When we lost Dio, there was one obvious next step, once the mourning period had ended. The perfect person for Iommi to work with next was Jorn Lande, the man who fashioned himself the modern Dio, and wasn't shy about telling people about it. If anyone could have filled Dio's shadow standing next to Tony on a record, it would have been Jorn. It was too obvious not to happen... and yet we have waited nearly fifteen years for it to come to pass.
"The Devil You Know" is the basis from which we can approach this record, not only because it was the last time Tony worked with a singer other than Ozzy, but because Jorn's approach is very much in the mold of Dio's. The opening "Over The Violent Sun" features a riff reminiscent of "Fear", but played with a bit more restraint. The low-end rumble of Iommi's guitar sets a tone perfect for Jorn's rasp. Jorn doesn't have the baritone power of latter-day Dio, but he brings a touch of 80s Whitesnake in the melodic department that Dio wouldn't have. That mix creates a sound that melds Dio's era with that of Tony Martin's, which gives us a bit of a summation of all Sabbath was in its various incarnations without Ozzy.
"Black Times" slows things to a doom crawl right after, building to a heavier ending the way classics like "Falling Off the Edge Of The World" did, but without the same level of payoff. Jorn is a great singer, but he isn't best suited to those kinds of slow numbers if they don't have enough air of drama, so the record stunts itself before any momentum can be built up. Flipping that one with "World Alone" in the track listing would have helped, as the latter being the most up-tempo song on the album would get the blood pumping enough for a cool-down to be warranted. Contrast that with "Beyond The Dead", which is also slow and doomy, but has strings and layered vocals to create a more epic scene. Jorn is perfect in the role this time, recalling to my mind what his "Dracula: Swing Of Death" album would have been if played without any of the tongue-in-cheek, 60s television Batman camp.
The majority of the album sits in that slower tempo, and despite that being true of "The Devil You Know" as well, I feel the tempo more on this record. Jorn's voice blends into the wall of guitars more than Dio's, which gives the mix a flatter sound, one that gets more tiring to my ears by the time these forty minutes have passed. The biggest issue, though, is what I have noted about Jorn for as long as I have been listening to him; his songwriting is hit-and-miss. He was part of writing great songs on that "Dracula" album, and his hand in the fourth Allen/Lande album was essential to that being as good as it was, but he also has a string of solo albums that all blend together into a pile of uninteresting songs. This record has a little bit of the former, but too much of the latter.
This album doesn't live or die on Jorn alone. Iommi brings his trademark riffs to the table (including at last two, one already mentioned, that sound quite like previous ones), but he also uses several songs as attempts to build a dramatic swell that might limit where the melodies can go. There was a point where this album was intended to be instrumental, and I wonder if that's what holds it back.
And here is where we cycle back to the starting point. Jorn was the obvious pick to carry on with after Dio's passing, but the people saying that were ignoring one major factor; chemistry. Jorn has the right voice for Iommi's music, no doubt, but I don't hear the same chemistry between the two the way I did with Dio, or even with Glenn Hughes. "From The Dark" is a good record, but it doesn't live up to what these fifteen years have let us imagine the combination could accomplish. Having the right pieces in place still requires great songs, and there just aren't enough of them on this album. I like this, but I don't see how it will ever leave as much of an impression as "The Devil You Know", which even if flawed was an album filled with personality.
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