Black Sabbath - Sabbath Bloody Sabbath (1973)

I've always wanted to talk about this album, since it's one of my absolute all time favourites ever. I even started writing and entry about it last summer, while I was bored at work but I didn't work out. It was day or so after Ozzy's unfortunate passing, so my feelings about his music and overall legacy might have been slightly influenced by it. Now that some time has passed, I'm ready to talk about Black Sabbath.

This is the album I always tell people about when they label Black Sabbath as this "evil scary metal band" with wacky vocals, or when they brag about how Ozzy can't sing. Well, this and also their subsequent release - "Sabotage". The overall sound and vibe of this LP is simply extraordinary. The cover artwork has this beautiful vibrant colors that contrast with grim imagery actually being depicted on it. Analogically, the music here is similarly vibrant. It's quirky, juicy and experimental, while being played with Tony's menacing C# standard tuning, which was crazy low and dark-sounding for the 70s. Additionally, Ozzy's voice is naturally really high, so there's another contrastring element to it all. All these aspects make this album feel very interesting and unique. The aspects of early "metal" music are still here, but are admitedly sparse. That being said this record contains probably the heaviest Sabbath song ever, which is...

...The title track. What a fantastic opener! It sets the mood for the album and for the entire experimental era of the band amazingly well. It features heavy hard-rocking verses, intercepted by beautiful, floaty acoustic bridges that lead to wordless chorus. This track also features colorful guitar harmonies - another staple of the LP. But don't let all the prettiness fool you - this song contains one of the heaviest breakdowns you'll ever hear. The breakdown section is genius! The riff is remarkably simple but hits sooo hard. I've heard that it's probably the first metal breakdown too! ...And in the meantime Ozzy delivers the highest notes he's ever performed. Then we have this quick and jammy intro that fades out until the next song begins... What a curious and cool track!

"A National Acrobat" continues the trend of melodic songs laced with hard rock and dark metal. This time, we also have some psychdelic elements. If not for the low, menacing power-chords in verses, the song would sound like it was made in the 60s by some proto-prog band. I like it a lot, it shows the listener an interesting side of Black Sabbath that isn't that well known.

One of the things that I like about this band the most is their belief in artistic vision and remarkable courage to place vulnerable, toned-down, often acoustic compositions in the middle of heavy metal album. It shows the band's maturity and says a lot about what the type of music that they pioneered was really about. I hate conventional metal music because of that. They'll never put a song like "Fluff" in the middle of the tracklist and got away with it. Sure, this is a common trope, but if not for Sabbath, these wannabe-evil trve metal \m/ bros would never enjoy a song so optimistic-sounding and light as "Fluff". I love this song so much. I often put it on in the morning, especially when I get to enjoy the "slow morning once in a while. The name "Fluff" fits the track perfectly, for how soothing and delicate it sounds...

Next up is "Sabbra Caddabra", which is often hated as it has some butt-rockish characteristics. God forbid the band has some simple fun from time to time... The lyrics might be shallow, but the musicality of this song is unreal. The song is alright for the most part, but this outro jam is genuinely one of the most hype and fun pieces of music I've ever heard! I get chills even thinking about this particullar section... The juxtaposition of jammy piano (Rick Wakeman!!!) with hard-hitting riffs by Tony and crazy bass work and lively drumming and crazy, soul-like vocals is just perfect. I could listen to this part for hours and hours...

The incoming three songs in my opinion comprise the album's low point. Don't get nie wrong, they're still pretty good, some more than others, but overall the album loses a lot of steam at this part. "Killing Yourself to Live" is a neat rock-oriented track with nice walking riff reminiscent of Pink Floyd's "Lucifer Sam". The song speeds up near the end and becomes another trippy psychdelic jam with Tony's crazy soloing on top. "Who Are You?" is the band's attempt at making doom metal track with synths instead of guitar as a main instrument. It works great in my opinion and I enjoy this song a lot, even tho it pales in comparison to the album's other tracks. The penultimate track - "Looking For Today" might be my favourite out of those three lesser-appreciated ones. It features some kind of woodwind instrument and very satisfying and interesting melodies by both Ozzy and Tony. I especially like the outro that merges this nice and haunting descending arpeggio riff (I really enjoy such guitar parts!) with Ozzy's ear-wormy vocal hooks.

As the last track, we have the wonderful "Spiral Architect", which seems to be an attempt to make a huge, bombastic arrangement that will transcend anything that the band has ever done at this point. And oh boy did they succeed... The song feels wide, vibrant and just very special. All these orchestral arrangements and very ceremonial-sounding guitar parts make this song feel enormous. I also like the neat acoutic outro and what seems to be a sample from live show recording at the end of the song. Amazing stuff, it's simply unreal that this is still Sabbath doing all this!

Overall this is an unbeliveably solid release. Nothing beats this era of Sabbath, they just couldn't do wrong at that time. One important thing is that the album is really concise. Not too short, not too long - just perfect in length, so it flows exceptionally well. And all the songs are memorable, well-written, experimental and innovative, while at the same time being catchy and enjoyable. Really, what's not to love about this LP? It shows perfectly what this band is capable of...