7 Days of Sabbath! Day 5: Into the Void Live 1971 (w/Alternate lyrics)

 HUGE props to blacksabfan for posting this. Head over to their YouTube page and check 'em out! Lots of great live and rare Sabbath videos (lots of Thin Lizzy, too!).

There are a number of Sabbath songs that started out with different lyrics than what Ozzy ended up recording. This is one I don't think I was aware of. 

There was a record store in Orland Park, IL when I was in High School. Red Tower. Located in the outer circumference of the Orland Mall's parkway, this standalone building carried with it for its south suburban location, the kind of cultural cache places like The Alley and Reckless Records did in the city (I'm aware The Alley wasn't a record store, but it was the most record store-like clothing/accessory store I've ever seen). Anyway, I already knew We Sold Our Souls For Rock 'n' Roll, the post-Sabotage Greatest Hits collection you could literally buy at gas stations in the late 80s/early 90s. While that introduced me to the first phase of Sabbath's music, it didn't prepare me for the second phase, those quasi-cinematic, philosophical Science Fiction-tinged tracks like Into the Void, the closer from 1971's Master of Reality. This song introduced a thread that, while "Supernaut" tugged on it again for Vol. 4, wasn't fully realized (IMO) until 1975's Sabotage, my favorite of the group's records and criminally underrated (and underrepresented on WSOSFR'n'R - I mean, how did they only add "Am I Going Insane?"). It was in Red Tower that I first heard Into the Void, and it literally made me stop, go up and ask the guy behind the counter what was playing. The song sounds like the soundtrack to a comic book or Science Fiction film, from the lyrics to the larger-than-life riffs. Instant favorite and the first inclination that I needed to move beyond the gas station greatest hits with this band. 

For the record, the alternate lyrics are not good. I mean, the actual lyrics to this track are amazing, and I'd be curious to read how the boys from Birmingham got to the finished product. It's still cool to hear this little slice of Sabbath history, though, and for some fantastic alternate lyrics to this song, there's always Soundgarden's cover from SOMMS.

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As we're getting close to the end of our celebration of Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath (my daily, personal one has been with me since I was a teenager and will carry on until I too, reside After Forever), I wanted to throw in a little something extra for today's post. Melvins and Sleep's Al Cisneros covering Sabbath Bloody Sabbath!

Man, they made it slower! I guess if there was going to be one way to make this song heavier than when it was born, this would be the only way to approximate that. 

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