Dio Rules, the five piece built around the catalogue of Ronnie James Dio, play three nights over Halloween weekend, and one dollar from every ticket goes to the Ronnie James Dio Stand Up and Shout Cancer Fund.
The dates are 29 October at Jergel's Rhythm Grille in Warrendale, Pennsylvania, 30 October at Penn's Peak in Jim Thorpe, Pennsylvania, and 31 October at Broad Brook Opera House in Broad Brook, Connecticut. They follow a July run staged around Dio's birthday, and across its first six shows the project has reached close to two thousand people.
Andrew Freeman sings, which is the detail that gives the thing its standing: he fronts Last in Line, the band formed by musicians who played on the Dio records themselves. Angus Clark and Mark Klett play guitars and keyboards, both of them bound for the Trans-Siberian Orchestra tour once the weekend is over, Matt Starr drums, Winston Roye plays bass.
The set reaches across all three of the catalogues Dio sang on, Rainbow, Black Sabbath and his own band, which is what separates this from the usual tribute booking: "Stargazer" and "Heaven and Hell" sit in the same night as "Holy Diver". The charitable cut is not decoration either, since the fund was set up in his name after he died of stomach cancer in 2010.