True, I probably should’ve been looking over housing rentals and formulating a plan for what apartments to see the next day — since that’s why I was in Boston a week and a half ahead of moving to Massachusetts anyway — but on the other, far less responsible hand, The Brought Low. The NYC trio were coming up to play Radio in Somerville with local-types Planetoid, The Scimitar and Hey Zeus also on the bill, and well, if I’m going to be living somewhere, there’s no time like the present to start getting my ass out to shows. What at its most convenient is a four-hour drive had taken more than six, my car’s air conditioner cutting out on the way. I’d been up since five in the morning. It was time to rock and roll.

I’ve been to Radio a few times now — I think every time I’ve been there a band on Small Stone has played, usually Gozu — and it’s a cool room. I had to remind myself that Boston’s a rocker town with a rocker crowd, so the place would probably be packed, and by the time Hey Zeus were finished, indeed it was. Last time I saw the native outfit was their first show, in January. It was one of the coldest nights of the winter. Go figure that I should run into them again as the heat index pushed its way past 110. A band for all seasons, they apparently are.

Opening up, I thought it was a pretty ballsy move for them to throw in a “Space Truckin'” cover halfway through, but they absolutely nailed it, vocalist Bice Nathan channeling his inner Ian Gillan to hit the screaming pre-chorus “Yeah!” high notes on the ultra-catchy Deep Purple classic. Ballsy as it was, they’d double-down by closing out a set otherwise comprised of driving original material with a take on “Speed King” from In Rock. It was almost like the set had a side A and side B and each closed out with a Deep Purple song. Not a bad way to go out, come to think of it.

Between Nathan‘s expert fronting the band, guitarist Pete Knipfing‘s red-hot Southern-style classic rock leads and the groove held down by the rhythm section of bassist Ken Cmar and drummer Todd Bowman, Hey Zeus were as tight as you could possibly ask them to be, varying their pacing somewhere between mid-moving stonerly lumber and the grown-up punk that has fueled so much of Boston’s heavy rock over the years. I dug it last time, I dug it this time, but more importantly, I’ll look forward to digging it next time. Feeling more metallic from their very start, The Scimitar followed in plundering fashion.

Guitarist/vocalist Darryl Shepard (see also Blackwolfgoat, Hackman, Roadsaw, and the League of Excellent Human Beings) announced from the stage that it was just The Scimitar‘s second Boston show. The trio, made up of Shepard, his Black Pyramid bandmate Dave Gein and drummer Brian Banfield, more or less functioned as an extension of that band’s marauding musical ideology, walking a line between thrashing metal and doom that Shepard‘s riffs navigated with ease. Some parts reminded me of Black Pyramid‘s 2013 outing, Adversarial (review here), but in cuts like “World Unreal” and “Forever and Ever and Ever” — based on The Shining and being played for the first time — there began to shine an individual personality for The Scimitar that will inevitably win out.

Gein and Shepard, recently back from a European tour in support of Adversarial with Black Pyramid, were dead on from the start, which gave Banfield a task in locking in with the two of them, but the drummer handled it well, the trio sounding solid if formative in their chemistry and like they were only going to get filthier sounding as time went on. I wondered if crusty battle doom was a thing, or if it could be, and as if either to answer or to shake me out of my bout of overthinking, they ran through “Void Traveler” on their way to closing out with the Motörhead cover “Metropolis,” giving a suitably grooving treatment to the mid-paced swagger of the original, which appeared on the 1979 landmark, Overkill. Needless to say, beer was spilled.

Dressed up in elaborate and professional-looking alien costumes — one guy actually looked so much like Nightcrawler from the X-Men that I thought that’s what he was going for at first — as they walked around Radio loading in and hanging out, Planetoid were playing last, which meant The Brought Low went on third after The Scimitar. There was a moment right before they took the stage that I could feel myself hit the wall. I stifled yawns and kept myself standing upright, but wow, I was ready to be done. The Brought Low, who were viewing this show as something of a makeup from having to cancel on the Small Stone Boston showcase last fall owing to the post-Hurricane Sandy gas shortage, hadn’t even started yet. I’d only seen two bands!

