Track Listing

1. King of Rock and Roll
2. Sacred Heart
3. Another Lie
4. Rock 'n' Roll Children
5. Hungry for Heaven
6. Like the Beat of a Heart
7. Just Another Day
8. Fallen Angels
9. Shoot Shoot

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #52906 in Music
• Released on: 1990-10-25
• Number of discs: 1
• Dimensions: .20 pounds

Customer Reviews

Nothing surprising, but is that really important?
Sure, you could argue that Dio's style has remained fairly constant and he does not have a tendency to "grow" stylistically. But I know one thing for sure: this is one guy who knows how to make metal. On Sacred Heart, he cranks out 9 great metal tunes, and he makes it seem easy. The truth is, while these songs do not shock you with stunning originality, they still rock you to the core. This music is not emotionally moving, but that's not the point!! The point is that it is hard rock, and it does just that: it rocks hard.

The best song on the album is definitely the title track, "Sacred Heart." It is in the vein of the title tracks of his last two albums, "Holy Diver" and "Last in Line." It is a slower, more epic composition, and it dominates!!! Other highlights are "King of Rock and Roll" and "Another Lie." However, there is not one bad track on here.

The band is in top form, as usual. The new keyboardist, Claude Schnell, is pretty cool; his sounds add a whole new element to the band's music. Sometimes they sound downright evil: check out the main riff to "Like the Beat of a Heart." And of course, Vivian Campbell tears it up on guitar.

Dio is one of the great voices of metal. His music, his lyrics, and his voice are almost definitive of the entire genre. Although he has better albums (Holy Diver, Killing the Dragon), it still seems that he can do no wrong.

"You're a runner but you're chasing yourself"
Dio was my favorite metal vocalist in the 1980s and his was one of my favorite metal bands during that time. Still, I have to be more critical of this 1985 release than of his previous albums, and it appears a lot of fans agree. Sacred Heart cannot stand up to Holy Diver and The Last in Line. It is surprising to me that the album I consider to be Dio's best [Dream Evil] came out two years after this one. Some fans point to the use of keyboards as a reason to dislike this album. I don't mind keyboards/synthesizers in metal in fact, I like them (i.e. Iron Maiden's Somewhere in Time). Even the highly-touted The Last in Line included keyboards ("Mystery") albeit on one of its weakest tracks. I just don't think the music on Sacred Heart is that good. It doesn't rock as hard but it is not just that. I do not mind metal acts taking a softer approach, but the music here just seems stale to me. Even the best tracks off Sacred Heart do not blow me away with the possible exception of "Another Lie." I included my favorite Sacred Heart tracks on a Dio compilation tape, and always seem to fast-forward through most of them.

As with Dio's previous albums, he starts this one off with a heavy rocker. "King of Rock & Roll" is an awesome track. It sounds like it was recorded live with the roar of the crowd and the slightly-unpolished sound, but there is nothing on the album cover or insert that indicates if that was the case or if an audience was dubbed in. The reason I am reluctant to praise Sacred Heart because of this opening track is because the first version of this song I heard was off a 1986 various artist metal compilation tape entitled Heavy Metal Thunder. This version is definitely live and blows the album version out of the water. The compilation is out-of-print, but it is worth seeking out a used copy. The title track is good, but not spectacular and, at 6:27, it just drags. Dio seemed to center his live show around this track, with his face and distorted voice inside a crystal ball reciting an intro to the track and, of course, the giant dragon. I want to like the song, but it just falls flat. On the other hand, the track which follows ["Another Lie"] rocks! It is the best track on the album. "Rock `n Roll Children" is musically OK but, lyrically, is contrived and, among Dio's songs of sorcery and magic, seems a bit silly. It is a song about kids alone, without friends, "but they got rock `n roll"? Give me a break. The video also seemed silly. The young man, finally taking some responsibility by getting a job to pay for his guitar, ends up returning to his true being by rejoining his heavy metal girlfriend, who had accused him of "selling out," and chucking his uniform in the garbage...ooookay.

"Hungry for Heaven" was on the Vision Quest soundtrack and is definitely a radio-worthy track with lots of keyboards. I like the track. It is catchy with a very cool guitar solo. The rest of the album is unmemorable. I can barely remember how the tracks go. I do remember "Shoot Shoot" because it is so bad: "You can be free forever, so next time someone points a gun at you [does that happen very often?] say, `Shoot, shoot.'" The way Dio sings the word "shoot, shoot" is almost comical. I don't think Sacred Heart is a terribly bad album. It has its moments. It just does not meet the high expectations of Dio's previous albums and his next release [and best] Dream Evil.

Keyboard-driven misdirected mishmash (with great vocals...)
The most underrated voice in rock, a stickler for top production and surrounded by top-flight session players at all times, Dio basically can't put out a "bad" album. But there's a wide range between "pretty decent" and "superb" and this is at the lowly decent side of things. A couple of standout songs are lost in a sea of keyboards and over-simplified radio-friendly riffing -- uncharacteriscally upbeat drivel, but it still sounds good. Just little to get excited about. The first two Dio albums are absolute classics of metal; Dream Evil is among the best guitar-oriented albums of the late 80s as well. Recently Dio's stylistic missteps have been to become too harsh and apocalyptic, but in the mid 80s it was trying too hard to score radio hits. Hopefully with Magica Dio is getting back to the Last In Line/Dream Evil style of which he is the undisputed master. Not bad, but not essential. Non-fans who want to check Dio out should start with Holy Diver, Dream Evil, Last In Line, or one of the import collections. Also Rainbow Rising, Rainbow On Stage, and Black Sabbath's Heaven and Hell...