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Friends and fans pay tribute to Dio

By | Published on Tuesday 1 June 2010

Ronnie James Dio was honoured at a public memorial in LA on Sunday, with family, friends and fans paying their last respects to the late metaller and Black Sabbath frontman, who died last month.

Fans watched on screens outside Hollywood’s Forest Lawn cemetery while friends and families gathered in the facility’s Hall Of Liberty. Dio’s cousin, and bandmate in his original band Elf, David Feinstein told the gathering: “He touched all of us with his music and his message and his magic. I know that Ronnie truly loved all of you. He had a great appreciation for your loyalty. I’m talking about all you out there, all the fans”.

The rocker’s son, Dan Padavona, used the occasion to encourage others to have regular medical check-ups, and to visit a doctor as soon as they detect any cancer-like symptoms, saying his father might have survived his stomach cancer had it been detected sooner. According to WENN, he said: “I beg you not to make the same mistake my dad made. For dad, the show always had to go on. He ignored the warning signs for years, and all along the cancer was growing and mutating from something that was probably easily defeatable into a monster which even Dio couldn’t slay”.

As expected, protesters from the nutty Westboro Baptist Church picketed the event, though they were seemingly small in number and went largely unnoticed. Blabbermouth quote a source as saying: “Protesters were cordoned off outside of Forest Lawn grounds proper and were small in number with an at least equal number of counter-protesters. All seemed orderly despite the usual idiocy from the WBC folks”.



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