That comes from a KNAC.com interview.
KNAC.COM: Iron Maiden announced recently that this tour [‘Give Me Ed ‘Til I’m Dead’ 2003] would be their last huge full-length world-wide arena tour, limiting future appearances to festivals and short runs. This is a big tour for you as well: do you have any similar plans? Is this true for you as well?
DIO: "Mmm… No, I never could say that. I think that they are, Maiden, in the throes of retirement, again, if you know what I mean. They won’t retire, but, I’ve heard rumors to that effect -- not from them, but from other people. Scaling back… the last big tour they ever do. I think Bruce is going to carry on I think… again, it’s hard for me to answer for them."
another thing...
KNAC.COM: Well, I mean… you’ve got this character -- I haven’t seen him in a while -- but he’s on the covers of Holy Diver and The Last In Line. He’s on the road-cases for your equipment…
DIO: Murray.
KNAC.COM: Murray! I mean- talking about “evil”… Iron Maiden has “Eddie,” Megadeth has “Vic Rattlehead”… and also, as a New Yorker, it’s the funniest thing to me because you’ve got--
DIO: We’ve got Murray! That’s right, that’s right -- we’ve got “Murray”! [laughs]
KNAC.COM: [laughing] I mean, how “evil” is a guy named “Murray,” you know?
DIO: That was the whole point! How evil is a guy named “Eddie”?
KNAC.COM: Good point.
DIO: You know? How evil is the guy? Shouldn’t his name be [dramatic voice] “BALTHAZAR!” Someone, at one point said, “Let’s call him, “MURRALISI.” [laughing] And I went: “Why? He’s MURRAY!” You know? What else would you want to call a monster? Because, we’re NOT monsters. Maiden are not monsters. We’re not monsters. So you got your monster -- what do we call him? “Murray!” Because it’s FUNNY, that’s why! And that gives him so much more of a persona than, [dramatic voice again] “BALTHAZAR!” I mean, how pretentious can you possibly get? I’m not pretentious… but he was a great logo. A great logo, because he, in some ways, epitomized what I’m saying to you – what I said to you before -- which was, we don’t explain what we are – we just create an image and you decide. And you give him a name like “Murray” then doesn’t that give the brighter person an insight as to, maybe, just maybe we were taking a little bit of a piss here? But he’s a great logo, and he was necessary for us, and it works!
KNAC.COM: Is he ever going to make it back to a [record/CD] cover? Maybe…
DIO: Murray-- well, he’s usually up there on our backdrop. We bring the “Murray” backdrop with us, a lot of our t-shirts feature Murray, as well, because he’s been our biggest seller -- he’s been our focal point, just like “Eddie” is a focal point of Maiden. Absolutely. He’s always there; he always will be. He’s been on almost every album we’ve done, in some way -- even in some subliminal way. He’s just part of what we are.
[a href=\'http://www.knac.com/article.asp?ArticleID=2321\' target=\'_blank\']full[/a] interview
KNAC.COM: Iron Maiden announced recently that this tour [‘Give Me Ed ‘Til I’m Dead’ 2003] would be their last huge full-length world-wide arena tour, limiting future appearances to festivals and short runs. This is a big tour for you as well: do you have any similar plans? Is this true for you as well?
DIO: "Mmm… No, I never could say that. I think that they are, Maiden, in the throes of retirement, again, if you know what I mean. They won’t retire, but, I’ve heard rumors to that effect -- not from them, but from other people. Scaling back… the last big tour they ever do. I think Bruce is going to carry on I think… again, it’s hard for me to answer for them."
another thing...
KNAC.COM: Well, I mean… you’ve got this character -- I haven’t seen him in a while -- but he’s on the covers of Holy Diver and The Last In Line. He’s on the road-cases for your equipment…
DIO: Murray.
KNAC.COM: Murray! I mean- talking about “evil”… Iron Maiden has “Eddie,” Megadeth has “Vic Rattlehead”… and also, as a New Yorker, it’s the funniest thing to me because you’ve got--
DIO: We’ve got Murray! That’s right, that’s right -- we’ve got “Murray”! [laughs]
KNAC.COM: [laughing] I mean, how “evil” is a guy named “Murray,” you know?
DIO: That was the whole point! How evil is a guy named “Eddie”?
KNAC.COM: Good point.
DIO: You know? How evil is the guy? Shouldn’t his name be [dramatic voice] “BALTHAZAR!” Someone, at one point said, “Let’s call him, “MURRALISI.” [laughing] And I went: “Why? He’s MURRAY!” You know? What else would you want to call a monster? Because, we’re NOT monsters. Maiden are not monsters. We’re not monsters. So you got your monster -- what do we call him? “Murray!” Because it’s FUNNY, that’s why! And that gives him so much more of a persona than, [dramatic voice again] “BALTHAZAR!” I mean, how pretentious can you possibly get? I’m not pretentious… but he was a great logo. A great logo, because he, in some ways, epitomized what I’m saying to you – what I said to you before -- which was, we don’t explain what we are – we just create an image and you decide. And you give him a name like “Murray” then doesn’t that give the brighter person an insight as to, maybe, just maybe we were taking a little bit of a piss here? But he’s a great logo, and he was necessary for us, and it works!
KNAC.COM: Is he ever going to make it back to a [record/CD] cover? Maybe…
DIO: Murray-- well, he’s usually up there on our backdrop. We bring the “Murray” backdrop with us, a lot of our t-shirts feature Murray, as well, because he’s been our biggest seller -- he’s been our focal point, just like “Eddie” is a focal point of Maiden. Absolutely. He’s always there; he always will be. He’s been on almost every album we’ve done, in some way -- even in some subliminal way. He’s just part of what we are.
[a href=\'http://www.knac.com/article.asp?ArticleID=2321\' target=\'_blank\']full[/a] interview