Ronnie James Dio with Mick Wall & Wendy Dio CONSTABLE

A story, rather than the story, about the late, great singer leaves a lot still to be told.

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Ronnie James Dio wasn’t just the guy who popularised the ‘devil’s horns’ sign. As the singer with Rainbow and Black Sabbath he dealt with some of rock’s trickier band leaders. As a band leader himself he captained his own ship with pragmatic ruthlessness.

Yet today, 11 years after his death from stomach cancer, doubts linger. He was dismissed from Rainbow for not writing love songs. His departure from Sabbath was so muddy a hippopotamus could have wallowed in it. And did he and wife (and band manager) Wendy underpay their on-stage employees, as former Dio guitarist Vivian Campbell claims? In response, they offer precise, albeit unverified, details of remuneration.

Understandably, Rainbow In The Dark is unashamedly the couple’s side of the story. It stops in June 1986, with Dio (the band) about to headline Madison Square Garden, so there’s nothing on his band’s demise, the reunion with Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler in Heaven & Hell, or his ultimately fatal illness. And since the singer was too ill to complete a proper manuscript, the Sabbath and Dio years have been expertly assembled by Mick Wall from rough notes.

It’s immensely readable, if partisan. Excesses are toned down once Ronnie finished sleeping on the tour bus luggage rack, whacked on Mandrax; he liked a drink, but not in excess; he took no drugs stronger than pot; he never looked at another woman once he met then-waitress Wendy, whose first response was: “He’s a bit short for me.” The tales of his Italian-American upbringing in New York State (such as the grandfather who owned a car, but only to impress his friends, since he couldn’t drive) rattle along, but for all his beguiling detail vis-a-vis professional relationships, beyond Wendy the personal is avoided. Indeed it’s a surprise when he announces after 105 pages that “I was married to my first wife Loretta”. That’s her only mention, but it’s one more than his son gets.