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Forbidden at 25

If you're the kind of fan who thinks Black Sabbath died after 1978, or are one of those fans that say "No Ward, No Sabbath", then you might as well stop reading now. This article won't be for you. I'm here to talk about the 25th anniversary of one of the more maligned albums in the band's back catalogue, 1995's "Forbidden". Please note that a lot of this is taken from a similar article I wrote from the 20th anniversary. I went through and tweaked things, added a couple of extra bits. I … [Read More...]

30 Years An Idol

Those of you who follow me on social media have noticed that I've started marking albums' birthdays a lot. In some ways, it is because I like bringing light to albums that never rGot the attention they should have. Mostly I just like marking the passage of time. Plus I like hearing from people who like the same albums. Today I'm writing about a whopper of the "bringing light" concept. That's Black Sabbath's 13th studio album... 1987's "The Eternal Idol". As I write this on Nov 23, … [Read More...]

In Memory….. of a 30 year old Star

NOTE: This article was originally published on Jan 28, 2006 and was called "In Memory of a 20 year old Star". 10 more years have passed, so I've brought it back to the top of the pile, and added a couple of small things. Enjoy. Thunder shattered the dawn Raging with fury, the king has come The power of terror will reign There is no mercy in pleading So begin the lyrics to "In for the Kill", the first track from the 1986 Black Sabbath album, "Seventh Star". Seventh Star just recently … [Read More...]

Happy 25th Headless Cross!

I don't have time to write one of the giant 5,000 word essays at this time, but I didn't want to let this anniversary pass. Today is the 25th anniversary of the Headless Cross album, originally released back in 1989. While technically the second Tony Martin era album, it felt like the "first" to me, because it was such a radical change from what was being done before. … [Read More...]

Happy 20th, Cross Purposes!

Today is January 31, 2014. That means that 20 years ago, it was Jan 31, 1994. And on that date, came the penultimate studio Black Sabbath album in the Tony Martin era of the band, Cross Purposes! I'm not doing a full retrospective, because I'm a bit too busy to write about it on its actual birthday, but I couldn't let this album pass unremarked. This album's production was a bit interesting. After the fall of the Dehumanizer reunion in late 1992, an awful lot of talk was bandied about … [Read More...]

Happy 30th, Born Again!

Today is August 7, 2013 (Well it was when I started writing this, it got too long, and it came out on August 8th). Thirty years ago today was the original release of one of the more polarizing albums in the history of Black Sabbath, that being Born Again. I was a recent Black Sabbath fan at that point. My original "onramp" to Black Sabbath was the Mob Rules album. Oh sure, there was Live Evil after that, but the first new, studio album by Black Sabbath was Born Again after I had become a … [Read More...]

Happy 30th, Holy Diver!

Today (March 25th) is the 30th anniversary (in the United States anyway) of the original release of the first, and arguably the best Dio album, "Holy Diver". Man, thirty years, eh? I know time is the enemy that marches on, never stopping, never ceasing, but when you reach milestones like that about things from your youth, they're reminders of where we've come from. … [Read More...]

An Angel is Missing – A Dio Career Retrospective

If you've been following me for awhile (and especially on Twitter), you'll know I like to post playlists. Given my overall music collection is so gigantic, I generally have a playlist for every band I like. I've posted several of them to twitter. However, this afternoon when I was thinking about Ronnie James Dio, I thought that it's hard to pigenhole him into a single playlist. You've got Dio, you've got Black Sabbath, there's Rainbow, and Elf. Not to mention the really older stuff like The … [Read More...]

About Henry

If you're a Black Sabbath fan, especially a long time one, you've seen Henry a bunch of times. Thing is, most people didn't know he's called Henry. He's something akin to Iron Maiden's "Eddie", although Henry has never come out on stage live. :) Henry is of course the "flying devil" or "flying angel" or whatever you want to refer to it. It's a logo that's been in use for a long time, and that was a point of contention with me. WHEN was the first time we saw Henry? The earliest I could … [Read More...]