DIO - This Means War! Page 3
by Martin Popoff
"I actually quite like most of the things I've written this time," replies Ronnie, when asked about another lyric he particularly finds key on the album. "I'm not always so up on myself. I think there are some clever ideas on this one. One More For The Road, just because of its content. And just because it's going to be such a misunderstood song, from its meaning perspective, anyway. I think One More For The Road is one of those. Most people think, oh, one more for the road, it means going on tour again, go have another beer for the road or whatever. But the song's actually about executions. It begins with the witchhunts, where a child could say, 'That person's a witch!' Oh, we should burn that person, and that's what happened collectively. You know, 400,000 people died in Europe during the witchhunts, only from the word of someone who really had no right to say it. And obviously, we know now that none of that was true. So that was one more, and at the end of the verse, it's, 'Let's burn one more for the road,' as we do with witches. And there's a verse about a guy who was accused of a crime he didn't commit, and is found guilty, and is just about to be executed. And I guess, sarcastically, he's saying to them at the end of all this, 'There's a cross that you can't carry because it's heavier than hell. And if you should meet your maker, just pray that he won't yell 'one more for the road!'' Again, it's really meant to kind of explain an observation of mine, and that is, life has seemed to become a whole lot less meaningful than it used to be before. And I mean 'a' life. And sometimes a group hysterically tends to say, 'OK, let's kill a whole bunch of people.' It doesn't seem to matters; it doesn't seem to be important. So the final statement for me was, no matter what god you believe in, just hope that if you are at that god's doorstep, he doesn't have the same attitude that you had as human beings. Hey, let's burn another one."
With Aldrich gone off to Whitesnake, Ronnie got Craig Goldy back in the fold, Goldy being the fretburner behind what in my estimation is in a tie for the best Dio album of all time, Dream Evil. I asked Ronnie about Goldy's particular strengths on his instrument.
