Heavy Metal Remembers A Legend

Ronnie James Dio's memorial service was held yesterday.  Over 1200 people were at the Liberty Hall in Forest Lawn Memorial Park with hundreds more outside, watching the event on giant screens.  The event was hosted by Eddie Trunk, who, on top of being a famous rock radio deejay, is a host on VH1 Classic's That Metal Show (he was the one who hugged Dio during the black carpet interview at the Golden Gods).  The city of Los Angeles even declared that May 30 shall be known as "Ronnie James Dio Day."  There are a couple of articles about the event already released.  Roadrunner Records' metal news site, Blabbermouth, posted some videos of speeches and performances from the service.  They're not the best quality, but they were the first videos posted.  Check them out here.  The Associated Press also wrote a very nice article about the event (I love the headline they used).

(Sigh...) Of course, a few worthless pieces of shit, who are aligned with the Westboro Baptist Church, or the "Redneck Nazi Party," as I like to call them, showed up to be completely ignored by the scores of metal fans, chanting "Dio, Dio, Dio..."

...only long enough to kick Satan's ass, fuckface.

Nice bib, BTW, for sucking your own cock.

Basically, the WBC just proved they're a bunch of dickweeds that no one should even pay attention to.  Fuck them.

The memorial service isn't the only place where the Metal community paid tribute to Dio.  Manowar, being as fucking awesome as they are, announced a new album, Magic - A Tribute to Ronnie James Dio, which will feature groups from Manowar's Magic Circle label, as well as others.  No release date has been announced, yet, but you can keep up to date with the album on their website.

Oh, one more thing.  At the memorial service, people were crowding in line to score one of these beautiful RJD memorial t-shirts, which were available to those who donated to the "Stand Up and Shout" cancer fund.  If you couldn't make it to the service, don't worry.  Later on this week, they'll be available when you make a donation to the cancer fund online.  More details can be found on Dio's website, so go there, make a difference, and show your support for Dio's legacy.

(Update: It seems that SPIN magazine has somewhat atoned for the derogatory and, overall, shitty article that David Dickcheese fucked up.  Chirs Martins wrote an appropriate article for RJD's memorial service, which reflected Dio's impact in music and the emotions felt by those who loved him.  Plus, there's a photo of that fucking WBC cocksucker shown above that's pretty funny.)

Kaiser out