Proud to report that I didn’t split before The Brought Low‘s set was finished. The trio — Ben Smith (guitar/vocals), Bob Russell (bass/vocals) and Nick Heller (drums) — were on my hypothetical list of stuff to see before no longer living in the New York area, so even though it wound up being in Boston rather than their hometown I caught them in, I wasn’t about to complain. Their on the cusp of 15 years together and lived up to the high standard the sets I’ve seen them play have set, Smith and Heller both having grown out their hair some since I last encountered the band in Fall 2011. In that time, they haven’t put out anything new — their last offering was a three-song EP on Coextinction Recordings (stream and track-by-track here) — but even “What I Found” from their 2001 self-titled debut sounded fresh among newer songs like “Army of Soldiers” and “Black River” from the aforementioned three-tracker.

“Black River” in particular made for an exciting shift just past the halfway mark in the set as Russell took the fore vocally with Smith backing, where the band’s usual process works the other way around, their chemistry and unique blend of country twang and rocking city grit underscored by the swing in Heller‘s drums, perhaps most prevalent of all in the slower “My Favorite Waste of Time” from 2010’s Third Record (review here), which was also a highlight. I don’t know how many times I’ve called The Brought Low the best rock band in New York, but I’m still right. Whether it was “Old Century” or “The Kelly Rose,” the only thing they left me wanting was more The Brought Low. Beat to hell though I was, I’d have stayed if they went on twice as long.

As it was, they didn’t go much further than 40 minutes. An encore after “Blues for Cubby” rounded out and I said a few quick goodnights and made my way back to the hotel, feeling guilty for not catching Planetoid but assuming this wouldn’t be my last opportunity to do so. The next day I got up and went and found a place to live.

More pics after the jump. Thanks for reading.

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I’m not surprised that Iron Man got signed by Rise Above Records because I think they don’t deserve it. That’s not it at all. I’m surprised because they do deserve it and it actually happened.

From where I sit, this might be the feel-good story of the year. I’ve seen Iron Man slog it out in mostly-empty rooms on more than one occasion and deliver sets that would’ve thrilled arenas — they most recently killed it closing out the first night of Days of the Doomed III. One hopes that getting picked up by Rise Above for a Sept. 30 release of their new album, South of the Earth, ushers in a new era of appreciation for the long-running Maryland doomers. They’ve long since had it coming.

Huge congratulations to the band and here’s looking forward to South of the Earth!

IRON MAN ‘SOUTH OF THE EARTH’

(RISE ABOVE 2013)

Rising out of the same Maryland/DC mean streets as fellow US doom pioneers Pentagram and The Obsessed, IRON MAN was formed in 1988 as a Black Sabbath tribute band by guitarist Alfred Morris III, whose musical career began in 1977 with mysterious proto-doom cult FORCE. Al’s legendarily heavy, unearthly guitar tone was already much in evidence on FORCE’s ultra-rare 1981 debut EP – and it has only deepened, hardened, improved and refined in the ensuing 32 years.

“The main thing for me is Al’s tone,” enthuses Lee Dorrian, owner of Rise Above Records and Morris worshipper since the late 80s. “It’s so brutal but in a natural way, no frills, straight for the gut. Listening to his riffs is like being stuck in a vat of molasses, unable to move with a rotating grinder lodged into the middle of your forehead down to the base of your stomach. It’s that heavy!”

“When I felt ready to be a live performer, I asked myself, who are the baddest guitar players out there?” says Al Morris of his earliest sonic inspirations. “I thought about it and came up with Jimi Hendrix and Tony Iommi! Being that they are both left-handed players, it was like looking into a mirror as their hands went up and down the fretboard. I dialled in the tone for soloing, but had to add some bass tone to get the Tony/Geezer sound combination!”

