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Shane Martin
Professor Iain Ellis
English 203
December 6, 2015
Black Sabbath: Drugs, Blues, and War
The four piece band; Black Sabbath, is from the late 1960s early
1970s industrialized working class area of Birmingham, England. The four
members; Bill ward drums, Geezer Butler on bass, Toni Iommi on guitar, were
led by front man Ozzy Osbourne. Black Sabbath is a multi-platinum Rock n
Roll Hall of Fame band that has a sound like no other. Guitarist Toni Iommi
had part of a finger cut off in a sheet metal accident that affected how he
played the rest of his life and would attribute to how the band sounded
(History). That injury showcases just how dangerous working in a factory can
be. With the prospect of never getting out the young guys formed a band
and managed to get out but they were still heavily influenced by their past.
Their working class background introduced them to drugs, the fear of war,
and the music they listened to. They did so many drugs that it affected their
state of minds and bodies later in life.
Many songs were written about drugs including Sweet Leaf and
Hand of Doom. The drugs influenced their creative writing process. They
took the memories in which they had experienced and turned them into

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songs. The title track on Masters of Reality is Sweet Leaf in which Ozzy
Osbourne talks about the first time doing marijuana. Saying; I cant forget
you, for your surprise, you introduced me, to my mind (War Pigs Lyrics). He
is talking about the mind altering effects of the plant. The THC in the plant is
the substance that makes you feel more happy, relaxed, or detached from
reality (Marijuana). Most of America the decade before Black Sabbath
emerged in 1970 was doing drugs such as marijuana in the hippy counter
culture. They were fighting back against the established order by living in
communes outside of developed areas so they could escape from the hard
ships of city or urban living or having peaceful protests. The members of the
band used the drug so that they could escape from the reality and stress of
living in Englands
lower income
working class
neighborhoods,
relieve the stress of
recording an album,
or playing live music almost every day (Vanbeekum). Black Sabbath singing
about marijuana showed that a song about drugs could resonate with young
people who could relate to the song. Many young people were using the
drugs as a way to relax and take a stab at their parents who disapproved of
the drug. After the hippy movement of the 1960s the rebels of the punk-era
started to ingest harder drugs such as cocaine and heroin on a regular basis.

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The song Hand of Doom off of their most successful album, Paranoid,
is about heroin. Written by Geezer Butler about his heroin addiction and all
the syringes that fans would leave on the floor after shows (War Pigs Black).
The song is about the mind altering affects and how heroin will slowly kill
your body; turn to something new, now its killing you (War Pigs Lyrics). In
the lyrics they mention push the needle incolors in your mind satisfy your
time, subjecting the first time you shoot up heroin and how it affects your
mind, making you see things that arent really there, altering reality, and
taking you to another universe while making your forget about where you are
in the present (War Pigs Lyrics ). Hand of Doom also mentions the negative
connations of doing heroin, face deaths sickly grin, holes are in your skin
(War Pigs Lyrics). After you start using heroin or any hard drug they begin
taking a toll on your body; in heroines case, causing your skin to break out in
hives and rashes, you begin to look like youre dying, and you have holes
and scabs from where you injected the needle over time. Many youth during
the time that were using heroin as a way to rebel against the established
norm of the period. They often had to commit petty theft and smash and
grab types of crimes so that they could fuel their addiction, like Jim Carroll in
The Basketball Diaries had to do, and continue to go against the established
order of working hard your whole life so that you can live comfortably during
your later years of life. They wanted to have that feeling of success while
they were still young before they had to get their lives straight. During the
making of Vol. 4 Black Sabbath had a budget of $60,000 for the album and

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spent $75,000 on cocaine (Lester). Geezer Butler said that the group used
to have cocaine flown in by private plane (Lester). They did a lot of drugs
during the early 1970s; and no one could control anyone else (Lester).
Most young people were doing drugs because they were a socially
acceptable way of rebelling against their parents and the government. It was
the end of an era where everybody was peacefully revolting against war and
the start of the punk-era that was more aggressive in their approach on how
to get change. They were strongly against the war because they were more
than likely the ones going to get drafted to go and fight in it. So to protest
the war they protested, burned their draft cards and claimed conscientious
objection to prevent going overseas and fighting.

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The two main conflicts that scared society at the time were the Cold
War in which they all thought they were going to perish and everything
would be annihilated in a global thermonuclear war between the U.S.S.R. and
the U.S.A. But it was the Vietnam War that took the cake when it came to
being publicly protested in the United States and Australia because of the
volume of lives lost and how long the war was drug out. The Cold War was
not so cold between East and West in the Vietnam War with American
involvement in the war starting in 1965 after U.S.S.R. backed North Vietnam
torpedo boats attacked two U.S. destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin (Vietnam).
The opposition to the war started out small on college campuses with
organized teach-ins organized by the Students for a Democratic Society or
SDS, but by the end of 1965 the outspoken liberal minority was making their
voices heard and people were listening (Vietnam). By 1967 more than
500,000 troops were in Vietnam, over 15,000 had died, and almost 110,000
were injured (Vietnam). The American people had a right to protest and they
finally got a heavy metal anthem that spoke what they were saying in
September 1970.
The song War Pigs, on Black Sabbaths Paranoid album, scrutinizes
the American involvement in the war and blast their government and
politicians. The generals gathered in the massesevil minds that plot
destruction refer to the military generals and political leaders that are
organizing the containment policy for the war effort (War Pigs Lyrics). They
use Vietnam napalm and Agent Orange to clear out landing zones and to

