The Contrarians Panel: Dark Horse Album #18 - Dio Strange Highways
ฝัง
- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 14 ต.ค. 2024
- Our esteemed group of music fans discusses a Dark Horse album from the Dio catalog!
The Contrarians is a show where one of us jumps in the hot seat picks a dark horse album from a band as that band's best album. The guest host will argue against them with facts, stats and all around truth, subjective and objective!
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![Dio - The Last in Line (Full Album) [Official Video]](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/OtqttwO1htA/mqdefault.jpg)
Do you agree or disagree with our rating? What do you rate Dio Strange Highways out of 10??
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8/10
As a Dio fanatic, this was a great and very important discussion.
The long haired guy said it so well. What an informed and thoughtful guy. 🙏
The song ‘Pain’ rang true for me as a teenager at the time of release. That’s the emotion I needed from a ‘mystery’ Dio at the time. Pantera we’re the vibe at the time and the main riff of ‘Jesus Mary’ was ‘Mouth For War’ esch.
The album is about madness and frustration like the artwork suggests. Yea it’s slow, but demands an introspective response.
No one here mentioned the line in ‘Evilution’ … ‘I hate u and u hate me, and everybody smiles’ - That’s about the feud with Ozzy, surely.
Anyway the takeaway tune here that still slams is ‘Bring Down The Fkn Rain! ☔️’
Power to the max.
Thank you guys for furthering the analysis of this amazing catalog. ‘The Popper’ is to be commended for suggesting a transcription of the ideas posed here. Here’s to you.
‘The King 🤴 Of Rock n Roll!!’
@13:05 - exactly why Strange Highways is my favorite Dio album. No dragons, no wizards. Just lots of ANGER and AGGRESSION. Brutal, Heavy, killer album that never gets old.
It's my second or third favorite.
I think that this came out not too long after Dehumanizer by Black Sabbath did so Dio still had that dark influence in his songwriting which is good
@@MetalHead-ks9zq - I don't know what was going on with Dio in the 90's , but he was certainly pissed off about something 😆
I Love Lock Up The Wolves, Dehumanizer, & Strange Highways. I give all 3 a 10.
Fascinating overview of this crushingly fantastic album! Where the soulless "Angry Machines" falls flat, "Strange Highways" fires on all cylinders, as well as signals a new era for Dio. Tracy G injects just the right venom for Dio at this juncture, eschewing the dungeons-and-dragons lyrical cliches and going for genuine emotion and a more stripped-back musical approach. I know Jamie prefers "fun Dio" (an anomaly, if you consider his discography as a whole), but when RJD's pissed and full of righteous anger, "look out!," as our diminutive hero might have said. Out of a maximum 10 rating, I'm giving "Strange Highways" a solid 9 (and great point about "intensity vs. slow," Reed. I couldn't agree more). For a live encapsulation of this era, I suggest "Dio: Live In London, Hammersmith Apollo 1993." Killer stuff.
Own entire DIO discography/ saw him countless times in NYC/ NJ area. First time was 1️⃣9️⃣8️⃣4️⃣/ November. MEADOWLANDS NJ. DOKKEN opened/ tremendous show. I’ll give Strange HIGHWAYS a 7.8 on 10.0 scale. Still listen 👂 to it 👍💯
I’m always going to love Tracy G’s contribution to the Dio catalogue.’Strange Highways’ is the more coherent of two albums ( Angry Machines). Great production and Ronnie sings so aggressively and definitely not faking it!
Tracy is a good dude👍
Absolutely love this album, my second favorite of his after Holy Diver. His darkest and heaviest and some of his best vocal performances too. A great continuation of what he did on Sabbath's Dehumanizer album, this tour was awesome too.
I remember an interview where Dio was talking about the subject of dragons and wizards being outdated and not what people were looking for. So I think it's clear he just replaced it with computers and machines.
This is my favorite Dio album 100%
I love this album. I'd give it a solid 9. Sometimes I feel like its my favorite Dio album, other times I'd put first two before it. The title track though is absolutely my favorite Dio song.
My 3 fav Dio albums are: Lock Up, Strange Highways and Angry Machines. I just love that period of the Dio. Cheers.
Mine are Dream Evil, Sacred Heart, Holy Diver and Strange Highways
I love Strange Highways album. It is my fourth favorite Dio album behind Dream Evil, Holy Diver, and The Last Line. It is extremely underrated. Tracy G is also extremely underrated.
This was maybe the best put together episode I've seen about the music I love! I watch Sea of Tranquility/Hudson Valley and The Rock Fantasy Files and this episode topped everything I've watched on TH-cam. I wasn't familiar with a couple of the guests, but I loved their contributions. DIO "Strange Highways" is a such a marginal album within the DIO discography. "Strange Highways" seems to represent a vitriolic response or this gushing adulation, which I don't feel passionate about either. "Strange Highways" represents the ultimate dichotomy of musical attitudes. This episode has done what all episodes should do when talking about a specific record. One just needs to go and play it and rediscover an album that still makes them go, huh. I will find time today and listen to "Strange Highways."
