Now What, 13 and ?

I’ve now digested the new Black Sabbath album, 13, a few times, after having listened to Now What [punctuation arbitrarily truncated hereinafter], the new Deep Purple album.  Verdict?  Both are excellent, but some caveats are in order.  Read on…

Now What is the second album from what I call Deep Purple Mark VII (not counting the Battle Rages On tail-end touring lineup with Joe Satriani filling in for Ritchie Blackmore’s obligations as a separate lineup, as no new material was released with Mr. Joe).  This is Ian Paice (drums), Don Airey (keyboards), Roger Glover (bass), Ian Gillan (vocals) and Steve Morse (guitar).  With Jon Lord’s retirement (R.I.P.) this makes Ian Paice the only original member left who has served in all Marks of the band.

DP w/Morse has forged its own sound, which has more in common with DP Mark II.1 (Perfect Strangers) than Mark II.0 (In Rock, Fireball, Machine Head and Who Do We Think We Are).  I don’t think they could make Machine Head II even if they wanted to. 

            Here’s the sad thing about Steve Morse.  To the extent he has his OWN guitar style, it’s an annoying widdly-widdly noodling I can’t stand.  But when he slows down and gets bluesy – hmmm, that’s more like it.  In fact, he out Blackmores Blackmore himself.  I can understand that he’s not Blackmore and wants to get out from under the shadow of the man, but as far as I’m concerned, he’s just as good as Blackmore at doing the same type of guitar work as Blackmore himself.  I’d just as soon he continue to out Blackmore Blackmore.  Examples?  “Sometimes I Feel Like Screaming” (Purpendicular) and “Blood From A Stone” (Now What).

13.  This is more substantial:  Black Sabbath’s first new album with Ozzy Osbourne since Never Say Die in 1978.  He rejoined the Sabs for one-off performances at Live Aid in 1985, another show in 1992, and the Ozzfests from 1997 to 2005.  They even made two new songs, “Psycho Man” and “Selling My Soul”, tacked on to 1998’s Reunion live album, though neither was particularly impressive.  Prior efforts to make a new album fizzled out, with Rick Rubin consistently demanding to produce it.  Finally they came together to do it.  Ronnie James Dio's abrupt death from cancer, followed by Iommi's own diagnosis of lymphoma, provided the firm incentive to get this done, and thankfully they have.

Bill Ward is not on this album.  From what Ozzy and Tony say, Ward wanted 25% of the cut despite being borderline useless even in the studio and highly questionable to tour the album.  Brad Wilk of Rage Against the Machine handles the drums.  I still don’t know who will be handling drums on the upcoming tour, assuming it’s not Wilk himself.  To be honest, I can’t really tell much of a difference.  I’d just as soon they play with any competent drummer than pack it in simply because Ward has gotten too old to play.

As with Deep Purple, I don’t think Sabbath could make Sabotage II even if they wanted to, although many parts of this album do sound very similar to classic era Sabbath.  The songs are heavy, the lyric are cynical, and it all comes together yet again.  Like Now What, this has to be judged on its own merits.  Or does it?  It’s better than Never Say Die or ANY of the Tony Martin albums.   I find it compelling; and I look forward to seeing them in concert this summer.

Led Zeppelin.  Now this leaves Zeppelin as the only one of the big three not releasing new material.  Their last release of new material was 4 Moroccan-type songs on the live album No Quarter from 1994, which was itself a Page-Plant operation without John Paul Jones.  Later they played a live show with JPJ and Jason Bonham, since released as Celebration Day, but still won’t put out any new material.  Probably they can trust Jason to do his father’s drum parts but don’t feel comfortable with the kid’s ability to assist in writing new material they can put the Led Zeppelin name on – of course, In Through The Out Door was somehow acceptable.  Mind you, by now Jason Bonham has been with several bands writing new material, including no less than three albums with Black Country Communion.

Page, Plant and Jones should find a suitable drummer (Ginger Baker?) and crank out a new album.  Is ANYONE expecting something as good as Zeppelin IV?  Probably a few clueless idiots.  Who cares about them?  It doesn’t have to beat Zep IV, it only has to beat Presence and In Through The Out Door.  How hard can that be?