Signed to the legendary underground doom label Hellhound Records, IRON MAN released the stellar ‘Black Night’ debut in 1993 – “an absolute classic in the field of Sabbath-inspired Doom,” Lee asserts – followed by ‘The Passage’ in 1994, before line-up and label instability forced the band into a late 90s wilderness period. They re-emerged in 1999 with ‘Generation Void’, before another extended hiatus. This time it took a full ten years before Al reassembled the indestructible IRON MAN with yet another new line-up for the aptly-named return-to-form ‘I Have Returned’ on Shadow Kingdom.

In 2010, Maryland doom circuit veteran ‘Screaming Mad’ Dee Calhoun joined IRON MAN on vocals, recording two EPs before starting work on their latest masterpiece, the monstrous snorting rocking doom behemoth ‘South Of The Earth’. Bursting with inspirational tunes, from the killer anthemic rumble of the opening title track to the blissful elegiac blues-doom of the closing ‘Ballad Of Ray Garraty’, IRON MAN’s fifth album is shot-through with stunning soulful leads, gargantuan riffs, powerful throaty vocal melodies and a muscular, resounding rhythm section.

“Every time Iron Man goes into the studio, we treat it like a blank canvas. As things progress, the art form takes shape,” says Al Morris on the band’s creative process. “We wrote this album in about 2 months. Then we practiced our asses off to perfect the performance of the songs. This CD was done with Frank Marchand, an engineer/producer with a head full of ideas! He enhanced every element of this CD. We have great trust in Frank and followed his ideas. This is what came out!”

“I’ve loved all of Iron Man’s work,” says Lee Dorrian. “‘South of the Earth’ easily matches it and the band sound better than ever. Great musicianship all round and they have a seriously killer vocalist with Screaming Mad Dee.”

Asked how Al feels the latest incarnation of IRON MAN compares to the line-ups he’s worked with over the last few decades, his reply displays a heartening, positive renewed enthusiasm for the bullishly durable group he founded all those years ago. “I am not the only person pushing the band forward!” he beams. “Now all of the band is pushing in the same direction!! We can write great songs together and perform on stage with lots of energy!”

Tour details will follow, you lucky bastards – in the meantime, get familiar with ‘South Of The Earth’, surely IRON MAN’s finest, fullest achievement to date.

IRON MAN: ‘SOUTH OF THE EARTH’ (RISE ABOVE)
1. South Of The Earth
2. Hail To The Haze
3. The Whore In Confession
4. The Worst And Longest Day
5. Aerial Changed The Sky
6. IISOEO (The Day Of The Beast)
7. Half-Face/Thy Brother’s Keeper (Dunwich Pt 2)
8. In The Velvet Darkness
9. The Ballad Of Ray Garraty

Al Morris III – guitars
‘Screaming Mad’ Dee Calhoun – vocals
Louis Strachan – bass
Jason ‘Mot’ Waldmann – drums

Recorded and mixed at Hudson Street Sound, Anapolis, Maryland
Produced/engineered by Frank Marchand III
Mastered at Bias Studios, Springfield, Virginia

Iron Man, South of the Earth album trailer

Natas, Delmar (1996)

I know there are those who swing other ways when it comes to Natas, the formative Argentinian desert rockers who’d later add a Los to the front of their name, but to my ears, their debut Delmar is one of the most gorgeous albums I’ve ever heard. Seriously. I have affection for that record over most. If you’re more into the second one, Ciudad de Brahman, or maybe Corsario Negro or something they did thereafter, that’s awesome too. I’m certainly on board for the whole discography — my most recent welcome addition was the Rutation collection of previously unreleased material — but tonight, with how sweltering hot it’s been all day, it had to be Delmar to close out the week. It’s like I can hear the heat bearing down on me. Or maybe that’s sunstroke.

