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Black Sabbath
Black Sabbath are an English heavy metal band from Birmingham. The original band line up of Ozzy Osbourne (vocals), Tony Iommi (guitar), Terence "Geezer" Butler (bass), and Bill Ward (drums) is the same as the current line up (2007) although there have been many shifts of personnel over the years.
Black Sabbath remain a dominant influence in the heavy metal genre they helped create. VH1's 100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock ranks them second, behind Led Zeppelin.
Currently, the early 1980s line-up of the band featuring Iommi, Butler, Ronnie James Dio and Vinny Appice are touring under the moniker Heaven and Hell, a title taken from the 1980 Black Sabbath album of the same name.
The original and best known line-up are frequently credited as the inventors of the heavy metal genre. Black Sabbath have sold over 100 million albums worldwide
Early Days
Black Sabbath formed in Aston, Birmingham, England in 1968 under the name Polka Tulk Blues Company (soon shortened to Polka Tulk), and later were called Earth, playing blues rock and hard rock.
Guitarist Tony Iommi was greatly influenced both by Hank Marvin's heavy guitar performances in the band Cliff Richard and the Shadows, and by jazz guitar, particularly that of Django Reinhardt. Iommi left Earth for a short time to tour with Jethro Tull. Iommi's efforts can be seen, albeit miming skills, on the film The Rolling Stones Rock and Roll Circus. Ward has also expressed a fondness for jazz music, especially drummers like Buddy Rich and Gene Krupa. Geezer Butler cites bassist/vocalist Jack Bruce of British blues band Cream as a major influence on him: “He was the first player I ever saw who bent the strings and played the bass as a totally independent instrument”. Early versions of Black Sabbath merged elements of blues, jazz, and rock and paid their dues playing cover versions of songs by heavy rock acts including Jimi Hendrix, Blue Cheer, and Cream. Osbourne says he was deeply influenced by The Beatles and his favourite album of all time is Revolver.
Earth moved in a darker direction when their bassist, Geezer Butler, a fan of the black magic novels of Dennis Wheatley, started to dabble in the occult. "Geezer Butler wrote the song Black Sabbath after he was given an occult book in Latin and Butler had a vision of a black hooded figure standing at the foot of his bed and told Osbourne about the vision. (from VH1 Black Sabbath Documentary)". In early 1969, the band found themselves being confused with another local band called Earth. After being called to play a concert, they found out the manager called the wrong Earth. As Tony Iommi put it "We died out there," as told in his interview in The Last Supper. As a result, they adopted the song title as their new band name.
The group found its signature sound almost by accident. When the group was rehearsing in a studio, which was situated opposite a cinema showing a horror movie, Osbourne recalls that Tony Iommi (Reference video: Don't Blame Me) remarked to the rest of the band how it was strange that people willingly paid to see a movie intended to scare them. The band began to purposely write dark, ominous songs in an attempt to be music's answer to horror films, and in rebellion against the prevalent happy pop music of the 1960s. In a VH1 documentary about the band, Ozzy Osbourne recalled the laughable lyrics of radio-friendly pop at the time, such as "if you ever go to San Francisco, be sure to wear a flower in your hair...," "screw that,", they said, "let's go over there and possess people."