That
Dio with majestic ease could lift the legacy of Ozzy became crystal clear with the astounding Heaven And
Hell release and there were more good things ahead.
Mob Rules continues where Heaven And
Hell ended, epic, clever, hard rocking and atmospheric, just not at the same extremely high level as its predecessor.
The opener
Turn Up The Night is a fast rocker with some great lead guitar details from Tony
Iommi, a party song of dimensions. A monster hook and inspiring bass wizardry from two of the genres best and most influential performers.
Voodoo is a slower and hard pumping track with a lot of depth coming from the drums, together with a seriously grooving bass line it creates an unbreakable force that just continues a bit too long down the same road.
Dio is one of my favourite singers ever and he performs with lots of energy and feeling on this record,
Sign Of The Southern Cross sees him act out some unforgettable atmospheric passages in the spellbinding acoustic guitar intro. This huge epic is an album highlight, it bleeds mysticism and enchantment.
The songs seem to flow in a very natural order and with
The Mob Rules we find the albums second swift creation, a down to earth rocker with a forceful drive.
The slow pounding
Country Girl is treated with a great mellow mid-section passage, still not the most exciting rhythm in this one.
Slipping Away has a quite odd structure, but when a cool diverse drum passage, powerful bass jamming and huge guitar solo part makes an entrance it becomes much more interesting.
With
Falling Off The Edge Of The World we reach a real Sabbath masterpiece, the depressing mood captured in the beginning of this creative composition surely leaves a big impression,
afterwards it turns into a powerful and heavy track.
At the end
Over And Over presents itself and again the mood is quite dark shrouded and with a sense of hopelessness,
Dio of course has the ability to transform these feelings with great empathy. The wonderful and ultra creative guitar work from
Iommi is down right spectacular.
The sound on the album is truly fantastic, lots of depth and power all placed in an appropriate and well-balanced wall of sound.
Lyrically
Dio has his own very poetical style which makes the lyrics complex and with an edge, lyrics you have to read a couple of times to understand them, and then again they can be understood in different ways. I think it's interesting with words that are a bit challenging to the mind. The themes are love, myths, spiritualism and personal issues from dealing with depression to feeling alive and well.
Musically the band sounds extremely tight and performs with an eye for detail, every player adds his specific strength to these songs; I have highlighted some of my favourite passages in the description of the songs and seen as a whole we are talking top of the line here.
A record that offers some great melodic tunes and dark atmospheres, a high level of technicality is reached and overall this album has a fabulous balance.
Written by
Tommy Tuesday, February 15, 2005
Show all reviews by TommyRatingsTommy: 7.5/10Members: 8.25/10 - Average of 2 ratings.
Member ratings
 | Stuart (Staff)
Rating: 8/10
Perhaps not quite as strong a release as Heaven and Hell but its still a top quailty relea... · Read more · |
 | notrap
Rating: 8.5/10
After the huge worldwide success of Heaven and Hell the second record of Sabbath Mark II h... · Read more · |
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