Angry Machines

Occupation

• Vocals: Ronnie James Dio
• Guitar: Tracy Grijalva
• Bass: Jeff Pilson
• Keyboard: Scott Warren
• Drums: Vinny Appice

Angry Machines is the seventh studio album by the American band Dio and was released in 1996.

Making of the album

After Ronnie James Dio had published in 1993 Strange Highways, he spent three years on tour. 1995, towards the end of Strange Highways tour, he worked at the same time on a new studio album.

Angry Machines was included in the Total Access studio in California from August 1995 to March 1996. August 1995 was Jerry Best Freak of Nature that already played as a warm up band during the European tour of Strange Highways tour, hired for a 5-day tour of South America. It was also said that he will be bassist on the upcoming album. However, in early 1996, he was replaced by Jeff Pilson who returned to the studio recordings. According to Ronnie James Dio's information, which he made in his biography, God Hates Heavy Metal was the only song in which Jerry Best is also to be heard. The album was produced by Ronnie James Dio personally.

In the summer of 1996, the track list was published by the official Dio Fan Club by circular letter. On the song God Hates Heavy Metal was listed, but the title was released only for the Japanese version as a bonus track. Also the title Hunter of the Heart was not mentioned. Initially it was dated for release in April 1996 but it was released only after problems on 23 September 1996 for Europe and Japan, and on 15 October 1996 for the United States.

Title list

Music style and refusal to fans

Angry Machines is rated as the worst album by Dio Strange Highways by many fans. Musically, it goes one step further than its predecessor and has a significantly harder way to play ( with the exception of This Is Your Life, which is a ballad ).

Trivia

• The song Stay Out of My Mind is the only thing that has ever been written in the band's history of Dio without Ronnie James Dio, as it was originally planned for a solo project of the bassist Jeff Pilson, but was later acquired by Dio.
• The album is dedicated to Reg Walters.
• The band photo, which is printed in the booklet shows the members without Jeff Pilson. This was because that Pilson was at this time with a solo project, the band but insisted that he is photographed with. The record company did not want to wait, so the image without Pilson was born.
• According to the information Dios lyrics caused by subjects, which he had taken from newspapers.
• For this album, there are some demo versions, which have large differences from the final versions. Thus, the laughter of children in Do not Tell the Kids the final section was added and omitted it and This Is Your Life was accompanied by a violin instead of a piano. The bass intro from Hunter of the Heart is also missing and has been replaced by a short guitar playing of Grijalva.