Sabbath after Ozzy

Ozzy briefly left Sabbath in late 77 and into early 78. He was briefly replaced by David Walker. He returned in early 1978, recorded Never say die and did the tour. By 1979 Black Sabbath had reached a point where something needed to change. So Ozzy was let loose and the band needed a replacement. They brought in Ronnie James Dio who had left Rainbow. Dio had a much different voice than Ozzy, but it allowed Sabbath to take a new approach and he added a much needed charge to the band. So they did two studio albums and a double live album over the next three years with Dio. Then problems arose again and Dio left to go solo taking drummer Vinnie Appice with him. Then they brought in former Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan and original drummer Bill Ward returned. Gillan is a great singer and he was in 3/4 of the original line-up. This seemed like a good move yet Born Again was a very listless and dull album. Gillian left after the tour to go do the Deep Purple reunion. After some searching the other members decided to break up Sabbath in 1984. Iommi retained a record deal and started doing an album in 1985. He wanted it to be a solo album, but when it came time to press, Warner Brothers insisted he use the Black Sabbath name but he could put featuring Tony Iommi under it. So the Seventh Star came out in early 1986 with Iommi as the only original member and Glenn Hughes was the vocalist. Hughes lasted just a couple of dates before being fired and the band brought in Ray Gillen to do the rest of the tour. The band reportedly struggled to bring in crowds as they tried to do an arena tour (at the same time Ozzy was packing people in on the Ultimate sin tour). Then the band changed singers and Tony Martin came in. He was a very strong singer and The Eternal Idol was a solid release in 1987. To me the next two albums were just okay and they were the Headless Cross in 1989 and TYR in 1990, both with Martin singing. Black Sabbath were struggling to sell albums by this point so they decided to bring back the Dio line-up. So the line-up of Dio, Iommi, Butler and Appice released Dehunanizer in 1992. It was really just a decent album at best. Although the line-up would soon break up and Tony Martin was back in for Cross Purposes(1994) and Forbidden (1995). That was it studio lp's from Black Sabbath, but the original line-up did a number of reunion tours starting in the late 1990's.

Okay, that's the history, but the issues that are often talked about are what is real Sabbath? Some purists think Black Sabbath is only Sabbath if Ozzy is in it. I am not in that camp as I like the Dio era Sabbath and consider it to be real Sabbath. I also consider Born Again to be real Sabbath even though I don't think much of it. My reasoning is that it ahs three original members. However, I think Seventh Star was the start of the Tony Iommi solo albums because it's more him than it is Sabbath. Now we get into the terrortory of whether using a band name is more than just having the legal right to do so. Dehumanizer was a reunion album and it is Sabbath, but to me all of the other albums from Seventh Star on are more Iommi solo albums. That's just me though.

***I hope I got all the history right. Ron Keel claims he was very briefly the singer for Sabbath, but I only ever heard him say that. His story was that he was hired, but wanted too much money and was let go. I think this may have been after Gillan left in late 1983 or early 1984.

Anyway, Black Sabbath week marches on with a review of a non-Ozzy album. On Friday I will review The Mob Rules