My alarm was set for 5 this morning, but I woke up at 4:57AM and agonized for two minutes before preempting it at 4:59. I wanted to get to work early in no small part to post the Carpet review and that interview with Steve Janiak from Devil to Pay. No regrets, but holy fucking shit I’m tired. At noon, The Patient Mrs. — who was coming up to Boston anyway to attend a wedding tonight — met me at my office and we split out to try to beat traffic northbound. Six-plus hours of traffic and intermittently cutting out A/C later, the little dog and I checked into the hotel where we’re staying after dropping The Patient Mrs. off at the aforementioned nuptials. I was tired then. Then I went and saw Hey Zeus, The Scimitar and The Brought Low at Radio. I’m even more tired now as we push toward 1:30AM. Go figure.

Next week though, a review of that show — spoiler alert: it was killer — and writeups on the new Trouble, The Flying Eyes and Black Willows records, one way or another. Also want to get something up on the Black Mare tape which is a solo-project from Sera Timms of Black Math Horseman and Ides of Gemini that’s ambientastic. Also a Lo-Pan check-in with drummer Jesse Bartz (always good to talk to him) ahead of next weekend’s The Eye of the Stoned Goat 3 in Brooklyn and I’m gonna put this one all in bold because I want it to stand out so someone might actually read it:

There’s a big surprise coming on Tuesday. I can’t say what it is yet but I think and hope you’ll dig it. Nothing’s ever 100 percent and things fall through, but I’m way stoked.

Speaking of things falling through, my housing plans. While we’re in Boston anyway, since we’re moving to Massachusetts in, oh, a week and a half, maybe it’s high time The Patient Mrs. and I found a place to live. After that house we were going to buy shit the proverbial bed — or at least poisoned it with carcinogenic gasoline additives — we now need to find a rental, and quick. Tomorrow’s the day. The truck and the movers are booked for next weekend. It’s tomorrow or it’s… well, Sunday, I guess. But definitely tomorrow’s preferable. The sooner the better.

So while we’re doing that, I hope like crazy you have a safe, terrific weekend. I’ll be back on Monday with more typo-laden riff worship.

The Obelisk Forum

The Obelisk Radio

Two weeks ago, Indianapolis doom rockers Devil to Pay hit the road for a handful of dates alongside Ohio-based cohorts Lo-Pan. It was Devil to Pay‘s first real road time since issuing their fourth album and Ripple Music debut, Fate is Your Muse (review here), earlier this year, and Fate is Your Muse is the first Devil to Pay album since 2009’s Heavily Ever After. Much of the material on the record had been tested at East Coast gigs last fall leading up to a performance at Stoner Hands of Doom XII, but still, for it having been so long since their last outing, the quality of the songs on Fate is Your Muse was all the more startling.

With tracks like “Already Dead,” “This Train Won’t Stop,” “Ten Lizardmen and One Pocketknife” and the eerily proggy “Black Black Heart,” Devil to Pay showed growth in what was already an engaging songwriting methodology. Strong choruses backed by the thick but not overdone riffing of guitarists Steve Janiak (also vocals) and Rob Hough lent a slick feel throughout, but a natural vibe persisted and won out, bassist Matt Stokes and drummer Chad Profigle holding down a straightforward foundation of organic groove from which tracks branched out in varying but consistent directions — the whole process both unpretentious and flowing over the course of the album as a whole. There was, in short, very little not to like.

As Janiak‘s vocals were a particular point of growth — he doubles as guitarist/backing vocalist in Indy trad doomers Apostle of Solitude — it seemed all the more appropriate to ring him up for a quick interview about Fate is Your Muse, what went into making it and if splitting his time as he does had any effect on the songwriting process for these tracks. Janiak has a keen, critical and self-aware eye, so to hear him turn those impulses inward to discuss putting the record together was especially fascinating. We spoke just prior to their starting the gigs with Lo-Pan and you’ll find the complete Q&A with pictures from last year’s SHoD after the jump.

