Black Sabbath Discussion Thread

[Imaginos]

Yeah Master of Reality is pretty overrated, but Into The Void is still a fantastic song. How about some love for Volume 4 though? Lots of cool stuff there. The outro section of Under The Sun is probably one of my favorite Iommi riffs. Supernaut and Wheels of Confusion are amazing as well, and Snowblind is a top Sabbath song for me. And Laguna Sunrise is one of my favorite "pretty" Iommi pieces.

[KevShmev]

I've never really gotten the love for Into the Void.  I don't dislike it, but it's just kind of there for me.  The only songs I ever go for from that one are After Forever and (wait for it) Solitude.

Volume 4 is really good. Wheels of Confusion is a top 10 Sabbath tune, and Under the Sun is chock full of Iommi godliness, in the main riffs and the outro.

[KevShmev]

Forgot to address this...

My favorite Ozzy era album is Sabotage.

Despite the suckage that is Am I Going Insane, it's a fantastic record.  The Writ and Symptom of the Universe are two of my favorite Sabbath tunes, and Megalomania and The Thrill of It All are not far behind.  Such great tunes.

[Mosh]

My favorite is Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, but Paranoid and Sabotage come really close.

Wouldn't be a DTF discussion without a list:

1: Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
2: Paranoid
3: Sabotage
4: Volume 4
5: Master of Reality
6: Never Say Die!
7: Technical Ecstasy

[bl5150]

Every time I see a discussion like this on Sabbath I give myself a big WTF? for never really bothering with Ozzy era Sabbath.   I am a massive Ozzy solo fan from Blizzard through No More Tears (RR Tribute was #3 in my DTF Top 50, an album that includes a couple of Sabbath tracks ) but somehow I never seem to get around to it.   Makes the usual note to myself to remedy that 

[Imaginos]

I've never really gotten the love for Into the Void.  I don't dislike it, but it's just kind of there for me.  The only songs I ever go for from that one are After Forever and (wait for it) Solitude.

Volume 4 is really good. Wheels of Confusion is a top 10 Sabbath tune, and Under the Sun is chock full of Iommi godliness, in the main riffs and the outro.

For the longest time I didn't really get Into The Void either. I didn't dislike it but I didn't love it either. Then one day a few months ago it just clicked and I loved it. Geezer's got some great bass work on that song. I tried typing out this detailed explanation of this one riff he plays, but it was just really confusing, it's much easier to just say Geezer is amazing.

I love Solitude too, I was going to name drop it but I didn't want to be laughed out of the thread.

[?]

In the videos I've seen of this tour (admittedly quite some time ago) Ozzy sounded pretty awful.

Based on the videos I've watched, he was pretty bad at the start of the tour (wasn't he sick back then?), but he improved a lot in the summer. When I saw them he sounded good for the most part and was noticeably off-key on just a few songs.

As for rankings, my top 3 is Master of Reality, Paranoid and Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. Into the Void is actually my favorite Sabbath song.

[Zydar]

My favourite Sabbath song is Spiral Architect, and my favourite album is probably Master Of Reality. Sabbath Bloody Sabbath is up there too.

[Tomislav95]

I listen to some albums on regular basis but often forget to spin others. So yesterday I listened to Sabotage, pretty good album
Master of Reality is my favorite, Paranoid and Sabbath Blood Sabbath are almost as great in my book. Anyone else love Technical Ecstasy?

[El Barto]

Forgot to address this...

My favorite Ozzy era album is Sabotage.

Despite the suckage that is Am I Going Insane, it's a fantastic record.  The Writ and Symptom of the Universe are two of my favorite Sabbath tunes, and Megalomania and The Thrill of It All are not far behind.  Such great tunes.

AIGI isn't a bad song once you get past the cheesy keyboard intro. The problem is that it falls in the middle of what would otherwise be a God damned onslaught of Megalomania, The Thrill of it All, Supernaut and The Writ. If they'd moved AIGI to side one, side two could well be the single greatest album side of any album. But man, you get over the insane heavyness of Supernaut and plow right on into that awful keyboard intro and it's a complete downer.

As for favorite albums, my top three would probably have to be SBS, Sabotage and Tyr. Sucks to have followed Ozzy and Dio, but the Tony Martin era is full of great stuff.

