaze: Yeah, it was sold out, I’m there hours before the show, but there’s no sign of the band! The rest of the band were driving over, an hour before the show no sign of the band, 30 minutes before the show no sign, 10 minutes before the show the band pull up in the van, they only went and missed the fucking ferry at holly head. The tour manager got lost and they had to wait for him. They just barely made it. So were all rushing falling over each other onto the stage, so we almost didn’t get to play in Dublin at all again. I said to all my lads, as much as I love coming here we’ve never really had a good headline show here in Dublin. The last time we played here, I don’t know if the world cup was on, it was badly promoted, no one knew we were on, so when we got here tonight and they said they’d sold 150 tickets, I said I think you must have got that wrong because I played to 12 people last time, it was a beautiful room, great venue, it would have been 15 but 3 of them were teenagers and the fuckers wouldn’t let them in. So every time I’ve been to Dublin, something has happened, so I’m just waiting tonight for something to go wrong. We said we’d play our longest set tonight because if anyone dose turn up I’ll be fucking amazed! And look at it now, I just can’t believe it.

Edisson: So things are really picking up?

Blaze: Yeah, we started off in the UK, cause that’s where I’m from. When we got Anna our manager, I said “Forget all this, you shouldn’t be seen here, or you shouldn’t be see there that place is too small, were doing things totally different, I DONT GIVE A SHIT WHERE WE GO, AS LONG AS THERES FAN’S THERE! Once we get paid the money and we can afford it were going!” Also we wanted to charge the lowest ticket prices we can give, managers and promoters in the past  wanted to charge twenty quid or more to see me, it’s ridiculous, your either in a big venue and there’s nobody there or people have to travel and their fed up, it becomes expensive, we said were changing that! We will go anywhere no matter how small, if they got the P.A. and they got the equipment were going there, I don’t want fans to have to travel hundreds of miles and pay fifty quid on the car park and over six pound a pint, it’s just not on! We’re not going to get on mainstream TV, were not going to get on mainstream radio so were gonna do it the old fashioned way, were going to go out and play to people who normally go out on the weekends to see bands and that’s it! With Wolfsbane we got from nothing to getting a review in kerrang and our own demo tape to becoming the biggest unsigned metal band in the UK. We played and played and when we got a record deal we wanted to carry on but we weren’t allowed to do that! WE PLAYED LESS GIGS AFTER WE WERE SIGNED UP! So this time around I said that’s enough of that so this tour I’m playing more shows than I did with iron maiden. It’s the first year that our album has come out on time that’s because it’s our own label, we set it, it’s the first time that the press has been there on time because we set it, it’s the first time we even had a tour when an album has come out since I left maiden. How can it go so wrong it’s not that complicated to organise everything? So that’s why were going to these places, we don’t give a shit about some advertising campaign, you might sell a fan one album that way, they trick you into buying the first album but they won’t buy your second album! If we do things our way and go take it to the fans, they decide right, that’s a band worth supporting and their loyal fans because their into heavy metal and that’s it! You stick with it. So over the next two years were gonna play as many places as we can. So hopefully next year or the year after we hope to come back to Ireland and not just play Dublin. We’ll play cork and maybe Galway, if we can play maybe six shows we will, as long as there’s a place to play and we can afford it we’ll come there.

Tubb’s (Motorhead road crew): I like your way of doing things its shocking the way fans are made pay fifty quid a ticket to see a band and the band probably only get 30 quid, the fans are getting ripped off!

Blaze: That’s it exactly, if you buy a ticket to our show your supporting us, if you buy a cd your supporting us. Before if you did this you were paying to the record label! You pay to some guy, you pay for his office and pay for his big car and whatever else is on his label which is probably crap. If you see a band in the academy or the o2 and you buy a ticket more than likely most of the money goes to the record company and the venue. You already have to hire the venue in the first place then when your there the venue automatically takes 25% of your t-shirt money. It’s crazy and were not part of that!