Please enjoy:

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You could teach a college class on the influences under which Carpet work. Sounding here like John Lennon fronting Adrian Belew-era King Crimson and there meandering into Floydian ambience offset by fuzzy heavy rock guitar work, the German progressive heavy rock foursome’s Elektrohasch-released sophomore outing, Elysian Pleasures, is rigorously plotted and technically accomplished. Like its cover, it is a collage, ably skirting the line of giving itself over to instrumental explorations, but never quite losing focus entirely on songwriting. This works markedly to the favor of tracks like “Elysian Pleasures,” “In Tides,” “Serpentine” and “For the Love of Bokeh,” though with richly varied parts throughout, each of the eight cuts seems to find its standout moment one way or another in the album’s total 49 minutes. The Augsburg/Munich outfit — Maximilian Stephan (guitar, vocals, clarinet, Mellotron, minimoog), Jakob Mader (drums, xylophone, glockenspiel, marimba, percussion), Sigmund Perner (Rhodes, grand piano, organ, accordion, Mellotron) and Hubert Steiner (bass) — split the songs into two sides even on the CD version of the album, and in line with the vinyl available in yellow or black with a poster and “Elysian Pleasures Textbook” lyric sheet, the individual pieces that make up the record work well with that construction, despite a linear flow that surfaces over the course of the CD taken as a whole. Such winds up being inevitable, since if the listener is going to be sucked into Carpet‘s world at all, it’s going to happen at the start, and with the variety of instrumentation the band utilize at any given moment, they establish a wide base early on, requiring the listener to keep a likewise open mind. The xylophone, in other words, appears with no delay. It practically opens the record, as a matter of fact, with Mader and Stephan announcing the arrival of Elysian Pleasures as a telling bit of fanfare plays out in the first 30 seconds. Like the best traditional prog, Carpet are patient and require a patient audience, but they do well in establishing a balance between what’s satisfying for them to play and still accessible for someone hearing it, which isn’t something that can be said across the board of the genre.

The King Crimson elements strike quickly, a bed of subtle noodling on guitar backing Stephan‘s echoing vocals as “Elysian Pleasures” begins to unfold. Ambient, jazzy and richly textured, the opener is a decent but not all-telling lead-in for the Carpet debut that shares its name, sounding modern in its production and classic in its ideology while a heavier tension lurks just below the surface later into the track as Mader rides his crash cymbal while Perner plays out the central melody on keys. It is busy from the word go and remains busy even in its quiet stretches. A subdued finish for “Elysian Pleasures” lulls the listener into a false sense of security as “Nearly Four” snare-pops its way in with a fuzzy guitar-led strut and vocals buried beneath the progression, all instruments headed in the same place anchored by Steiner for a section of insistent and showy crashes. Of course, they take the initial idea and run with it like gleeful children — half of the appeal of progressive rock is imagining how much fun the person playing it is having — but return to the main riff near the halfway mark, realizing perhaps that not every song needs to be an indulgence. Stephan is no less an able vocalist than he is a guitarist, his voice smooth and engaging before he and Perner trade solos, his own leading to a stop that once again brings back the main figure before organ closes out the proceedings and “Man Changing the Atoms” revives the Belewery, Mader taking the fore for a time to lead an instrumental section of jazz complemented by trumpet (credited to Andreas Unterreiner) in one of Elysian Pleasures‘ jazziest and most singularly enjoyable stretches. It seems to just happen — one minute Carpet are headed one way, then they turn, decide they like this better and that’s all there is to it. It’s a flagrant — almost arrogant — casting off of structure, and it could easily fall flat, but it doesn’t, and they smoothly work “Man Changing the Atoms” to an excitingly heavy build, saxophone (courtesy of Jan Kiesewetter) joining the fracas as it peaks with crashes, and just when the verse seems most like a thing of the past, vocals arrive again and renew the initial spirit of the track. Did that just happen? But for some resonant Mellotron and bass tension, it’s hard to be sure. Past six minutes in, they pick up again and end “Man Changing the Atoms” big, so it’s fitting the modus so far that “In Tides” should start quiet. And it does.

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Texas rockers Switchblade Jesus have inked a deal with Bilocation Records to release their self-titled debut on vinyl later in 2013. Sound nifty? It is.

