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ROCK AND ROLL! => Black Sabbath => The Ozzy Years => Topic started by: Zzzptm on November 02, 2020, 06:50:07 PM
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Kick it off with "Back Street Kids", which I not only think of as the best track of the album, but a solid track in and of itself. Yes, the production is muddy and the drums don't come across as powerfully loud as on other Sabbath tracks, but it's still a tough little rocker of a tune and I love that simple chorus - Noooooooooooooooo body I know / will ever taaaaake / my rock and roll / away from me!
It sets my expectations high, which is not good news, given the songs to come... or am I being too hard and relying on the memories of my earlier listens? Have things changed?
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Back Street Kids is a solid, fast opener, a no nonsense rocker. Slight gripe is the keyboards are a little "in your face" intrusive on occasions... and the mix is horrid!
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I'll make it a hat trick. Back Street Kids is a solid tune, and my favorite from TE. I especially like the sound of the keyboard when making the transition in tempo. I have always honored this song by the signature of my profile here at the Community.
"Nobody I know is going to take my rock and roll away from me."
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Back Street Kids is among the best tracks of this very weak album. Sure it would do just fine without the keyboards but it's still a nice fast soft rocker. Far cry from the Heavy Metal style of Hole In The Sky but still.
I've always liked that Typhon's signature line as well. Best lyric on the album I'd say.
Also yes the mix is pretty damn far from perfect but honestly the entire album's mix is horrid...but then again a better mix wouldn't have saved this album alone either.
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Moving on to You Won't Change Me, this is the best song on the album. It's got one of Ozzy's best vocal melodies. It doesn't crack my top 20, but it's still my favourite here.
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The intro is nice and has a bit of doominess in it even but then when the keyboards hit before the verse the song takes a fast turn to worse. And the Popeye the sailor man lyric doesn't help.
The song I suppose is kind of Sabbath's version of a power ballad...and the truth is I hate power ballads so...
The positive side of the song is the guitar solo. It's got a nice twist to it. But then the middle section drags on again...they should have just let Tony go wild with the solo and leave out the vocal part entirely and it would have worked much better cause the second solo again is quite good.
But overall this is very much in the meh category....which is a shame cause the intro promises something good.
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It's been so long since I listened to the album, I forgot this song entirely. So I'm coming in fresh on it, almost.
You Won't Change Me... starts in a way that honestly sounds very much like Ozzy's early solo material. The middle part sounds like Ozzy singing for The Beatles, with that piano and all doing the descending scale like something from The White Album. Tony's solo is a real cracker, but that keyboard comes back and puts a drag on the energy from the "Beatles" section. And then that "Beatles" section repeats and it kinda feels like they're playing the song twice as Tony gives us a very similar-sounding cracker of a solo... and we end with the keyboards.
I'm with Charger, they should have made the middle part into the second half and let Tony just jam away until the end.
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FUN RECORDING STORY FACTOIDS:
Sabbath was recording TE in the same studio as the Eagles - who were recording Hotel California. While the Eagles complained about Sabbath being too loud, the Sabs had to scrape all the cocaine out of the mixing board...
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Mixed review for me with You Won't Change Me. Not bad , but not great either. I do think it contains some unique sounds, in a positive way.
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Next we have It's Alright... I suppose it's alright :-X
(I've always been a little indifferent to it as it isn't very "Sabbath-y")
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It's Alright is hands down the worst track of the album. A total cliche filled snooze fest.
Bill should have stick with the :drummer:
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You know, hitting on the Beatles-sounding part in the previous track, I hear it again in this one. It's like one of Paul McCartney's "granny songs" as Lennon called them. The guitar solo sounds like it came out of Supertzar, with the chorus/mellotron sounds and drum thump behind it.
As for the lyrics and delivery, it's very much in line with mid-70s soft rock. Maybe they were listening to Jimmy Buffet records while they were getting high out on Miami Beach? But honestly, this could be slipped in between "Dreams" and "Baker Street" and nobody really notice that there was a song by Black Sabbath in that mix, as opposed to having "Hole in the Sky" between those two. :D
Quiet songs like Planet Caravan and Solitude at least had a Sabbathy feel to them. This one is straight-up middle of the road mellow rock. They lost studio discipline and while Blow on a Jug was just a snippet at the end of Sabotage, imagine if it had been put on there in a full 2:34 in the middle of the album. Total WTF??? moment when it comes up. That's It's Alright. If it had been a snippet somewhere else, nice interlude. As a song on its own, WTF???
