Black Sabbath: fifty years of “sabotage”

For a mere randomness, in the meantime it was decided to compose this article, the sad and unexpected news of the trapasso of Ozzy Osbourne was given to the world. Trapasso took place in a few weeks after the ‘Back to the Beginning’ event at Villa Park, in that of Birmingham (hometown of the Black Sabbath) and with a very happy Ozzydespite the already precarious state of health, struggling with a double final appearance, to which the fans, present and not, have witnessed with shiny eyes. Remembering with respect the peculiar vocal uniqueness with which he has been able to stand out, in his artistic life, is today more than ever a duty. We do it here, therefore, retracing the fifty years of an album, ‘Sabotage’, where he himself, together with his companions Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward, had the opportunity to leave a particularly significant study test although surrounded by an unspeakable tension. ‘Sabotage’ was and remains one of the most significant work of all the artistic life relating to Osbourne and therefore to the Black Sabbath, although his gestation – we are about to see – was surrounded by an unspeakable tension.

Sabbath Sabotati

Before the arrival of ‘Sabotage’, the Black Sabbath had been able to touch, in a short time, the heart of audiences and wider, and this thanks above all to a sequence of albums destined to make the history of hard rock and Heavy Metal (or more simply than that of rock in general). The homonymous debut and the next ‘Paranoid’both released in 1970 (a bit like ‘Led Zeppelin I’ Led Zeppelin II ‘had been published in just one year, 1969), had granted the band to grow, proliferate and refine a compositional skill that had led to the creation of three giants such as ‘Master of Reality’ (1971), ‘vol. 4 ‘(1972) and’ Sabbath Bloody Sabbath ‘(from 1973). That during that first half of the seventies many British artists were subject to receive a certain unbridled idolatry, for the public and the US criticism, was certainly not a rarity.

The US success, in the case of the Black Sabbath, was solicited by the manager Patrick Meehan, But the relations between him and the four of the band led to a break When, through Derek Shulman, frontman of the prog gentle Giant legends (and neglecting a job like ‘Acqiring the Taste’, let it be said, it would still be a crime today), they were informed that they had been greatly scammed by the aforementioned manager. After a more in -depth analysis of the situation, in fact, to the discovery of the Heavy Metal it was up: from cars to homes. Meehan was in all respects the legitimate owner and after the bitter discovery, according to Shulman still reported, whose band had undergone something similar by Meehan himself, Ozzy would have faced the impresary shrewd face to face: But more than using the words, he made him throw in the direction of the same a bottle of scotch tape, ending up missing him “literally of a finger”.

Anger as a compositional engine

Back from an important live appointment in California, Ozzy and the rest of the band, already quite exhausted by the abuse of substances and too many concerts, tried to cut the bridges with the company of Meehan, the Worldwide Artists, an intent that gave the kick to start a long procedural process that would have further exasperated the theses of musicians. Despite the situation, Iommi and the others settled at the Morgan Studios of Willesden (London) to work in co-production with Mike Butcher at a new album, and the awareness of having Meehan’s lawyers constantly at the heels served to increase an unprecedented anger in them (and anger, in the artistic field, can often turn into a boundless source of inspiration). Also for this reason, the material that was composed and engraved with the Morgan, in February 1975, touched levels of sound heaviness (heaviness, however in a good sense) never lapped first by the quartet. “One day we were in the studio and the next day to defend our reasons in court,” recalls Tony Iommi. “The sound of my guitar hangs down, and in this it certainly played a role all the exasperation of those days“. It is not surprising, in fact, that the group’s sixth album would take as a title that of ‘Sabotage’ being that the band, according to Iommi, perceived to be” sabotaged throughout the line and hit at every point “. Bill Ward, remembering those days, instead ironized that “(‘Sabotage’) is probably the only album in the history of music to have been created in a study (registration) in the presence of lawyers“.

Rediscover ‘Sabotage’ five decades later

Among the traces of exemplary ‘sabotage’ of the hardness narrated by Iommi, in particular regard to its sound, certainly stands out “Syptom of the Universe”. The sinister riff of the guitarist with the cross around the neck would have made school at all the thrash metal to come, and can be in all respects considered a structural and sound predecessor of that same kind of heavy. “Syptom …”, of which Ozzy Osbourne will insert a faithful version in its ‘Speak of the Devil’ (live album composed entirely of Black Sabbath songs), is anticipated by one of the best diamonds of the entire Sabbathian classic repertoire: “Hole in the Sky”, in whose text proper osbourne complains of the need to trace “a window on time” that allows him to ascend “up to paradise”.

For the writer William Irwin the text, written by Geezer Butler, would allude to the cosmic journey and apocalyptic war. In reality it would be more likely to think that the theme tackled there was that of pollution. In “Hole …” Iommi shows off a double trace solo, before the song slides in a short acoustic interlude entitled “Don’t start (Too Late)”. Even more than in the cases of the works that precede it, ‘Sabotage’ needs to be listened to with great care and attentionin particular for its most intricate and experimental traces (hence the use of use, in cases of some, a term as “prog” to describe a part of the album style). In fact, the marriage between the bizarre and the seriousness of intent that permeates a sound story like that of “SuperTzar” is surprising, certainly embellished by the work of the English Chamber Choir.

