The metal world lost one of its all-time greats this morning as Ronnie James Dio passed away of stomach cancer.

Its truly sad to see Dio go, but it is good to know he isn’t struggling anymore. Dio had a long and still active career, from fronting Elf, Rainbow, and Black Sabbath, to starting his own band, Dio. His most recent work alongside Toni Iommi, Geezer Butler, and Vinnie Appice in Heaven and Hell continued to draw large crowds on tour and critical acclaim.

Power metal is what Dio did best, and he did so with relish. Warrior outfits, swords, and castles made Dio’s video for Holy Diver look like a Dungeons and Dragons fans’ wildest dreams come true.  Or how about Rainbow in the Dark with Ronnie singing on top of the building and Vivian Campbell coming from out of nowhere to play that solo? And while it might seem cheesy, Dio wasn’t the kind of guy who took himself seriously enough to let it bother him; just check out his role in Tenacious D and the Pick of Destiny for proof.

Were you to take away all his musical accomplishments and just give Dio credit for the “metal horns,” it would be enough to make his birthday a holiday. Just think-it gave millions of metal fans around the world who lack any dancing skills something to do at concerts.

Hopefully, Dio’s importance to music will be realized and he will receive the recognition he deserves in death. So blast some Dio and raise those horns to the sky in salute. While you’re at it, put on Straight Through the Heart. If the riff after the drum intro isn’t the manliest, most balls-out fuck yeah! riff ever, I don’t know what is.

View more news videos at: http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/video.

Let’s face it, we all know that Phillies fans are assholes.  Case in point is the douchebag who threw up on a 11 year old girl.  Yeah, it takes a big man (literally) to shove two fingers down his throat to induce puking so he can douse an entire family with burrito, hot dog and stomach juices.  Bravo!

However, one comes to pause when a 17 year old Phillies fan gets tasered for running onto the field during the 8th inning of a game.  Is it because his fellow douchebag comrades in arms have ruined base running for the rest of the fans?  Probably.  Or is it quite possible that people from Philly are assholes when they get together in large groups?  Yeah, definitely.

When stadiums have to put a jail in them in order to contain “fans”, that’s when you know your fanbase are assholes.  So what is it about Philly that makes seemingly normal people turn into frothing at the mouth dipshits when they get together?  Now I know some people are pissing and moaning about the use of excessive force on what they construe as an innocent act of joy.  What they forget is that the kid is a Phillies fan.

Now I’m not a bleeding heart Mets fan.  Quite the contrary.  I’m a die hard Yankees fan (even when they sucked in the 80s and early 90s).  I live close enough to Philly that it isn’t much of a trip to get there (about a half a tank of gas).  So I have experienced the douchebaggery in person.  Last year I went to a Social Distortion show, and a normally laid back Mike Ness actually had to tell people in the crowd to knock it off.

We all know that they have a long history of dickatude.  There was a beating death of a fan in a parking lot, there was the chick who tried to trade sex for World Series tickets, and let’s not forget the Peter Griffin look alike that I mentioned earlier.

No one really knows why people from Philly act the way they do when they get together.  However, I hope for the kid who ran out on the field that he took a moment while laying in a pool of his own piss that maybe, just maybe, he shouldn’t act like a Phillies fan.

You stay classy, Philadelphia.

I’m sure that you have heard about the big patch of plastic soup that is floating around in the Pacific Ocean by now.  It is often referred to as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch or the Pacific Trash Vortex.  Estimates are that the patch is roughly the size of Texas (containing about 3.5 million tons of trash), and that there might be a couple of islands floating out there in all the oceans.  No matter how you put it; it means trouble for us dillholes.

Recently it was reported that another island of garbage was found in the Atlantic Ocean.  Two groups of scientists that were trawling between Bermuda and the Azores Islands made the discovery of the micro-particle soup that is very similar to the ones in the Pacific Ocean.

This is a total rut-roh moment for the human race.  Unlike other forms of garbage, plastic does not biodegrade.  Instead, it breaks down into smaller and smaller pieces until it is small enough for marine life to eat.  Then the plastic enters the food chain.  I’m sure some of you are like “what’s the big deal?”  Well there are a couple of big deals here.  Some plastics can decompose into toxic chemicals like bisphenol A, PCBs, and forms of polystyrene.  They also can act like a sponge where they can attract organic pollutants and toxins in the ocean.  Not stuff that you really want on your dinner plate, is it?

So what can we do about it?  Well the first thing would be to use less plastic.  Instead of getting plastic bags when you’re grocery shopping, why not get some nifty totebags instead?  Stop using water bottles and use the refillable aluminum ones.  Properly dispose of garbage and education on how objects break down is really important.  This is the information generation and instead of looking at porn for a half hour, why not check out some easy solutions for recycling and becoming greener. Try and pick up a piece of trash every single day. Get your family and friends to do it too.



Come on, don’t act like you didn’t know.

Don’t act like Ricky Martin coming out of the closet on his website today was any news or surprise. So it turns out Ricky was living La Vida Fabulosa this whole time and there’s nothing wrong with it. I guess it’s good he officially came out (even though everyone including Barbara Walters knew) but I can’t stand when celebrities act like they’re revealing this great secret. To me, this ranks in the top “captain obvious coming out announcements of recent memory” list.

1. Clay Aiken- Yep, saw this one coming ten miles away

2. Adam Lambert- Would have been first, but flamboyance wasn’t enough to automatically stamp him as gay. I mean look at David Bowie, he’s not gay, right…right??

3. Lance Bass- Oh Lance, he was so naive. With that big silly grin someone probably had to explain to him what gay was.

4. Ellen Degeneres- I could see where there was some wiggle room here, but that haircut gave it away

5. Ricky Martin- Thanks to you Ricky we straight guys get to hear women complain about “how all the good ones are gay” for another month.

Today I passed by a magazine rack and picked up an issue of Guitar World magazine. It’s cover said that there was a brand new Hendrix album, so I flipped through and found out that yes indeed-the Vood0o Child is back with a slight return in the form of Valleys of Neptune, a disc composed half of never-before-heard takes of classics like Stone Free and Red House, and half previously unreleased songs, heard only by the hardest-core bootleggers.

The best part-it comes out tomorrow! But of course, that didn’t stop me from getting it today. I’ve got the torrent downloading as we speak…er as I type, so expect a review soon! I mean it this time. Anyways, peace and love.