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Gypsy next. Love the drum intro... after that it doesn't work that well. The lyrics are little unwieldy which then makes the vocal melody a little forced. So generally a weak track with a great intro.
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It's Alright is exactly the type of stuff I don't listen to. It was Bill Ward's song, and for some reason, the other band members liked it. So it was put on the album. This is the only true mistake I can find in the Great 8.
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Gypsy is among the better songs on the album...granted that still doesn't make it a good song but atleast it's half way decent and has some rock edge to it.
The drum intro is good and I've always felt it was Bill Ward trying to channel Ian Paice a bit.
The one thing that brings this song down is (I can't believe I'm saying this) is the main riff...it's just all over the place. Very un-Iommi-like riffing. The pre-chorus riff is where things start to get better.
Ozzy's vocals are rather weak on this same goes for the melody.
The background piano is pretty darn annoying...it's like a 5 year old banging on the same keys constantly...also it's waaay too high on the mix.
Again Ozzy goes on and sings over Tony's solo which is also quite annoying. no need for that...again they should have just let Tony go crazy all alone till the end.
But the song does flow kind of nicely and like I said eventhough it's among the better songs on THIS album doesn't mean it's a good song...
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The intro to Gypsy got me hooked, up to about 1:50 into the song... and then the next part goes weird. Totally dissipates the energy from the intro and the whole thing gets a little too ABBA-ish for me with that piano and the lyrics. The solo is good, but I would have rather had a solo on top of the intro part.
Honestly, I'm still of a mind that matches what I had thought before - Back Street Kids is a proper Sabbath tune, the rest are a band without inspiration, going wherever. I know that around this time, the lawyers they hired to deal with the managers that were screwing them were now, in turn, starting to screw Black Sabbath, so it was a desolate legal situation for the band, having to make money in order to pay lawyers. So why not just go through the motions, sell some records and concert seats, and just be done with it?
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Well it seems I like Gypsy more than others do. The opening 2 minutes is inspiring. The middle section has a, for lack of a better term, gypsyish feel to it. And I don't mind, what I believe is, the electronic keyboards. In fact, they used keyboards in nearly every song on this album. Iommi plays out the final section and Ozzy does not sing for the last 50 seconds. Overall, one of the better songs on the album.
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^^^ Yes it starts really well. Its the last three minutes where it loses it's way for me.
All Moving Parts (Stand Still), is a song I've always had a soft spot for... but I'm not really sure why! It's ok, lyrically obscure, but I like line "Not tonight, well I might, oh alright yeah!" Yes, not the best or the worst on the album.
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All Moving Parts is an odd beast. The middle part and the gallop rhythm shortly after that are the best parts. The main verses, however, I just don't care for. It's like walking around without going anywhere, and the lyrics really aren't helping, either. Their hearts just aren't in this one.
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All Moving Parts (Stand Still) is another song I like on this album. Yes, it is odd, but in a good way. This song probably contains the largest tempo changes of anything found in the Great 8. Pretty cool. 8)
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All Moving Parts (Stand Still) is a bit of a mixed bag...like most of the album really.
The underlying soloing on the song is all pretty good but there's just way too much stuff going on. So many guitar tracks layered it's bit overwhelming. Plus the lyrics make no sense at all.
This is a song that might have worked much better had it been bit more simple. But as it is it's just like "hey lets throw all fruits in one bag and smash them up and see what kind of juice we get out..."
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Rock n Roll Doctor up next. It's a strange one completely out of keeping with the rest of their catalogue, you'd expect this sort of song with UFO or ELO etc!
To some extent I like it, but it is a little "throw-away", a little simplistic even.
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Rock 'n Roll Doctor is kind of funky little rocker but indeed it's not very sabbath sounding one. And lyrically it's just silly...too silly.
The riff is so un-Iommi like it's pretty odd even. Oh and Bill...could I have some more cow bell please? Oh sure...here's some...and here's some more...oh and I'll throw some here too...and here.
This song borderlines annoying...without the silly piano bit in the middle and that goddamn cow bell...I don't know...
Ps.
Ian Gillan made this song sound much rockier during the Born Again Tour.