Edisson: So this all brings back why you gave SPV their marching orders and things seem to be working better now for Blaze Bayley because of it, so what advice can you give bands starting out now to help them avoid the record company trap?

Blaze: The main thing is, rehearse, practice all you can and most especially write the music you believe in! One of the biggest advantages we have in this band is no one is trying to copy anyone. None of us in this band want to be iron maiden or Metallica or Megadeth none of us want to be like anyone else, we certainly don’t want to be the new Nickleback none of us give a shit about what’s in the charts or what’s happening! We just go into a room with all our ideas and go, I might have something to go with that and something with another idea, we never say “doesn’t that sound a bit old fashioned or doesn’t that sound a bit retro, we never do we just ask each other do we like it and if we do that’s it.  Once the idea is good, once we can take the listener on a musical journey saying here we are come follow us. We don’t play any stupid tricks on anyone, that’s why people will trust you, the listener will catch a song and it’ll take them somewhere they didn’t expect and they enjoy it so they will follow you.

Edisson: It’s true what you just said and it seems the bands that really get somewhere are the ones who literally don’t give a shit.

Blaze: Exactly, the main thing is to pick and write something you are totally happy with and that will be your sound and creation. It’s the key to an original sound to be happy with what you’re doing.  Don’t get me wrong we all wear our influences, I’m a massive Bon Scott and Ronnie James Dio fan, early Ozzy and all those classic vocalists, you can tell that as well but I’m not trying to sound like those people, I’m just trying to get the sound that I want to tell the story emotionally in the song. What I leaned in Wolfsbane is we went back and one of the songs we had was called “Man Hunt”, it was on the first demo and first album so whenever we get together we still play it and it always goes down great, that shows that it always might be a bit hit and miss when you start but that doesn’t mean that you not doing something that’s valid. You actually manage to get selective, you come up with a few ideas and some are shelved that you come back to but starting off you have one idea, then another idea and another and try to finish everything you come up with. You have to be selective to things you feel really work. Another thing is what we do now and did then is we write for being live! For us the studio part of it is a recording process, we don’t put much creativity into that, we mix it and go ok, this is a recording there are a few more elements in there compared to being live but were always thinking how is this song going to stand up live, how is it going to be performed live, does it make sense live and I believe that’s exactly what you should do. Also don’t be afraid of the technology, get you own type of recorder and record yourself as soon as possible, immediately record yourself even on something as basic as a Dictaphone and you will hear exactly how fucking terrible you are! (Everyone keels over laughing) That is the very first step towards serious improvement. Once you start recording yourself on anything you will forget these ideas that you’re going to be playing the point (O2) next year and in a studio in two weeks because somebody will discover you, you will actually discover that when you compare yourself to other bands you realise you’re not really in tune, the guitars sound shit, the drummers going faster and slower and the vocalist sounds like he got a kick in the bollix. That’s when you really start and its one of the things I did early on, when we started to gig we would record them, we wouldn’t get pissed straight afterwards like the other bands we used to go sit around and listen to the performance, you’d hear the faults, you’d hear what’s too fast, I’d be trying to figure out why I can’t understand what I’m saying. Then when video came out, we were one of the first band to record our live performance, it was so expensive, we had to rent cameras, you’d look at the footage and go you cheesy wanker, then that’s shit and that’s good, out of the whole half an hour you might only get one bit that was any use! That’s the best way to improve you should be your own worst critic. You’ll always go out and perform and do your best but you have to look at it realistically and ask yourself how am I gonna improve. To me its metal, metal is always searching and pushing yourself for constant improvement.

Tubbs: One thing I have to bring up is the real class of bands like yourself. Take Simon Cowell for instance who takes people and says this is not about the singing factor it’s the x factor, they have 1% of talent and people like him take it and use it 99% of the time, it’s pure shite, it’s amazing how people can take something like that and sell tickets, take over the charts, when there are so many real bands working out there that are the whole package. I mean there going as far as bringing back vanilla ice with Jedward and they’re making the charts!

