Five modern songs to play to your parents who have bought Black Sabbath tickets
A generation of legends have embarked on their career swansong over the past few years. Whether it’s the likes of Elton John and his never-ending farewell tour or the PR teams of any artist over the age of 60 scrambling around movie studios hoping for the next rinse-and-repeat biopic. And recently, Black Sabbath, another big-hitter announced that their final chapter would be brought to a close.
Forefathers of heavy metal and certified gods of rock, Black Sabbath, will be playing a mammoth show in Birmingham on July 5th, in what is being billed as the last time Ozzy Osbourne will ever step foot on stage.
It will be an explosive finale to a career glittered with chaos. Sabbath were a band that delved into the deepest pits of darkness and moulded a sound from it, redefining how groove and distortion could combine for a marriage of melodic chaos. With Osbourne on vocals, who Jack Black so eloquently claimed was the “motherfucker” who “invented heavy metal”, Sabbath were a rock tour-de-force both performatively enigmatic and creatively intriguing.
So, as they gear up for their monster farewell show at Villa Park and your uncle dusts off his old Sabbath t-shirt, it’s high time that the torch of stoner rock was passed on. While the adage ‘music isn’t what it used to be’ is often reserved for the fringes of wedding dancefloors, the resurgence of an Osbourne-led Sabbath will no doubt provoke more claims. So in preparation for your rebuttal, here are five songs you can play to prove the Sabbath flame of influence still burns bright.
Five modern songs for Black Sabbath fans:
‘Superbug’ – King Gizzard & The Lizard Wizzard
The versatility of King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizzard makes it possible to compare them to pretty much any act from the classic rock era. But at the heart of their experimentation lies a band who know how to headbang with the best of them.
Their 2019 record Infest The Rats Nest was self described as the band as their “hardest and heaviest album to date” and no doubt inspired by the works of Sabbath. This particular track puts vocalist Stu Mackenzie behind the microphone with a feat of deep throat-singing that a mid-1970s Osbourne would be proud of. Paired with a frenetic guitar part that flips from intense downstroking to slow, stoner power chords, it’s a Sabbath track repackaged.
‘Penetrating Eye’ – Thee Oh Sees
It’s no secret amongst the music community that John Dwyer and co are the hottest ticket for anyone looking to get a classic rock fix. With two drum sets often on stage and lengthy improvisational parts, they’re a band that embraces the unbridled chaos of heavy psychedelic rock. With this particular track, the talented rhythm and vocal parts lay their weapons down and submit to the anarchic overlord that is the distorted guitar in a track that pays homage to the foundations laid by a band like Black Sabbath.
Interestingly, Dwyer’s worshipping of the Birmingham band is no secret. So much so that he treads very carefully around their material, as actor Bill Hader found out. In an episode of What’s In My Bag?, Hader explained: “On Barry… we did a whole section to the song ‘The Wizard’ by Black Sabbath. The song was too short, so I asked [Dwyer], ‘Could you elongate just this one part? Could you do a cover and elongate it?'” Hader explained, adding with a laugh, “He was like, ‘That’s sacrilege dude, fuck you.’ Like, ‘You don’t fuck with Sabbath.’ And he was right!”
‘I’m The Man, That Will Find You’ – Connan Mockasin
Hear me out on this one. While we know and love Sabbath for their heavy distortion and deep running groove, one of their best cuts came in the refined. Their third track on Paranoid, ‘Planet Caravan’ thrusts Sabbath into the ethereal, with broken and whimsical vocals laying over soft guitar lines and the pitter-patter of Bill Ward’s drumming.
While vastly different in many ways, the guitar playing feels strangely similar in this Connan Mockasin track. As though ‘I’m The Man, That Will Find You’ is ‘Planet Caravan’’s more colourful and charismatic cousin, who occupy different ends of the family dinner table but undoubtedly meet in the garden for a smoke at night.
‘Lava Lamp Pisco’ – Psychedelic Porn Crumpets
With a band name this irreverent, the influence of Ozzy and his fellow Brummie bandits is undoubtedly etched into their hallmarks of influence. While they’ve largely taken the distorted footprint set out by Sabbath and turned it into something more psychedelic, this track has an unrelenting rhythmic underbelly to make them proud.
No matter where Psychedelic Porn Crumpets take their sound, Sabbath seems to have a subconscious influence which can be largely attributed to the childhood of lead singer, Jack McEwan. He once told Flood: “my old man would play ‘Sabotage’ when he got home from the pub most nights, and I’d fall asleep on the sofa trying my hardest to stay awake to hear the whole album. I’ve been hooked on riffs ever since”.
‘What’s In My Head?’ – Fuzz
Ty Segall is widely considered the fuzz lord of modern rock. While complex and nuanced, the essence of his music is all about the celebration of plugging in, turning it up and letting rip. As part of his band Fuzz, Segall and co harness the very heart of Sabbath’s groove, a mid-tempo monster that wiggles through the sludge, allowing for Segall’s vocals to soar above.
Segall has made no bones about his Sabbath influence and has regularly made his cover of ‘Paranoid’ a part of his live show. While he shares the same adoration for their work as Dwyer, and similarly thinks covering them is sacrilegious, he does what Ozzy would do and ignore expectations: “If a show’s going ridiculous, you’ve got to take it to the next level. To own it. It’s fun to cover a song you’re not supposed to. You shouldn’t be allowed to cover Black Sabbath. That’s why you have to do it three times in a row” he told Uncut.
