Like, okay, Maiden I can kind of see, but in the SA thread about Ronnie James Dio, everyone's like "he's in hell now getting crunked with Satan." And I get why that sounds like a good thing, it's just sort of funny to me when people post things like this:
And on the 17th of May, in the year 2010, Ronnie James Dio stood before the gates of hell. Standing before him, the unholy hosts of the pit were arrayed in all their dark majesty. At their front stood the Lord Satan himself, his baleful eyes downcast. As Dio approached, Satan fell to his knees, weeping tears of blood, and offered His crown to Dio. Dio did then take the crown from Satan's claws, placing it upon his balding head. Thus did it come to pass that Lord Dio was crowned Lord of the Nine Circles of Hell.
Admittedly that's bad ass, but here is the website of the organization that he and his wife founded and which got some huge cut of the proceeds from Heaven and Hell: http://www.childrenofthenight.org/
We're talking about a man who had a bizarre fixation on rescuing orphans and runaways from lives of prostitution. And now he is the king of Hell.
And then there're posts like this:
Metal is far from dead. Dio was just from the group of bands that birthed it. My brother met him a few times and once asked him what the future of metal was.
He said simply "Well, that is up to you."
Yes. That heart-rendingly cheesy, comically good guy hangs with Satan.
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Willis, it seems like every other time you post, I need to look up a word that's in the OED or Urban Dictionary but not both.
-Mimir
I think it started with the screaming and wailing voices/instruments sounding hellish and just kinda went from there. In the age of electrical guitars in the mainstream, I would think it could be re-evaluated, but there it is.
Well and it's perpetuated by certain of them.
Holy crap, Dio is dead. Rest in peace.
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CSBE FTW!
DarthMarth - Better than a bowl of Cheerios.
I guess this is the sort of subculture where Satan is just a bad-ass thing to put on your album cover or T-shirt or what have you, rather than the actual supernatural representation of actual evil behavior. In fact, this reflects something inherent in badassitude: people who are bad-ass can do benevolent things while evoking an air of malevolence and danger.
Or something like that.
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Shake your windows and rattle your walls.
Metal is definitely a more free-spirited, rebellious sort of music, that had a lot of clashing as it was appearing in the music world, with those who were older. I only have second-hand information about it, but it seems older generations didn't approve of this music their children would listen to.
Punishment and scorn from old-fashioned parents makes the music seem bad, and rebellious. If it were made out to be holy, clean and refreshing, it would probably have a very different connotation today. It's almost a natural step from bad and rebellious to associating with the most powerful figure of badness and rebelliousness, isn't it?
This is all pure opinion with not really anything backing it up, but it sounds good. Though I get what you mean... he seems like a really great guy. Why Satan? Why Hell?
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