According to what Tony Iommi told between the pages of ‘Iron Man’ (his unmissable autobiography translated also in Italian, and already rather rare), when Ozzy arrived in the studio, realizing the presence of the members of the choir, thought he was in the wrong place and made up behind. Again, the songwriting of “The Thrill of It All” (same title, among other things, of a song by the Roxy Music of those same years) lets himself be admired for the various changes of time, but also for his exploration of a certain as a skepticism towards the material success and the value attributed to the faith (“Mr. Jesus”, wonders here Ozzy, “If he saw this world in which we live, would still believe in man?”). Certainly, one of the highest points of the ‘sabotage’ material lies in “The Writ”, an intricate composition with a varied sound, accentuated by the frenetic song of Ozzy. It is interesting to denotes how, for this particular case, it was not the usual Geezer Butler who took care of the text, but Ozzy Osbourne himself. In the song, he ran against music business and the aforementioned manager several timesdescribed as the personification of the devil (“Are you Satan? Are you a man?”).

In his ‘I Am Ozzy’ memorial (largely funny reading), Osbourne reveals that writing the text of the piece independently “was a bit like consulting a squeezing: all the anger I felt towards Meehan came out”. Theatically, “The Writ” and “Megalomania”, the fourth trace of the album, seem to find a certain intertwining in facing the same tensions deriving from legal problems. “Megalomania” (whose title was erroneously marked as “Meglomania” in different editions of the album) is manifested as a long journey of over nine minutes, divided into several passages and that if first it penetrates a more quiet and reflective nature, it is subsequently torn by a heavy guitar tour escorted by Ward’s Campanaccio. Ozzy gives here the best of himself, but his powerful shade is able to shine even in an overwhelming song with a more commercial cut: let’s talk about “Am I Going Insane (Radio)”whose term in brackets led many listeners to believe that the one inserted on the album was a radio version and therefore published (in reality, that “radio” was referring to “Radio-Rental”, a gaily term that would rhyme with “mental”, or “crazy”).

LED Sabbath: an unexpected meeting

If you take the historiographic side in which a border line between the world of Black Sabbath and that of Led Zeppelinit should be precisely the period of ‘sabotage’ that coincides with the famous and legendary Jam Session who would have united – in one way or another – the two factions. According to the memories of Osbourne, The Sabbaths knew Robert Plant and John Bonham since the times when Plant, after having played in his first bands, would have joined Jimmy Page’s new Yardbirds Yardbirds, just before they changed the name in Led Zeppelin. Bonham was an admirer of the Black Sabbath, and “When we played in the clubs, sometimes John came to see us and asked to go on stage to play,” recalls Tony Iommi. “There was that time when we satisfied him, but in which he ended up destroying Bill’s battery, who took a lot. In fact, at every subsequent attempt by John to go up again on our stage, Bill would have answered with a dry no”. It was only when the Black Sabbath made ‘Sabotage’, that the two bands finally gathered in the studio, even if in a very uncertain and chaotic way.

“We were recording at the Morgan Studios in London,” says Iommi, “and John went on to visit us, taking Planty and John Paul Jones. John said: ‘Next, we play’ Supernaut ‘!’ – He loved our song. From there we sparked in a jam session (Plant would not have participated, however, simply observing the scene – while it is not known what Jones’ role was actually in the matter). According to Ozzy Osbourne, however, the visit to the studio by the Zeppelin would have had a second goal, that is, to propose to the Sabbaths to move on to their record label, the Swan Song, perhaps unaware of the legal problems that the Black Sabbath disguised in those days. Tony Iommi, nevertheless, claims that the Jam was even saved on a tape but not to know where he can find himself. Other theses would deny that the Jam had taken place during the recordings of ‘Sabotage’, since the Led Zeppelin would have found themselves on tour, at that time. What we can confirm and that the Black Sabbath, albeit caught in a moment of crisis, found the right push to create a last great classic of their discography, which according to Ward was conceived as a return album to the origins and, at least in part, since if we talk about ‘Sabotage’ let’s talk about a multifaceted job, in the wake of the “Black Sabbath’s iron sound”.

For the first time since they had started their career, the big four left on tour with an additional keyboard player, Gerald “Jezz” Woodroffe, this in the intention of remedying the scores to orchestra them and other new sounds to which he had resorted to the ‘sabotage’ sessions. With the Kiss as a special guest, the concerts went on with a certain success until November 1975, when Ozzy remained injured in a motorcycle accident. In the three years immediately following, the unit of the group was destined to crumbleand after the exit of the albeit valid ‘Technical Ecstasy’ (1976) and ‘Never Say Die!’ (1978), Ozzy greeted friends Bill, Geezer and Tony to embark on a solo career today already entered the legend in full right.