My favorite Dio album/era hands down. It was heavy and different. No surprise that with the passing of time it’s gained more appreciation. It’s not dated sounding.
I love the Tracy G guitar version of Dio....his aggressive, snarling, stuttering, growling guitar style was a great fit. Would have liked to have seen a couple more albums from that combination of the band.
Tracy G also has some great solo material - not a shredder, but very creative.
Talking about this album brings back great memories! Went to the concert on this tour! My brother took me, he has since passed away! He got me into Dio! He totally loved this album! I have his copy; which means a lot to me! I’d give it a 6! The songs just aren’t up to the caliber of earlier albums! 8.4 rating is awesome! Great episode guys, 🤪🤘🏼!!!
Ronnie James Dio is exceptional for having been involved with multiple iconic albums across multiple bands. It makes ranking his work challenging because some of his albums -- being iconic -- are almost beyond ranking. Sure, Holy Diver is probably the consensus favorite. Last in Line is just as strong. Dream Evil is probably my most-listened-to. But Strange Highways is insanely underrated. While later Dio gets labeled as slow and plodding, a lot of this record is anything but; e.g. the opening track, which is easily in my top 5 Dio songs. It's anything but slow and plodding. It's in-your-face metal at its best.
Great time guys. I love digesting your thoughts and opinions. Keep it up and Defend the Faith, always!!!!
Thank you!!!
Time changes perspectives, definitely. I remeber buying this album and taking it to a "listening-party" with my friends, and we all looked at each other, took the CD out of the player, put another album and didn't say a word about it 😂
Almost a decade later, I started to like this record, now I love it; agree with everything positive said here about it (specially Tracy's chops) great show guys, thanks! 🍺🤘
Damn I thought I was a burnout when I have to ask what day it is Martin had to ask what century are we in fuck yeah you rock dude😂
I feel like this album was Ronnie letting out all his anger from the Sabbath fallout in 92.
Dio had 3 albums that are 9.75 in my ranking. Holy Diver, Dream Evil and Strange Highways.
I've mentioned some of these comments before, in various places. I love this album, for basically the same reasons as given by Peter and Reid. I also really enjoy the live albums and bootlegs from the Tracy G era, as I think they sound like Black Sabbath playing Dio band music. No, Tracy can't play Vivian's solos, but Iommi wouldn't have been able to either. The trick with Dehumanizer, The Devil You Know, and the later Dio albums is that you need to listen to them A LOT. They aren't as immediate as earlier material, and need time to sink in. Further, most of us have heard those earlier albums, Heaven and Hell through Dream Evil, many more times than we've heard the later ones. But once those later ones sink in, once you expand your frame of reference to include all of them, you'll find that most of the later Sabbath and Dio albums are really good in their own right. It took me many years, but I now really like Lock Up the Wolves. I liked Master of the Moon pretty much from the get-go. I'll be 52 soon, I lived through Dio's Rainbow and later career. I notice that when the under-30 crowd listen to Dio's various projects, they rate the albums differently than the old timers do, because something like Holy Diver sounds a bit quaint, a little old-fashioned, while Strange Highways fits in well with trends in Metal sub-genres over the past 30 years. I'm glad to see some of Dio's supposedly "lesser" albums getting recognition these days, even as I'm looking forward to the Holy Diver 40th Anniversary Edition next month.
I need to pick that album up
Absolutely love this album, it comes in third under the first two for me. Dio was so pissed, so energized and committed on this album and he met the moment (1993) with the perfect statement of intent. Vinny is crucial to Dio's music and Gus G was the modern foil Ronnie needed for this era.
Tracy G not Gus G.
I don't have this in any format, I like to have a psychical copy of every album I see in The Contrarians. Unfortunately the Strange Highways CD is way to expensive for a CD now and the LP is just impossible to find unless you sell your car lol
Yeah the CD copy I eventually got hold of a few years back was an expensive Japanese import version.
wow cool that we have influenced you that way! Thanks for watching! Good luck trying to find this on vinyl!
@@thecontrarians2438 Well, must of the albums you show I already own, guess I was a contrarian before the contrarians lol Very cool choices !
@@MsKalachakra haha youre the OG
I like Dehumanizer bit more but this is still great 8/10❤
To me it's the third best after Holy Diver and The last in line. I didn't realize that this was a controversial album, lol
Strange Highways is a 9 out of 10 for me , as good as his first 2 DIO albums
Agreed
I have photos of dio on stage at wolverhampton wolfren hall england on the killiing the dragon tour
This is definitely Ronnie's heaviest, darkest and best sounding solo album. It really feels like a sequel to Dehumanizer. I also can't stand 13.