[TAC]

Saw Bush era Anthrax play Supernaut and it was unreal.

[Stadler]

Anyone interested in me doing a Sabbath discography, like I did with Kiss a while back?  Or Priest (the problem with Priest is I don't have the two Ripper albums, and I'm not going to get them)? 

[Scorpion]

If you did Priest, I'd be happy to guest-host the two Ripper albums. And that would definitely be something that I'm interested in, a Priest discography.

[Mosh]

I'd be interested in both but would rather see them in chronological order. Will participate regardless of how you decide to do it though.

[Evermind]

I'm interested in Priest indeed.

[Ben_Jamin]

I'll be interested, I like reading people's discography threads.

[LudwigVan]

My favorite is Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, but Paranoid and Sabotage come really close.

Wouldn't be a DTF discussion without a list:

1: Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
2: Paranoid
3: Sabotage
4: Volume 4
5: Master of Reality
6: Never Say Die!
7: Technical Ecstasy

Not too different from my ranking:

1: Paranoid
2: Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
3: Sabotage
4: Master of Reality
5: Vol. 4
6: S/T
7: Never Say Die!
8: Technical Ecstasy

[TAC]

You guys missed the first album!

[LudwigVan]

You guys missed the first album!

Good catch!  edited 

[Stadler]

All right.  Priest it is, in chronological order, skipping the Ripper albums (or with Scorpion guesting, at his pleasure).  Gimme the weekend to listen up and start (plus I'm traveling).

Awesome. 

[Mosh]

Oops. Black Sabbath is in between Master of Reality and Never Say Die.

Would like to see at least Jugulator included. Don't care about Demolition.

[Mladen]

1. Master of reality
2. Paranoid
3. Black sabbath
4. Sabotage
5. Sabbath bloody sabbath
6. Vol 4
7. Technical ecstasy
8. Never say die

3 and 4 switch around sometimes, and so to 6 and 7.

[Art]

Ranking Sabbath with Ozzy:

1 - Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
2 - Master Of Reality
3 - Sabotage
4 - Vol. 4
5 - Paranoid
6 - Black Sabbath
7 - 13
8 - Never Say Die
9 - Technical Ecstasy


With Dio:

1 - Heaven And Hell
2 - The Devil You Know (poetic license here  )
3 - Dehumanizer
4 - The Mob Rules

With Tony Martin:

1 - Headless Cross
2 - The Eternal Idol
3 - TYR
4 - Cross Purposes
5 - Forbidden

[KevShmev]

AIGI isn't a bad song once you get past the cheesy keyboard intro. The problem is that it falls in the middle of what would otherwise be a God damned onslaught of Megalomania, The Thrill of it All, Supernaut and The Writ. If they'd moved AIGI to side one, side two could well be the single greatest album side of any album. But man, you get over the insane heavyness of Supernaut and plow right on into that awful keyboard intro and it's a complete downer.
 

Wait, Supernaut is from Volume 4; did you mean Symptom of the Universe or Superztar?

I will admit I have a hard time getting past that keyboard intro of ...Going Insane. It's so bad.

And I have to admit that I have never heard any Sabbath from the Tony Martin era. *ducks*

Gimme some songs to check out and I will rush over to YT to check them out.  4-5 will work (in other words, don't be like, Hey, check out these 39 songs ).

[TAC]

I certainly wouldn't want to overrate the Martin era, as I do see that around here. But there are some great moments.

I completely thumbed my nose at it while it was happening. It's one of my biggest "music regrets". They came around a few times. Not even having Cozy Powell could get me to buy into it. And I feel like if it wasn't called Black Sabbath, I would've approached it completely differently.

[Big Hath]

Gimme some songs to check out and I will rush over to YT to check them out.  4-5 will work (in other words, don't be like, Hey, check out these 39 songs ).

The Battle of Tyr -> Odin's Court -> Valhalla (two short interludes/intros and a proper song)
When Death Calls
The Shining
Headless Cross

[El Barto]

[/quote]

AIGI isn't a bad song once you get past the cheesy keyboard intro. The problem is that it falls in the middle of what would otherwise be a God damned onslaught of Megalomania, The Thrill of it All, Supernaut and The Writ. If they'd moved AIGI to side one, side two could well be the single greatest album side of any album. But man, you get over the insane heavyness of Supernaut and plow right on into that awful keyboard intro and it's a complete downer.
 

