Paranoid (album)

List titles

Luke' S Wall/War Pigs (7.55)
Paranoid (2.47)
Planet Caravan (4.24)
Iron Man (5.53)
Electric Funeral (4.47)
Hand Off Doom (7.07)
Rat Salad (2.29)
Fairies Wear Boots/Jack The Stripper (6.13)

Symbolic system

In 1970, the Beatles separate, marking end of the year 60 and the appearance of a musical new generation in the world of the music rock'n'roll. A particularly aggressive movement will take the high-speed motorboat with old glories of the sixties: the hard rock. Three groups will share success: Led Zeppelin, group of virtuosos to the sulfurous reputation, Deep Purple, meeting of talented musicians, and Black Sabbath, with the unhealthy reputation. These four musicians of Birmingham immediately will impose their style with a first album éponyme, appeared earlier in the year 1970. But it is with their second opus that the group will take its true dimension.

Description of the album

The disc starts very extremely with a howling agreement, opening " War Pigs" , the longest song of the album. The distortion is rageuse and wild, announcing the tonality of the album perfectly. This first track is of a not very common force, presenting many ryhtmic ruptures and solos particularly sharp and inspired of Tony Iommi. The title is a wild denunciation of the Guerre of Vietnam. “Paranoid” is the individual one extracted the album, it gives him its name. It is a concise and rough song, built on a very simple front, but of an undeniable effectiveness. The words are a diving in the sadness and the loneliness of a man. “Planet Caravan” is a strange ballade, with the astonishing sound. The guitar of Tony Iommi traces distant arpeggios and melancholic persons. The battery of Bill Ward has a sound much more delicate than on the remainder of the disc. But the most outstanding remainder the voice of John “Ozzy” Osbourne, undoubtedly slowed down with the mixing, is filled of a envoûtant echo and has an unusual texture. “Iron Man” is one of the paramount titles of the album. It presents a sinister introduction to wish, followed of a front cash among most powerful and sharpest of this beginning of decade. The solos are complex and of a great speed. The words evoke a science fiction cruel and disturbing. “Electric Funeral” is built on several dark and distorted fronts, supported by effects like the wah-wah. The title is compact and aggressive, there is not a true solo. “Hand Of Doom” is a rather long piece, presenting passages threatening carried by the low one of Geezer Butler, and the metal explosions carried out by Iommi and Bill Ward. The text treats despair vis-a-vis the madness of the men, the war, the atomic danger. Instrumental “a Rat Salad”, supplements the album. It is characterized by its rate/rhythm which gallop and its many rhythmic and melody variations. The disc ends in a song divided into two parts “Fairies Wear Boots/Jack the Stripper” presenting an introduction in arpeggios and rhythmic parts wild and stubborn persons. The title speaks about the mishaps of a strip-teaser.

Reception and posterity of the album

Paranoid was accommodated by the scorning reactions of the specialized press, which accepted the style of the four musicians forever. On the other hand, the public reserved a triumphal reception with the new disc of Black Sabbath, individual the éponyme becoming (with the great surprise of all) n°1 of the British charts, way which the album will follow in its turn some time later. If one considers the history of metal until our days, one realizes of the range of Paranoid . Indeed, it is undoubtedly about one of the most famous discs of Black Sabbath, but this does not explain all. Indeed, the style of the four of Birmingham was much basic and easy to reproduce that those of its competitors of the time, with the result that tens of English and American groups undertook to learn the repertory from Sabbath. Whole generations musicians rock'n'roll made their ranges on " Paranoid" or " Iron Man". The group can be regarded rightly as one of most influential of its time. Waves of groups were claimed of their influence: Iron Maiden, Metallica, Saxon to only quote most famous. One finds his trace until in the grunge of Nirvana, Alice In Chains or of Soundgarden.

Anecdote

The original title of the album was to be War Pigs . But the persons in charge of the group refused this title, asserting that the disc would be badly perceived under this title in the USA, then engaged into full Guerre with Vietnam. One thus chooses the name of individual, to follow the success of this last.

Composition of the Group

Ozzy Osbourne (song)
Tony Iommi (guitar)
Geezer Butler (low)
Bill Ward (battery)

External bonds and sources

Official site of Black Sabbath
French Site devoted to Black Sabbath

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