The PR wire sends over foreboding word(s) of the impending vinyl issue of Switchblade Jesus‘ Switchblade Jesus, and for that we thank it as ever, but the proof is in the black gold of the music itself. Broiled in native burl and groove imported no doubt under the radar of local law enforcement from Southern heavy mainstays like Down and the funky start-stops of Clutch, it’s a ride just as likely to shake the record on the turntable as the booty of one in earshot.

Boogie:

Bilocation Records is proud to announce the signing of Texas based stonerheads SWITCHBLADE JESUS. The earthshaking debut will be released on heavy vinyl in 2013.

Hailing from the land of oil and tar Switchblade Jesus is a 5 piece equivalent of a heard of elephants slamming into a brick wall.

Jamming together since 2010 they had a killer ride so far – playing live nearly every week they were forged to a unbreakable live unit. They played a shitload of shows with great bands – just to name a few: Kylesa, Orange Goblin, The Sword, Wo Fat, Egypt, Baroness.

Asked what the fans can expect of the band, the guys state: Loud alcohol fueled heaviness laced with fuzz and slight hallucinations of tube amps piercing your mind. …that is a word!

Switchblade Jesus, Switchblade Jesus (2013)

From reuniting formative psychedelic wanderers to supporting up and coming genre-crossers. Last week, Loop was revealed as the headliner for Roadburn 2014, and today it’s been announced that Relapse Records upstarts Inter Arma and Windhand will both take part. Both bands make their home in the fertile dirt of Richmond, Virginia, so I’m left wondering if maybe a Euro tour with the two acts is in the offing?

Time will tell on that. Until then, and in related news, it was also announced today that Windhand‘s full-length Relapse debut, Soma, will be released Sept. 17. More on that here, and you can find the album trailer below:

INTER ARMA And WINDHAND Confirmed For Roadburn Festival 2014

Following last week’s announcement of Loop as the main headliner for Roadburn 2014, the festival is excited to report that Relapse Records artists WINDHAND and INTER ARMA have also been confirmed for next years event, set for April10 ? 13, 2014 at the 013 venue in Tilburg, the Netherlands.

Walter Hoeijmakers from Roadburn: “Windhand’s S/T was definitely THEE psych/doom album of 2012, while anticipation of the band’s upcoming album on Relapse is reaching a crescendo that will continue to build throughout the year and culminate in their main stage set on Saturday, April 12 at Roadburn 2014. Inter Arma’s “Sky Burial” is a serious contender for this year’s Roadburn Festival-related album of the year. Both Windhand and Inter Arma seem poised to rank among the regal line of iconic Relapse bands, and Roadburn is proud to welcome both bands on Saturday, April 12 at the 013 venue in Tilburg, The Netherlands.”

Richmond, Virginia’s WINDHAND cut their teeth worshipping at Iommi’s school of a thousand riffs, fusing classic churning doom as smooth as melted chocolate with Electric Wizard-ish bong-cloud obscured psychedelia. Sparking your natural highness, the band locks into a mesmerizing sprawl of epic, doomic heaviness, a trancelike reverence that inspires lethargic, hypnotic head banging and is embellished with enough hazy psych to be a tripped-out soundtrack for some obscure war on drugs propaganda film. Meanwhile, vocalist Dorthia Cottrell’s hellish howl beckons from the distance, swathed in distortion, transcending any earthly ideas of gender, and positioning the band firmly at the top of the pile of the current crop of female fronted metal outfits.

Windhand will release “Soma”, their 2nd album on Relapse Records on September 13 in the Benelux, GAS and Finland and on September 16 in the UK and Europe. The album was recorded & mixed by the band’s own Garrett Morris at The Darkroom & mastered by James Plotkin, in their hometown of Richmond, VA.

