Today (May 16th) marks 10 years since the death of Ronnie James Dio (Elf, Black Sabbath, Dio, Heaven & Hell) due to stomach cancer. During a conversation with Ultimate Guitar's David Slavković, drummer Vinny Appice looked back on his first tenure in Black Sabbath, which lasted from 1980 to 1982. Appice made his studio debut with the band on 1981's Mob Rules. When he joined in '80, Ronnie James Dio had been with the band for about a year and had made his studio debut with them on Heaven And Hell in 1980. 

UG: After the 'Live Evil' album, why did Ronnie and you leave the band?

Vinny: "Well, Ronnie, Tony (Iommi / guitar), Geezer (Butler / bass) - it wasn't working out anymore. Not musically, nothing was ever musically a problem; we all played the same way, we played great together. It was more of a business thing that the band was presented with. Not me, you know, I'm just the new guy. So, they weren't getting along as they were in the beginning, and then I guess it came to a point where Ronnie...

See, Ronnie always had a solo record deal with Warner Bros. while Sabbath was touring and recording, and Ronnie was planning on doing a solo with all his friends; have all his friends on it, and it'd be a one-off album, it'd be fun. But since he had the deal in place, he was getting to thinking about putting his own band together. And they weren't getting along, so Ronnie one day just asked me, 'Hey, I'm gonna put my own band together, I've got a record deal in place. You wanna join me? Or not join me, you make the decision.' So I was, 'Uh-uh.' So I had to make a choice 'cause Tony wanted me to stay with him as well. And I just thought Ronnie literally lives a couple of miles from where I lived in California, and it'd be easier to work together.

Tony and Geezer were in England at the time, and this sounded exciting - putting a band together with one of the greatest singers. So I decided to take Ronnie up on his offer, and it was just him and me for a while, getting together in rehearsal studios, auditioning guitar players. And then we finally went over to Europe to find a guitar player because he wanted to have an international flavor to the band. And then we hooked up with (bassist) Jimmy Bain. Jimmy played with Ronnie, obviously, in Rainbow and they knew each other. So, he called Jimmy, and Jimmy said, 'I'll be back in town in two days,' so we flew over. And he knew (guitarist) Vivian Campbell. Everything was arranged for us to meet in London and jam at the rehearsal place.

And that's how Dio came about; 'cause we jammed and it was just really magical and Viv was amazing. Jimmy fit right in, so Ronnie decided, 'We got a band!'"

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