‘Black Sabbath’ Debut Album: Where Metal Began [VIDEO]

Into The Sabbath via YouTube

A bizarrely written poem inside an inverted cross on the gatefold sleeve and an eerie depiction of a figure dressed in black standing in front of a watermill set the stage for one of the most striking opening statements in the history of rock music. Released on Friday the 13th February 1970 by Vertigo Records, Black Sabbath’s self-titled debut album ‘Black Sabbath’ combined elements of rock, jazz and blues with heavy distortion and created what is widely considered the first heavy metal album. According to Ozzy Osbourne in I Am Ozzy "Once we'd finished, we spent a couple of hours double-tracking some of the guitar and vocals, and that was that. Done. We were in the pub in time for last orders. It can't have taken any longer than twelve hours in total.

According to black-sabbath.com, the gatefold poem reads:

"Still falls the rain, the veils of darkness shroud the blackened trees, which contorted by some unseen violence, shed their tired leaves, and bend their boughs towards a grey earth of severed bird wings. among the grasses, poppies bleed before a gesticulating death, and young rabbits, born dead in traps, stand motionless, as though guarding the silence that surrounds and threatens to engulf all those that would listen. Mute birds, tired of repeating yesterdays terrors, huddle together in the recesses of dark corners, heads turned from the dead, black swan that floats upturned in a small pool in the hollow. there emerges from this pool a faint sensual mist, that traces its way upwards to caress the chipped feet of the headless martyr’s statue, whose only achievement was to die to soon, and who couldn’t wait to lose. the cataract of darkness form fully, the long black night begins, yet still, by the lake a young girl waits, unseeing she believes herself unseen, she smiles, faintly at the distant tolling bell, and the still falling rain."

Black Sabbath

The Wizard

Behind the Wall of Sleep

N.I.B.

SIDE TWO

Evil Woman

Sleeping Village

Warning