Marking
its golden anniversary this month is the fifth studio LP from Black
Sabbath, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, which was released 50 years ago in
November of 1973. As the band struggled to regroup after an exhausting
tour and expand their musical pallet, their eventual success created
perhaps the album defining the pinnacle of their career.
On the
back of the release of their previous LP, VOL. 4, the band had burned
themselves out on a tour which ended up being cut short when guitarist
Tony Iommi collapsed during their LA gig from a combination of overwork
and overindulgence, blazing out on the tail of a massive cocaine binge
which had been going on for days. The situation for the guitarist was
nearly life-threatening and precipitated the band taking their first
actual vacation period since the group was founded. After spending some
time apart to rest and recuperate, the initial plan was to take the
same approach to their next album as had been so successful on their
previous, so they booked into the same LA studios and began their first
attempts at buckling down and getting to work. The problem was that
Tony was bone dry in the inspiration department and the rest of the band
were entirely dependant on him to get the ball rolling when it came to
songwriting. Other factors, like their continued substance abuse, also
conspired to diffuse their focus and make it impossible to recreate the
atmosphere of the previous album. Even their favourite room in the
studio wasn't available as it had been overtaken by a massive
synthesizer system installed by Stevie Wonder.
After
floundering in frustration in LA for a month, the group decided a change
of venue was in order and opted to head back to the UK where they
rented Clearwell Castle in the Forest of Dean, Gloucestershire, England,
in which the likes of Led Zeppelin, Mott the Hoople and Deep Purple
wrote and recorded. The castle provided a suitably ominous creepiness
for them to work, with the armoury and dungeon offering particularly
spooky settings. Band members even reported sightings of ghostly
apparitions while wandering the castle's dimly lit hallways, though
given their penchant for chemical indulgence, who knows what they
actually saw. The group were also prone to pranking each other in the
most vicious manner, which significantly amped up the sense of fear and
paranoia, resulting in some members refusing to sleep there and, in the
case of drummer Bill Ward, who often seemed to get the worst of it, he
insisted on sleeping with a dagger at hand.
Mayhem aside, the
creative damn burst, thanks to the ominous setting, when Iommi stumbled
on the riff for the album's title track. Up to that point, they were
seriously starting to think that they were finished, but once they hit
on that riff, they knew they were back. By this time, they were also
looking to expand the diversity of their sound, so they started to
incorporate more experimental elements like strings, keyboards and
synthesizer. Ozzy had picked up a MOOG synth and the group even got Yes
keyboardist, Rick Wakeman, to guest on Sabbra Cadabra, though he
refused payment for his work and was happy to receive a few beers as
compensation. The group even attempted experiments with instruments
like bagpipes and sitars, but these proved unsatisfactory and were
abandoned from the sessions. At one point, members of Led Zeppelin
dropped in for a visit and an impromptu jam session was recorded, but
never released.
Once the album was completed and released, the
band were surprised to find that they actually created something the
British music press were willing to acknowledge as a good album. Their
previous works had notoriously been dismissed by UK critics, so it was a
surprising about-face to finally receive a bit of praise from this
quarter. But as Ozzy later commented, he felt like he should have
called it quits from the band after this release as the writing was on
the wall that their peak had been reached. Internal conflicts and
tensions between the band members were about to take their tole. They
were far too dependant on Iommi to get songs written and Geezer Butler
was also feeling like Osborne was far too reliant on him to come up with
lyrics.
The album went on to become a commercial success as well
as garnering critical raves. Within the scope of the band's canon,
many consider it the high water mark of their career. After this, their
conflicts and personal demons would undercut their ability to work
together successfully. They still had three more LPs in their pockets
before the original lineup would fracture, but none of those would be
considered in the same light as their first five.