Wait, Supernaut is from Volume 4; did you mean Symptom of the Universe or Superztar?

I will admit I have a hard time getting past that keyboard intro of ...Going Insane. It's so bad.

And I have to admit that I have never heard any Sabbath from the Tony Martin era. *ducks*

Gimme some songs to check out and I will rush over to YT to check them out.  4-5 will work (in other words, don't be like, Hey, check out these 39 songs ).

Yeah, definitely Supertzar. I actually despise Supernaut. Go figure.

From the Sabbath Survivor a few years back. Pretty reasonable assessment, though certainly not perfect.

Ancient Warrior
    - 0 (0%)
The Shining
    - 0 (0%)
Glory Ride
    - 0 (0%)
When Death Calls
    - 0 (0%)
Headless Cross
    - 0 (0%)
The Sabbath Stones
    - 0 (0%)
Anno Mundi
    - 0 (0%)
Cross of Thorns
    - 1 (16.7%)
I Witness
    - 0 (0%)

[LudwigVan]

I certainly wouldn't want to overrate the Martin era, as I do see that around here. But there are some great moments.

I completely thumbed my nose at it while it was happening. It's one of my biggest "music regrets". They came around a few times. Not even having Cozy Powell could get me to buy into it. And I feel like if it wasn't called Black Sabbath, I would've approached it completely differently.

Tony Martin era doesn't do it for me at all.

[jjrock88]

I think Wolf and myself are the same when it comes to Sabbath. More of a casual fan of the Ozzy era, but a mega fan of the Dio and Martin era. Plus love Born Again, Seventh Star and the Ray Gillen demos.

Ozzy era- 1) Sabbath Bloody Sabbath 2) Paranoid 3) Master of Reality 4) Sabotage 5) Black Sabbath 6) Vol 4 7) Never Say Die 8) Technical Ecstasy 9) 13

Dio era- 1) Heaven & Hell 2) Mob Rules 3) Dehumanizer 4) Devil You Know

It just shows how good the first three Dio fronted albums are because I would say The Devil You Know is one of my favorite new metal albums of the last ten years and still ranks last of the four Dio albums

Martin era- 1) Headless Cross 2) Eternal Idol 3) Tyr 4) Cross Purposes 5) Forbidden

Forbidden is easily the worst of the Martin albums but still has some great tunes. I will try and ignore that ice T song though lol. Now that the reunion tour seems to be winding down, hopefully Tony can finish up releasing the Martin deluxe albums. Sounds like Tony is open to recording something new with Martin as well. Hopefully on the Headless Cross deluxe, they release that Russia live show from 1989. Great stuff!

[Mladen]

7 - 13

Holy shit, how did I forget about this one?

It would be one spot above Never say die for me. Not a bad album by any means, I just didn't find it too memorable.

[KevShmev]

  I actually despise Supernaut. Go figure.

Interesting. It's not a favorite of mine, but it sure does rock and sounds fine when I listen to Volume 4 (Changes is one I always skip).

Anyway, I checked out a couple Tony Martin-era tunes on YT last night.  Anno Mundi (The Vision) was pretty good; I could see listening to that one again. Valhalla was alright.

Big Hath, I will try those others you recommended. 

[TAC]

Annu Mundi is awesome.

My fave Martin era album is Cross Purposes. I Witness,  Crown Of Thorns, Imaculate Deception, and Psychophobia are all great tunes.

[TAC]

I actually despise Supernaut. Go figure.

Dude, that makes like zero sense. 

[KevShmev]

Haha, I agree. I mean, it's not a top tier Sabbath tune, but it's still a nice rocker.

Back to Master of Reality, even though I think it is easily the least best of the first six, I get why so many love it.  It was kind of the start of the whole doom and sludge thing, which became big in the metal world, so I get why that appeals to a lot of people; I am just not a big sludge or doom metal guy, so there ya go.

[Mosh]

I really like Sweet Leaf, Into the Void, and Children of the Grave. As for the rest, I can take it or leave it.

With early Sabbath there's definitely two major sides to the band: the more doom-y stuff and then the more progressive sounding stuff. I like both sides but naturally I  gravitate more toward Sabbath Bloody Sabbath and Sabotage.