Blaze: I can’t understand it either; who would have ever taught that shit flavoured ice cream would sell!

Edisson: I have to go on and ask about the band, “The Man Who Would Not Die” was one of the best metal albums of 2008. I would have taught it would have been a very hard act to follow but you come together and make an absolutely cracking performance on “Promise and terror”. There must be a great chemistry with the band now to keep producing music and performances of this quality?

Blaze: We’ll you know it’s been a long time between the two albums…….

Edisson: When you look at the majority of bands out there it actually hasn’t been that long.

Blaze: Well in that time a lot has happened to us and I mean a hell of a lot! So much and it’s been a big struggle but we’ve managed to thankfully keep it together.

Edisson: Especially with yourself personally. You really have kept it together where people would have just packed it all in but you kept going.

Blaze: Well I wanted to but I had so many friends around me, a lot of support, so many fans sending me wonderful messages asking me to keep going. So many wonderful people supported me and were so kind that one of the things that really kept me going was that if I gave up I would be leaving so many people down. My wife defiantly wouldn’t have wanted it so I kept going.

Edisson. If I’m not mistaken she had mentioned it before that if anything happened to her you should always keep going with your music.

Blaze: Yeah, a while before she passed away we had a casual conversation, she was nagging at me about not taking medication, not taking my vitamins not wanting anything to happen to me and she said “Well what would you do if anything happened to me?” I told her I’d give up!  What would be the point of living, my life was over before you met me, that was it, she was my life, she was my everything. She said “no, I would want you to go on!” Obviously we never taught anything would happen, a few weeks later she was in a coma. If it wasn’t for my wife I probably wouldn’t be here. She managed to get the money together to finance the first album, she got the money together to get David and Nick to England so that we could rehearse and write together. So without her we wouldn’t be together so in one way I’ve been really lucky. In another way I feel that whatever success I have started with her because she saved me. She got me together, stopped me drinking, got me to start practicing, to start looking after myself, so without her I wouldn’t even be here, I don’t even know if id actually be walking around.

Edisson: So to change the subject it’s been announced that you’re going to be playing hard rock hell on the same night as Paul Di Anno……..

Blaze: I heard nothing of that its news to me……..

Edisson: But it was announced on the website yesterday?

Blaze: What on the internet? I wouldn’t believe everything you read on that!

Edisson: But it was the official site?

Blaze: Aw ok, fair enough so I’ll do it! It is the first I’ve heard of it but if the opportunity is there I’ll defiantly do it.

Edisson. Now there’s one question I gotta ask, myself and the vice president of the I.M.h.C. both work in the motor trade and we know what it’s like to deal with the public every day especially those annoying customers who seem like they only come in to get on you wick, but you actually worked in the motor trade after iron maiden and had to deal with this as well?

Blaze: That’s right I worked in Halfords, one of my fans was manager in Halfords and mentioned it to me that if ever I needed a job to just call him. I had no gigs coming in, id been dropped by the record label, I had absolutely nothing coming in at all. I had bills and bills piling up. I phoned Jerry, Jerry Flaherty his name is, I said Jerry I’m absolutely stuck is there anything you can do for me, he told me to come in and I didn’t even have to fill in a form, he says how many hours do you want? And I told him I’ll do whatever hours you can give me, I’m so stuck I really needed to get these bills down. He started me part time, letting me do as many hours as I wanted on the condition that I just let him know a week in advance if I needed time off for gigs if they came up. I could have as much time off for the band as I needed. So I started and whatever hours the shop was open I was there. I had to start learning how to make number plates, of course I knew my war around the car since I always had crap cars. But it was great that I could work so hard and then just say right I’m off for 3 weeks to do a tour or I’m off to work in the studio for a couple of days then come back and back into work again to keep me going. It was before me and Debbie got married that I lost my house because I spent so much money on trying to keep the band together, on equipment and recording, SPV hadn’t paid me the money they owed me in the contract so I went broke! Completely broke and because I spent the money before I got it I went completely broke, the bank called in the overdraft, they took my credit card machine off me so my fans couldn’t buy stuff over the internet, they killed me completely so I lost my house. I had to move out of my own house which I still blame SPV for taking. It was around then I was working in Halfords and one day it got on top of me really really bad. That was the day the police came and arrested me.