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members of the North Vietnamese Army or NVA (War Pigs Lyrics). The effects
of Agent Orange were known to be carcinogenic and harmful to human
health, often after it was dropped members of the military had to march
through it to clear out those areas. Those same members were often
treated like pawns in a chess game because the politicians hid
themselves away and left the poor to fight (War Pigs Lyrics). There were a
disproportionate number of poor working class and black people fighting and
dying in the war. Many people either deserted the army, fled to Canada, or
burned their draft Cards to avoid having to fighting in the war. Those same
people were the ones organizing and marching the protests against the war.
But if you were a privileged youth whose parents were able to provide them
with a silver spoon in hand and had connections in high places then you
would not have to go and fight in the war effort (War Pigs Lyrics). That social
class divide did little to dampen to anti-war sentiment but did limit the
number of opportunities that you got throughout your life.
The number of opportunities that are lost due to being a working class
family compared to a middle and upper class family were innumerable. It did,
though, change your outlook on life and how you behave and act. You had to
grow up tough and often learn several life lessons on your own. Like in any
social class you grew up listening to music. Black Sabbath members grew up
listening to blues and soul music such as B.B. king and Frank Zappa. This
musical influence is apparent in their two albums Black Sabbath and
Paranoia in which you can hear a harmonica played by Osbourne in The

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Wizard, tempo changes in Iron Man, and up beat melodies in Behind the
Wall of Sleeps intro and Wicked World. Although the Rolling Stones album
critic Lester Bangs seems to think that the song are just a resinous essence
of noise which has a thick plodding, almost arrhythmic steel wool curtains of
sound. The essence of the blues influence is not lost in these albums rather,
just, turned into something heavier with different chords than are
traditionally associated with blues. Black Sabbath is known for playing in the
Devils tri-chord which is more dynamic in tone that blues which is more
mellow and flat. When they first came out they came under great fire for
being too dark and filling their listeners ears with Satanism and messages of
darkness. Such as in the song Black Sabbath where Geezer butler writes
about seeing a figure in blackwith eyes of fire standing at the end of his
bed after he had been dabbling in the dark arts (War Pigs Lyrics) (History).
That led many in the church to criticize their music. Which also attracted
more fans because those fans were tired of having church pushed on them
by their parents and wanted a way to escape and also get back at them.
In conclusion, Black Sabbath was credited with creating a new form of
Rock n Roll that are darker, slower, and heavier than that of Led Zepplin,
Cream, and The Beatles. It ushered in a new era of music that is still popular
to this day. The topics that they were focused on changed little over the
course of the period written about. Drugs still play a major role of youth
rebellion; with several states legalizing marijuana for recreational and
medical purposes. War is still an issue today about the cost of money and the

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toll on human lives. Blues music is still alive and thriving today in the Deep
South where it was originally created. And the satanic anti-god music is still a
popular genre to write about in todays heavy metal and thrash scenes. They
created a brand of music that is the essence of two decades of influence with
two different mind sets. The love and peace movement of the counter culture
in the 1960s and the tougher, urban movement of the punk-era or the early
1970s. They combined the two to create a sound that is enduring and
instantly recognizable to this day.

Works Cited

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Bangs, Lester. Rollingstone.com. N.p., 17 Sept. 1970. Web. 06 Dec. 2015.

<http://www.rollingstone.com/music/albumreviews/black-sabbath19700917#ixzz3rLUaiBbk>.
"History." The Official Black Sabbath Website. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Dec. 2015.
<http://www.blacksabbath.com/history.html>.
Lester, Paul. Theguardian.com. N.p., 06 Jan. 2013. Web. 06 Dec. 2015.
<http://www.theguardian.com/music/2013/jun/06/black-sabbathcocaine-private-plane>.
"Marijuana - Marijuana Use and Effects of Marijuana." WebMD. WebMD, n.d.
Web. 06 Dec. 2015. <http://www.webmd.com/mentalhealth/addiction/marijuana-use-and-its-effects?page=2>.
Osbourne, Ozzy. Warner Bros. Records Inc. Perf. Toni Iommi, Geezer Bulter,
and Bill Ward. Black Sabbath. Rodger Bain, 1971. Vinyl recording.
Rhettman, Tony. "Top 10 Drug Songs." Ultimate Classic Rock. N.p., n.d. Web.
06 Dec. 2015. <http://ultimateclassicrock.com/drug-songs/>.
Rogers, Kenny. "The United Kingdom Involvement in the Vietnam War - The
Vietnam War." The Vietnam War. N.p., 06 Nov. 2014. Web. 07 Dec.
2015. <http://thevietnamwar.info/united-kingdom-involvementvietnam-war/>.
Thomson, David. "Explore Rock 'N' Roll. Song Meaning & Analysis: War Pigs
by Black Sabbath. N.p., 03 June 2013. Web. 06 Dec. 2015.
<http://explorerockmusic.blogspot.com/2013/06/song-analysis-warpigs-by-black-sabbath.html>.

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Vanbeekum, Mitch. "Ozzyhead.com: Ozzy Osbourne Tour Dates."

Ozzyheadcom RSS XML News. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Dec. 2015.
<http://www.ozzyhead.com/olddates/olddates.htm>.
"Vietnam War Protests." History.com. A&E Television Networks, 2010. Web.
06 Dec. 2015. <http://www.history.com/topics/vietnam-war/vietnamwar-protests>.
"War Pigs, Hand of Doom, Paranoia by Black Sabbath Songfacts." War
Pigs by Black Sabbath Songfacts. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Dec. 2015.
<http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=1299>.
""War Pigs, Paranoid, Hand of Doom, Black Sabbath, Fortunate Son
Lyrics." BLACK SABBATH LYRICS. N.p., n.d. Web. 06 Dec. 2015.
<http://www.War Pigs Lyrics .com/lyrics/blacksabbath/warpigs.html>.