Ronnie James Dio and "the Maloik"

At the risk of having readers think this is a Dio blog, which it is not,* I wanted to follow up my post below by mentioning something I saw recently in a rockumentary on cable music channel Palladia. Heavy metal fans have commonly adopted the sign of the horns--middle and ring finger clasped under thumb, with index and pinky fingers pointed at the sky--as "the devil's horns," reflecting the evil or tinged-with-evil nature of much of the music in the genre as well as the bands and the fans. The Palladia program I saw contained an interview where Ronnie James Dio, who made the horns a staple of hard rock and metal culture, said this about them:

"I doubt very much if I would be the first one who ever did that. It's like saying I invented the wheel...I think you'd have to say that I made it fashionable. I used it so much all the time and it had become my trademark until the Britney Spears audience decided to do it as well, so it kind of lost its meaning with that. But it was...I was in Sabbath at the time. It was a symbol that I thought was reflective of what that band was supposed to be all about. It's not the devil's sign as if we're here with the devil. It's an Italian thing I got from my grandmother called the "Malocchio". It's to ward off the Evil Eye or to give the Evil Eye, depending on which way you do it. It's just a symbol, but it had magical incantations and attitudes to it and I felt it worked very well with Sabbath. So I became noted for it, then everybody else started to pick up on it and away it went. But I would never say I take credit for being the first to do it. I say because I did it so much that it became the symbol of rock and roll..."

Dio often dealt with themes of spirituality and immortality in his music--as reflected in one of his song titles, exploring both Heaven and hell--and like most metal artists he never shied away from allowing fan fascination with a touch of evil** to stoke interest in his music. Yet he was one of the most professional, well-spoken and, from all reports, kindest people the world of metal has ever seen: someone whose intelligence and gift of communication would have stacked up favorably in any business or segment of society. Dio said it all stemmed from his Italian grandmother, "I believe it, and that settles it." (Inside joke that may resonate with many and anger some, but I hope I may be forgiven.)

If all this talk about horns has you hooked (you know that one is for you, University of Texas sports fans), you can read the passage above and much more on Wikipedia, which like me owes attribution for the actual Dio interview to Metal-Rules.com online magazine, content "Dio interviewed by EvilG," 9 March 2001.

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* Most of what I do elsewhere on the web, as expressed on News 2.0 (link above) is about research, writing, marketing & products at the speed of business™.  I love what I do in all those places, but here on Blogger I stretch out a bit and write about something else that stirs my passion: music.

** A nod to the song Touch of Evil by Judas Priest.