Quote:
Black Sabbath reunites, minus Ozzy
Thursday Oct 26 12:05 AEST
Ozzy Osbourne's bandmates in British heavy metal group Black Sabbath have reunited without the singer for a planned tour early near year, a spokeswoman said.
The threesome have joined forces with vocalist Ronnie James Dio, who sang in the band during two stints in the 1980s and 1990s after Osbourne was ousted for his prodigious drug abuse, but will bill themselves as "Heaven and Hell".
Lest anyone think that Osbourne has been ostracised again, representatives for the so-called "Prince of Darkness" issued a separate statement, announcing "there is only one Black Sabbath", and that he would join forces with his old Birmingham buddies for a tour and new album late next year.
Original Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi and Dio "are working on a project together which has nothing to do with Black Sabbath," the statement said. "However, Ozzy wishes Tony and Ronnie much success in their project together."
The members of Heaven and Hell — Dio, Iommi, bass player Geezer Butler and drummer Bill Ward — were not available for comment. The group's spokeswoman said Dio and Iommi were in England writing songs together.
The combo takes its name from the first album Dio recorded with Black Sabbath in 1980. This lineup recorded another studio album in 1981 and a live album in 1982, after which Dio quit. He reportedly complained there were not enough photos of him in the live album artwork, while Iommi reportedly referred to the diminutive headbanger as a "little Hitler".
After a stint at the helm of a successful 1980s metal band bearing his last name, Dio briefly rejoined Black Sabbath a decade later, by which time Iommi was the only original member left and the group had lost most of its fans.
The founding foursome, famed for such jarring metal anthems as "Paranoid and War Pigs", buried their various hatchets in the mid-1990s for a successful series of tours, although plans for a new album never came to fruition. After years of being snubbed, they were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame earlier this year.
Osbourne concurrently found mainstream notoriety as a reality TV star, thanks to his role as the perpetually confused paterfamilias in MTV's The Osbournes.
There are the objectives.... here come the subjectives... twisted
It's about freaking time Iommi and the others figured out that all Ozzy cares about is his image, preserving Black Sabbath in a state of suspended animation rather than even attempting to put out some more music (that press release from Ozzy's 'people' seems overly reactive, as though to quash rumours of a split). The man is falling apart, he hardly has the wherewithall to provide Black Sabbath with the frontman they really need. I've long been of the opinion that 'Heaven and Hell' and 'Dehumanizer' were two of Sabbath's all time best albums, and at least Dio has some degree of integrity.
In my opinion, he's a much better vocalist than Ozzy too.
But yeah, hopefully the name of the band will be some indication of their musical direction, because that album ******** pwned.
NEON KNIGHTS!
