When Ozzy Osbourne was fired by Black Sabbath in 1979, it was hard to know what would happen to the band. What happened was, they hired Ronnie James Dio and produced two of the greatest albums in heaven metal history (interestingly, Ozzy found a guitar player named Randy Rhoads and also produced two of the greatest metal albums, but we’ll talk more about that another day.)!
Now it’s 2021, Ronnie has sadly been gone for over a decade, and Black Sabbath has come back with a reissue of those two classic early 1980s albums: Heaven and Hell and Mob Rules. I’m going to talk about Mob Rules here because it’s my favorite, but similar sentiments apply to both.
Black Sabbath and Dio fans likely already have multiple versions of these two albums as they’ve been reissued a half-dozen times in different formats over the years. I picked these up on vinyl because, frankly, my two 1980s records were played like crazy by whoever first them, and I needed an upgrade. These absolutely are an upgrade. They sound great and there are some good live bonus tracks and remixes on the second LP (although sadly, not much that fans haven’t already heard on other releases).
I‘d also like to pay tribute to Martin Birch, who passed away last year. In addition to Mob Rules and Heaven and Hell, Birch produced and engineered dozens of the greatest British hard rock and metal albums of the 1970s and 1980s. The world of rock and roll would sound a lot different without Martin Birch.
5 Highlights
- The Mob Rules - there are actually four versions of the title track on this collection, and that’s ok because I could listen to it a 1,000 times. Here you get the remastered track, a 1981 live version from London’s Hammersmith Odeon, the version that’s on the Heavy Metal soundtrack, and my favorite, which is a 2019 Remix.
- Voodoo - this is a Black Sabbath song through and through, complete with creepy lyrics and a really good groove. Tony Iommi’s riffs throughout this song and whatever that is he is doing on the solo make this track a highlight for me.
- The Sign of the Southern Cross - “If an echo doesn’t answer when it hears a certain sound” (duh-duh-DUHHHH). This is one of my favorite Black Sabbath songs of any era. Ronnie is at his “Ronniest” on this track, with soft, mellow vocals at the beginning that quickly turn ferocious.
- Falling of the Edge of the World: Remember right before this when I talked about those beautiful, soft vocals that quickly turn ferocious? That happens again here, except with the coolest, darkest interlude in between the intro and the main part of the song filled with heavy riffs and bombastic drum fills that somehow leave you with feelings of amazement and hopelessness, in nearly equal doses. You can only get that from Black Sabbath.
Over and Over: A slow tempo but heavy, bluesy track with great vocals from Ronnie, spectacular bass and drum fills from Geezer Butler and Vinnie Appice, and two killer blues solos from Tony Iommi. A great way to close the album before changing to the bonus LP.