Edisson: Was it from hitting a customer?

Blaze: Yeah, you see the thing is, when a shop lifter would come in people would turn to me because I’m so confident, I’d just walk over to them and go “Come on fuck out of the shop!” and that would be that. Because of that people got nasty, I got threatened 3 or 4 times, I’m gonna get you, I’m gonna follow you home, of course they never do because there pricks! This day, it all got on top of me, I was losing my house I was the only full time member of my band, I had no record deal, and this bloke came into me and started slagging me off! Now I might be a fucking shop assistant but I’m a human being, I don’t say I’m famous and have been all around the world! I can go to any rock bar in the world and get a drink bought for me but that’s not important, that doesn’t make me special or a good person, what makes me special is the fact I phone up my step mum to see how she is! I take care of my friends, that whoever has the money in my band buys the fucking chips at the end of the night! That’s what’s important! So this prick comes in and starts all this shit. It was at this moment that I realised I had super powers!!!! (Everyone cracks up) Its true because witness’s of the event say I sprang like a cat straight over a five foot counter, it was like I became some x-man, I just grabbed him and BOOM! The bloke was really lucky to be honest because we had a full complement of staff that day and it took five of my mates to drag me off. I had bruises on me for a week from where they were grabbing me to drag me off. While there doing that this bloke says if this carries on I’m phoning the police, “Fucking phone em you’ll be dead when they get here” So he did and they took me down to the station. Debbie came to get me and she just laughed! When she asked what happened I said “I lost my temper!” She said “That’s the last day you ever work a day job, your BLAZE BAYLEY, you’re a singer, that’s it” and it was, that was the last time I ever worked a day job. She made me, she wouldn’t let me get a regular job again, she said no more day jobs, you’re a singer, you just can’t do it you have to get something in your industry. So I couldn’t get people to come over and play with me because I didn’t have any money so I went around and played about 15 shows unplugged and that really gave me my confidence back. Fans loved it and people stuck with me, so it became the start. We started to get a bit of money together, we got together enough to bring David over from Colombia, eventually start writing, we got more so we could organise a drummer who we got in Larry! So that moment which was probably one of the lowest points in my life ended up to be the massive turning point!

Edisson: I can sympathise with that because I work in the motor trade and some customers seem to make it their job to just come in and ruin your day. So you never know…..

Blaze: Yeah maybe someday you can have a go too!

Edisson: Yeah so beware! Right its being running around the iron maiden online forum for a while, so what people are wondering is have Iron Maiden approached you yet about you involvement with the history of Iron Maiden DVD’s?

Blaze: No, obviously id be up for it but no one has got in touch with me. Steve’s got my email, we email each other every so often to keep in touch. So I’m sure if they wanted me for something they’d let me know. I taught they’d probably do something for the 30^th anniversary, maybe with the 3 singers or something, I taught that might be quiet funny. To be honest the sticking point might be Paul. You see I’ve been friends with the band, I’m friends with Bruce, I met Bruce before I met any of the band, then my friendship with the band grew. But the thing with Paul is you never know what he’s going to say.

Edisson. Actually Paul is an honorary member of The I.M.h.C. and he told us he’s been to a few of your shows from time to time?

Blaze: Yeah, he has, he came to a few shows. You see the thing about Paul is whenever I see him, he’s a great bloke, he’s a great laugh, then I’m doing an interview and the journalist says “well Paul said this about you, Paul said that about you”

Edisson: The question is did he actually say those things about you! He never passed a bad word to us! So things are going great now?

Blaze: The most important thing now is what I’m doing, the Blaze Bayley band. It’s been a struggle to get here, to finally get recognition…..

