But there's still the question of whether you even call it Black Sabbath when it's obviously not the same band that anyone would consider Black Sabbath, or any form of it. Sure, you might be legally allowed to call it that, but that doesn't mean you should. And seriously, "Black Sabbath featuring Tony Iommi"? That's the official name of the band on
Seventh Star. Nothing like saying "Hey, look, I'm still in the band, in fact I'm featured! It's still Black Sabbath, really!"
Okay, I do get it. I understand that the name recognition of Black Sabbath is greater than the name recognition of Tony Iommi, and the record label pushed for the former in order to maximize sales. After all, sales are more important than artistic integrity. But when
Seventh Star came out, even though I wasn't even following Black Sabbath anymore, I still was both amused and disappointed, for obvious reasons. Look at the cover; he actually looks like he's thinking "I'm the only one left."
Based on name alone, Dream Theater will sell more albums than a John Petrucci solo album, but if the band broke up, or something happened to everyone else and JP was the only one left, it seems to me that JP would have the good sense to not just make his next solo album a Dream Theater album,
unless he truly felt that the new band embodied the spirit of Dream Theater. (Wow, that's a long, awkward sentence!) Some weird part of me thinks that it's important to honor the name of a band that put you on the map in the first place.