1970 JULY - $91E.NOR TRACK BY what you mean to say and we are totallysatisfied with the way the sound is going," drawled lommi. Speed and forceTRACK Sabbath do not plan their music. They prepare very little. Their music comes from the immediate mood on them at that time -it must NME SEPT 26zzy Osbourne talks be a sad world they live in- but nevertheless, they just start playing, and goon. Paranoid was an album that took only a matter of hours to produce. ,..6th Sabbath's second LP. "It was all just an instant thing, spontaneous, ifyou like; there was little written down. It was all in our heads, and came out as one," he continued. BLACK SABBATH TURN out through space and seeing stars A dark, satanic coffee arrived, the atmosphere became just a little a gutsy, "sock 'em all the and things." lighter, but it was still all too uncomfortable. "Audience reaction gets time" type of music which is better and better, and we get more excited with the success that seems to never pretentious and the Iron Man be coming. Yet people still expect us to sacrifice virgins, and occult album is a good example of "This is about a guy who things like that, which if we say it once, we say it a thousand times, was what they're doing on stage. invented a time machine and he never anything to do with us." The speed and force of the goes through time and finds the While I was with them, the band were told that a Black Sabbath parade music is sustained throughout, world is going to end. Coming had recently been held in the States, with thousands of people taking Terry Butler's bass and Tony back, he turns to iron and part, and apparently hyping the band to no small extent. Large sections lommi's lead guitar forcing the people won't listen to him, they ofAmerica had met the news that Sabbath were doing an October tour numbers along while drummer think he's not real. He goes a bit with wild cries of "great". The band took it all in a rather cool, heavyway. Bill Ward puts down a solid barmy and decides to get his "We haven't done the States before, and we are looking forward to it with foundation. Ozzy played me revenge by killing people. He interest," said Tony -and the rest of the group. Theyare also looking their new Vertigo album (42s tries to do good but in the end it forward to a large European tour. They have done good business across 6d) and talked about the tracks. turns into bad." the Channel, and know theycan do more.RoyHollingworth Here's what he had to say: Electric Funeral - NME SEPTEMBER 26 - War Pigs "In years to come, the way "It's about VIP people who things are going, there's going BECAUSE OF TH Enature of the group's name, people tend are sitting there saying `Go to bea nuclear war, which is to associate Black Sabbath with witchcraft. This is an out and fight' and all the what this track's about. There's understandable misconception, but one which should be put everyday people are forced a lot of evil in the world today." straight- the Birmingham quartet has nothing whatsoever to do with to, but the VIPs never do. slaying cockerels and goats. Making their NME chart debut this week We're not a political group, Hand Of Doom at No 26 with "Paranoid" - the title track of their new album - Black it's just that most of our songs "It's about people on drugs and Sabbath are pretty fed up with the tag and lead singer Ozzy Osbourne have messages." what happens to them -their met me at his manager's office to set the record straight. skin turning green and things. "A lot of people have a grudge against us because of this black magic Paranoid There's a lot of gory words, but thing, but it has got out of all proportion. At one time we got so confused "This is about a guy who has we've seen a lot of people like with Black Widow it was unbelievable, though ! understand that Black a hang-up with chicks. It's got that and it's getting out of all Widow are getting out of black magic now. We're two completelydifferent a heavy riff. We're not a single proportion. If you can frighten bands in music and everything," he began. group and after the first single, people with words it's better "All the tracks on the first album were a warning against black magic. which we didn't like, we just than letting them find out by You get old business tycoons wanting to go with young chicks, so they go wrote this in the studio and trying drugs. I'm not trying to along to black magic rituals and get themselves involved... things like now it's starting to sell." say we're angels, I've indulged that, they're sick. I believe in black magic but I've not tried it and I won't." to a certain extent, but I'd never The black magic thing caused a lot of worries for Black Sabbath when Planet Caravan try any of the hard drugs or trips going toAmerica was mentioned. Ozzy explained, "It frightened us "We wrote this in the studio as or anything." because of the Sharon Tate murder and we got very uptight that people well. We decided to vary the would expect us to go on stage and turn people into frogs and things." album more by having a soft Fairies Wear Boots He laughs about it now but at the time it wasn't funny. Ozzy finds that number. It's a smoky jazz club "Again, it's a warning about the people realise what the group are once they've seen them and he's more number about someone going use of drugs." Richard Green than pleased that they're starting to break big at last. "We used to be called Earth," he revealed. "We were just bumming round the country for two years like a lot of other groups and when things started happening we thought maybe it was our turn.All that sweat has now paid off. As long as people want to listen to Black Sabbath we'll be around. "It's unbelievable on the Continent. We've just finished a tour and every night we were getting two or three ovations. Up until the last tour we were going down well but there was a thing that just wasn't there. At one time I just wanted to get a record in the charts and when we did it was amazing. It's not changed any of us; we just want to go on playing good music and making people happy." Ozzy sat chain smoking and not holding back on his language, much of which was fruity. He makes use of expletives to emphasise points, most of which are good sense, and he has strongviews on things like drugs and groups who have no time for other people when they've made the big time. When he talks about Black Sabbath's music, he is just as enthusiastic but he tends to get worked up in a quieter way: "We got so fed up hearing stories about love that we decided towrite about what's going on in life around people. Ifwe start writing now for the next album, bythe time it comes up we mayhave a lot of good tracks or we mayhave a load of numbers we don't like, sowe leave it till the last moment. We're prettyquick at writing. Tony thinks of a riff or a melodyand we write round that usually. We tryto blend our music instead of getting the same monotonous riff. We like a lot of tempo changes so that it doesn't get on people's nerves."