Edisson: Actually speaking of recognition, “Promise and Terror” has become the biggest pre sale you ever had!

Blaze: Yeah the biggest demand of presales we ever had in our shop! It’s more than double the albums that we gave to the distributor last time. So it’s been going good, we’ll see.

Edisson: Yeah and I’d like to thank a certain website (who can’t be mentioned) that mistakenly sent me for my order the avatar soundtrack featuring the brand new song by Leona Lewis!!! Imagine sending that shite to the international metalheads club president!!!!!

Tubbs: Don’t forget about Jedward! (Cracking everyone up again)

Blaze: Well you’ll know better the next time! The best place to order my albums is to go to blazebayley.net and go to our online store! You can pre order there before the album comes out and you will be guaranteed to get it before any other company can get it to you. We are our own record company, we own it, we set the release date, no one else is allowed to give you the album before then! We can because it’s our company and it’s our album! Almost every fan that ordered “Promise and terror” from us got it before you could get it in the shops!

Edisson; and sometimes you can get a few extras?

Blaze: Yeah what we did with the first five hundred is you got a DVD with the making of! A t-shirt! Everyone was individually hand numbered and signed by me with a certificate of authenticity. So only that first five hundred got that t-shirt, only they have got the signed numbered cd and only they have got the DVD. That’s what we do, we want to give the fans value.

Edisson: It really is great and I kinda wish all bands would work the same way. Look after the fans! Treat the fans with respect and it pays off in the end!

Blaze: We’ll that’s what we think but unfortunately not everyone thinks like that.

Edisson: It’s mainly the record companies!

Blaze: Well record companies basically treat people like cows. You may as well be a cow in a shed. How much can we get out of em? Then once they’re gone then we can get new ones. They’ve got these massive marketing seminars, they’ve got everything worked out in a democratic who will buy what way, how many of your friends will buy an album, what you’ll tell your friends in school. It’s all bollocks that they go to school for, learn this crap and none of this is related to a fan being a person with a mind. A lot of people in the industry treat fans like kids! Do I look like a kid! So all fans are kids, innocent and child like and easy to brain wash! How insulting is that! I hate that!

Edisson: I know what you mean, then again there was a survey came out that said metalheads were the most intellectual of all music fans. There’s so much going on in their heads that metal is their release and a way to let go from everything that builds up in the head. It’s a total escape.

Blaze: The thing about metalheads is where ever we are, at a festival or a gig or whatever, we all stick together. More than what you see any pop fans do.

Edisson: Go to a pop concert and your nobody go to a metal gig and every one’s a friend. Just walking in the door tonight we’ve been making new friends because we all have a common unity and that’s where the international metalheads club started. And speaking of which things are going great for you Blaze, the albums fantastic hopefully the tour go’s even better and we’d like to make a presentation. It has been a struggle for you but you defiantly kept going where others would have just packed it all in and walked away, so it’s an honour for me as a fan and president of The I.M.h.C. to present you with the honorary membership award on behalf of all our members for outstanding achievement in the world of metal and hard rock.

Blaze: Thank you very much for that! As soon as I can get it on eBay I will!

Edisson: I doubt if my signature will get you much, maybe a packet of cigarettes!

Blaze: I taught it was from all your members there’s only two fucking signatures on it? At least if you bought our album we all signed the fucking thing!

Edisson: Well we signed five of em and there’s only five of you in the bloody band! It’d be the most expensive award in the world if I had to fly across the world to get all our members to sign it.

And there we left it. Blaze Bayley is one of the most down to earth and nicest guys in metal today. If you get to a gig he’s very approachable so go up and say hi. Blaze Bayley is currently on tour so check www.blazebayley.net for details of him coming to your area and also where you can order his new album “Promise and Terror”. A very big thank you to Anna, Blaze’s manager, for organising the interview. You can hear the whole lot in a couple of weeks on the I.M.h.C. online radio show! Full details will be announced on www.metalheadsclub.com and www.metalhertzfm.com really soon