This was the last album I bought on vinyl. It also marked a decline on my interest in rock and metal music. I liked the changes Ronnie made to his sound, and the absence of dragons, but I don't think there's any more than half a good album here. A step up on Lock Up the Wolves.
I listened to this album before this went up. Agree that it sounds great, Vinny in particular. I don't think the songs are that memorable and many of them are really generic, so I rank it lower than the panel here. My rating is a 6.0.
Have the Contrarians covered any of the original Big Star albums?
hmm i dont think so
Vinny's and Carmine's last name has been pronounced for TH-cam and radio often enough. "App-ish-Shay".
Strange Highways sounds like Dio wanted to pick up where Sabbath's Dehumanzier left off and hadn't planned on the stupid proposal of a "Super Sabbath" show which would include Ozzy. The album art for Strange Highways was the same illustrator as on Dehumanizer. You can sorta tell by the silvery metal imps pulling the brains out on S/H that it's the same artist who drew the Terminator/Grim Reaper. And "Give Her The Gun" isn't just a song, it's a mandate. All victims of Child S/A are entitled to dispatch their abusers. That the law says, "No" is the LAW'S MISTAKE. Natural Law trumps Codified Law.
How about a set list of that later Dio albums mix cd?
I love this album
I agree with the view that Strange Highways is a follow up/ continuation of Dehumanizer in some respects. When I think of the album from such a perspective, I have to wonder what Iommi/ Butler would have done with this material. Yes, Tracy G and Pilson are cool, but they are not Black Sabbath. I adore Dehumanizer and like Strange Highways but think that the Iommi/ Butler version of Strange Highways would have been at least an equal to Dehumanizer. It's such a shame that the prospect of an Ozzy reunion was enough to destroy the second coming of Black Sabbath with Dio.
If I forget what may have been, I can appreciate Strange Highways on its own terms. It's no on par with the Vivian albums or Dream Evil, but certainly holds its own. It's better than Lock Up the Wolves. The title track is my favorite, though I enjoy almost every song. Tracy G made quite a bit of noise, and I mean that in a positive way. I feel like Vinny needs to be turned up in the mix. I love it when his drums are very loud. He's one of my all-time favorite drummers.
Great episode! I am with Pete and Reed on the 9.5 and much of what they said about it. Pain is a massive song to me...incredibly heavy! Strange Highways, Evilution and Jesus Mary and The Holy Ghost are favorites. I really liked Tracy G's style on the album and yeah Vinnie's thunder is magnificent.
I used to own this CD but I really found it very hard to listen to. Maybe I'll stream it and see what it sounds like almost 30 years later.
I completely disagree with the last guy, I didn’t have to warm up to Strange Highways, I picked it up in 1994 on cassette, then stopped listening to it in 96, then picked it up again in 2022 and it was like not skipping a beat, the songs were instantly memorable, not pop crap memorable that dude is listening to.
I’d give it 5.5 out of 10..couple of good songs but quite a letdown after dehuminizer…way better than cross purposes though
I watched this whole show and have never heard the album but I still don’t know if I wanna hear it lol
I rate it 4th in my personal Dio ranking. I like it better than Sabbath Dehumanizer if that helps. Its the best of heavy (slow as Martin says) Dio for me.
Strange Highways along with Lock Up The Wolves are the least favorite of Dio albums for me. However, I would still give it a 6/10 - just because it is Ronnie.
Just some constructive criticism…could’ve done without the long Wikipedia intro. Otherwise an interesting episode.
Any album after Dream Evil, in my opinion, is forgettable as soon as you take it out of the cd player.
I've never liked Strange Highways . It's overwrought and bombastic, almost a self-parody. A joke,a farce. Don't buy the vinyl.
The songs are fine, Tracy G ruins it IMO.
Strange Highways is a bad Dio album...
No. It's a VERY DIFFERENT Dio Album. Tracy Grijalva was a very industrial "Rammstein-like" player. Not really suited for the overall Dio sound.
I completely disagree. Ronnie dropped the Dungeons and Dragons stuff. Early Dio is like Rainbow whereas this album is closer to Metallica with its realism.
Hi, left a comment but it didn’t show up here.
I had listened to it once years ago then forgot about it. Recently I gave it another go and really liked it. Not as good as dehumanizer but still a good follow up Dio album. Track order could have been better currently slower songs clumped together too much. One of the best since Vivian albums 7/10, dehumanizer 8/10, mob rules 8.5/10, heaven and hell 9/10, holy diver 9/10. For comparison.
we had a bit of a glitch and had to reupload the episode, thanks for commenting again! nice ratings, im a big fan of Dehumanizer as well