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Rock 'N' Roll Doctor is the only conventional rock song in the Great 8. So what is wrong with that? It was never suppose to be more than what it is. It is a catchy tune, and I have fun with it. Another one on the plus side, for me. :rockon:
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After 6 albums of progressively more intricate and doomy material, Rock 'n' Roll Doctor takes that intricate doomyness to heart only in the middle solo. The rest is pretty much a love letter to Slade and their typical happy-go-lucky sound. :D It's uncharacteristic for the band, but I nevertheless really enjoy this tune as is.
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Let's continue with She's Gone. It's alright I suppose but it's no Solitude.
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She's Gone is another cliche fest. It's the kind of song that epitomises why I generally hate ballads. Boring, pointless, blah blah lyrics.
Bottom of the barrel along with Changes and Am I Going Insane....
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She's Gone is probably my least liked BFTO tune in the Great 8. Although Ozzy does a good job on it, its just not my cup of tea.
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She's Gone - The lyrics are so basic for this song, just one metaphor in the whole of it. Moon-June rhyming here and there, but for a song like this to work, it needs a much sharper turn of the phrase in each verse. And a lot less, "Oooh my baby" in it, as well.
It gets me wondering, is Technical Ecstasy basically Black Sabbath's answer album to Sgt. Pepper? If so, that makes this track the "She's Leaving Home" of the album. A very emotional track, one that Paul wrote for the grannies.
But I will say that the melody is very lovely and works amazingly when played by an Armenian orchestra:
Drop the lyrics, and it's amazing.
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The album finishes with Dirty Women, my second favourite from the album.
Tony shines on the solo, and musically it is really good, I understand why it became a staple of the set list. However, the lyrics are weak and the subject matter is more AC/DC than Sabbath.
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Dirty Women is the only GOOD song on the album. And that is mainly because of the brilliant outro solo from Tony. But it is also the heaviest song on the album and the most Sabbath sounding one of the lot too. In fact the was the LAST really Sabbath sounding song until the Heaven And Hell album.
Lyrics are indeed the weak point of the song. But Ozzy's delivery is good and the melody is catchy and easy to sing along.
Although I'm not sure it deserved a live staple status though. It's not THAT good of a song...and it's a lengthy tune as well.
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Dirty Women is a strong closer to this album. The entire band shines in this tune, especially Tony.
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The inevitable ranking arrives:
1. You Won't Change Me
2. Dirty Women
3. Backstreet Kids
4. Gypsy
5. All Moving Parts (Stand Still)
6. Rock N Roll Doctor
7. It's Alright
8. She's Gone
I'm going to downgrade this album to #9 from #8 in the Ozzy Era, I think MOR is actually better than this one.
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1. Dirty Women
2. Back Street Kids
3. All Moving Parts (Stand Still)
4. Gypsy
5. Rock 'n Roll Doctor
6. You Won't Change Me
7. She's Gone
8. It's Alright
Only Dirty Women is a good song...and Back Street Kids is alright the rest are...well...pretty forgettable rubbish in Black Sabbath's standards.
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Dirty Women - about 4 minutes into it, we switch from the AC/DC "THOSE DIRTY WOMEN..." lyric and aggro guitar riff to a descending scale melody, a la White Album-era Beatles by way of Eric Clapton. Bill Ward drives hard on the drums, but there's no mistaking the lads from Birmingham have Liverpool on their minds, musically speaking. It's a metaphor for the whole of the album - half Sabbath feeling very tired, half Beatles tribute. This unevenness repeats on Never Say Die, which is why both albums pale next to the earlier albums, especially Sabotage and SBS.
It seems like 1976 was a year of a lot of major old-school acts drifting around or getting into a rut or breaking up. Zeppelin did Presence, which left fans scratching heads, Deep Purple was phoning it in before calling it a day, Slade was on the fade, Bowie was getting waaaaaaaaay too strung out on cocaine, Grand Funk were steering towards obscurity... it was time to make way for newer acts, even if the players in them weren't all that new - Rush with 2112, Rainbow, Aerosmith, Queen, and that Eagles album recorded at the same time as Technical Ecstasy - well, Hotel California gets a ton more airplay and attention than the Sabbath album. Seems like it was easier to do mellow rock for a band all coked out...
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Inserting my final rating of the albums for completion's sake.
Technical Ecstasy - 8/10
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Technical Ecstacy
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The decline is imminent