Review: Dio - Killing the Dragon tour (Quebec City) | |||||||
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Killing the Dragon tour (Quebec City) | |||||||
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Venue: L’agora du Vieux-port City: Quebec City, Canada Show date: July 04, 2002 Guests: Voïvod Rating: 4/5 Review online: July 5, 2002 Reviewed by: Pierre Bégin |
![]() for:Killing the Dragon tour (Quebec City) Rated 4.5/5 (90%) (8 Votes)
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Review | |||||||
It was the return of Ronnie James Dio and his teammates in Quebec City yesterday at l’Agora du vieux-port, an outdoor venue. I had the privilege of getting tickets in the front row in the middle (just in front of Ronnie)! The last time that Dio came here as a headliner was in 1988 (14 years ago) for the "Dream Evil" tour. He also came as opening act for Iron Maiden in 1998 for the "Angry Machine" tour. As opening act, it was, once again, Voïvod, a veteran Quebec metal band. Denis Bélanger (Snake) is back on vocals and Vincent FROM Groovy Aadvark was on bass guitar. On stage, Snake looks and moves a bit like Bono of U2! (-: They played for about 45 minutes (which to me felt more like 2 hours) and the crowd stayed quiet most of the time. Even after many years of touring and experience, Voïvod still can’t raise a crowd. Only a few hundreds fans were there for them. "Astronomy Domine", a Pink Floyd cover that they play very well, received a good acclaim by the crowd. Sorry, but I never dug Voïvod's music. So, let's skip to Dio! At the end of the Voïvod set, the rain began to fall. Fortunately, 15 minutes later, Dio cast a spell and the rain stops and starts again… 15 minutes after the end of the Dio gig! (-: The lights went down and the intro of "Killing The Dragon" began. The band enters on stage greeted with applause by the fans. It’s unbelievable how Dio still looks young after all these years. He is still in very good shape and still very expressive with all his "evil eyes" sign. Moreover, Dio’s voice is still intact after all these years! Next, they played a surprising song FROM "The Last In Line" album, "Egypt (The Chains Are On)". It’s incredible how this song sounds live. In the middle of the tune, the band played some bars of Black Sabbath's "Children Of The Sea". Ronnie had some problems with his mic on this song and seemed angry but fortunately, the problem didn’t happen again. "Push", the first single of the new album is the next song followed by Simon Wright’s drum solo. Next is "Stand Up and Shout" and "Rock & Roll", which was inspired by the aftermath of the tragedy of September 11th. Before "We Rock", Dio announced that Quebec City is the capital of Rock & Roll under a thunderous applause. Later in the show, the band played back-to-back the slow paced "Lord Of The Last Day" and the grooving "Fever Dreams", two excellent songs FROM "Magica". The beautiful acoustic intro announced the excellent "Don’t Talk To Strangers". They also played some Black Sabbath and Rainbow material on their near 2 hours set. For the encore, Dio played 2 classics and mandatory Dio songs: "The Last In Line" and "Rainbow In The Dark". The crowd really went crazy, especially on "The Last In Line". For me, the highlight of the set was the "Egypt" – "Children Of The Sea" medley, "Rock & Roll", "Fever Dreams", "Don’t Talk To Strangers" and the two encore songs. The crowd was very noisy and Ronnie seemed to really appreciate it. The sound was very good for the whole set. Curiously, the band only focused on four Dio albums: "Holy Diver", "The Last In Line", "Magica" and "Killing The Dragon". No songs FROM "Sacred Heart", "Dream Evil" (my favourite Dio CD), "Lock Up The Wolves", "Strange Highways" and "Angry Machine"! Sure, the fact that the band played some tunes FROM Black Sabbath and Rainbow and added a drum and guitar solos didn’t help. I would have preferred more songs and no guitar and drum solos in spite of a good performance by Doug and Simon on their instruments. The musicianship was very good. It was a lot better than the last time I saw them in 1998. Doug Aldrich on guitar is excellent. He played very accurately and well and has a good stage presence, which make a HUGE difference with Tracy G., guitarist of the "Strange Highways" and "Angry Machine" era. There were about 2,500 Dio fans, which is great. You can add a thousand more outside the venue that came to "listen" to the SHOW (as I said earlier, it was an outdoor gig). The crowd varied FROM 25 to 50 years old. There are also some younger ones (7-8 years old) with their parents. I also noticed that there are a little bit more women than at the average metal show, which is great! Moreover, I can tell you that female metal lovers are the prettiest women on this planet! (-: (ahem... depends on the shows :) - ed.) So, it was an excellent gig of Ronnie James Dio excellent music legacy of over 4 decades! He’s a true legend of heavy metal music and, contrary to Ozzy Osbourne these days, he STILL can sing, makes good albums and has control over his destiny. Two thumbs up! Show playlist:
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More about Dio... | |||||||
Review: Dio at Donnington UK: Live 1983 & 1987 (reviewed by MetalMike) Review: Dream Evil (reviewed by Larry Griffin) Review: Evil Or Divine (reviewed by Michel Renaud) Review: Holy Diver (reviewed by Mjölnir) Review: Killing The Dragon (reviewed by Michel Renaud) Review: Killing The Dragon (reviewed by Pierre Bégin) Review: Killing The Dragon Tour (Toronto) (reviewed by Michel Renaud) Review: Lock Up the Wolves (reviewed by Hermer Arroyo) Review: Strange Highways (reviewed by Hermer Arroyo) Review: The Very Beast Of Dio (reviewed by Christian Renner) | |||||||
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