Also emerging (like Windhand) from the seemingly ever-fertile metal breeding grounds of Richmond, Virginia, INTER ARMA sports a sound that’s difficult to pin down, as it continually changes and surprises with each passing album track. “Sky Burial” starts with a strong dose of the industrial infused black metal of “Volcano”-era Satyricon, then takes a decidedly Pink Floydian left turn for the next two tracks (the first is acoustic and the second of which culminates in an unexpectedly raucous blast of Cascadian black metal). They then introduce truly hellish sounding occult doom followed by caustic, repetitive noise rock in the vein of Unsane. They continue with epic, abrasive, majestic doom with vintage Gibby Haynes-style menacing vocals into another foreboding acoustic track and cap the album off with the title track, a noisy, doomy, mathy, blackened rock and roll experience that is rippling with evil and menace. Their live set will be a constantly evolving, emotionally devastating experience that is sure to leave us all uncomfortably numb.

www.facebook.com/WindhandVA
windhandva.bandcamp.com
www.facebook.com/INTERARMA
interarma.bandcamp.com

Windhand, Soma album trailer

Prepare to be underwhelmed…

About two weeks ago, I took part with a slew of other alt-weekly journo types in a conference call with Ozzy Osbourne about the new Black Sabbath album, 13 (review here). It was an hour long and there were I think 20 or so writers involved. Everyone, I was told, would get to ask at least one question.

I had never done a conference call before, and the idea seemed lame, but it was my only chance to get even a smattering of phone time with Ozzy and not-at-all-blown-away-by-13 though I was, I wasn’t going to miss probably the only chance I’d ever have to ask him anything, let alone something about the process of making this album after talking about it for so long.

Before calling in to the weird phone chat thing — like a partyline of people who’ve made terrible life choices — I made a list of questions to pick from should I be lucky enough to actually get a word in. All my questions were among the first asked, and not by me. By the time it was finally my turn to ask something, I had nothing left and had to come up with one on the fly.

So, after being a Sabbath fan for more than half my life and finally getting an opportunity to speak to Ozzy Osbourne himself (a man who has clearly had no shortage of media training), here’s how it went down — my question and a follow-up:

—

I just wanted to ask you a little bit about the sort of reception to the new material live. Obviously, there’s Sabbath’s catalog of classics, but in terms of mixing new songs in and the shows you’ve already done…

Ozzy Osbourne: So we recently went to New Zealand, Australia, and Japan, and we did a couple of the new songs. We said they’re all new. God, you’d think it had been released as a single or a first track off album, and so that – I remember when we played two shows in Auckland, New Zealand.

The first night they didn’t really respond much to it. The second night they’re all singing the lyrics with me. I’m going, I can’t even remember them that good. I mean, it’s good for us as well to do new stuff, because you know, we’re all tuned into “Iron Man,” “War Pigs,” “Paranoid,” and all of the old classics, but instead, it gives us as a band something refreshing to put into the show, and so I’m just glad that people have bought into the new songs.

You mentioned before the songs being in sort of a middle range you could bring live. How much of a consideration when you guys were writing the album was doing the songs live?

Ozzy Osbourne: Well, after keeping the people waiting for as long as we did, I certainly — I can still get the range, but I can’t do it onstage. Maybe one gig I can do it onstage, but then it’d be every other night, I mean, my voice gets tired you know? And so I personally specifically went in the studio and kept it a little comfortable range that I could do onstage, you know.

—

On the other end of the line from one of heavy metal’s true gods and I’m left asking about… playing the new songs live. As if he doesn’t shout, “Here’s one off the new album!” and everyone goes to get a beer in time to be back for “Into the Void.” I’d call it a bummer if it wasn’t so much better than nothing.

I didn’t attempt to dial in for another round, but didn’t hang up either, and just listened to the rest of the hour as other writers from around the country took turns flattering and lobbing softballs. The first question had been about Bill Ward and that got shut down pretty quickly to more or less set the tone. By the end of it, charismatic though Osbourne is and though — as with the record — I’d expected no more than I got, I had gone back to checking my email.

And there you have it.

Black Sabbath, “Naïveté in Black” (2013)