BORN AGAIN

Born Again is the eleventh full-length studio album by UK heavy metal act Black Sabbath. After two succesful albums Heaven and Hell (1980) and Mob Rules (1981) with former Rainbow and Elf frontman Ronnie James Dio as the lead vocalist in Black Sabbath, Dio and drummer Vinny Appice left the band after disputes with Geezer Butler and Tony Iommi over the mixing of their coming live album Live Evil (1983). Original drummer Bill Ward returned to the fold sober and ready to work ( it didn´t last long though as the psychic preasure of the thought of going on the road to support the album made him drink again and he had to quit the band. He was replaced by former Electric Light Orchestra drummer Bev Bevan for the subsequent tour) and the band set out to find a new frontman. Former Deep Purple frontman Ian Gillan was asked to join the band and he accepted the offer.

The music on the album is unmistakably in heavy rock/ metal Black Sabbath style but there are more keyboards on Born Again than on any previous album by the group. The biggest difference between Born Again and earlier releases are of course the addition of new lead singer Ian Gillan though. His bluesy style is very different from both the style of Ozzy and Dio. Allthough I greatly enjoy Ian Gillan´s contributions to Deep Purple his performance here is a problem for the album. He sounds uninspired and weak to my ears and his bluesy and often forced style really doesn´t click with the heavy metal style of Black Sabbath IMO. Most of the songs on the album are also weak and not really of the usual high standard from the band. There are only two songs here that I think are worth mentioning and that´s Disturbing the Priest and Zero the Hero the rest are more or less dispensable.

The musicianship is good as ever but as mentioned Ian Gillan´s performance is way below what you could rightly expect from a singer of his caliber.

The production is awful to my ears. After the powerful and rich Martin Birch productions on the two previous albums, Born Again sounds lifeless and flat in comparison ( the sound on the guitar solos is an abomination IMO). The album was produced by Robin Black and Black Sabbath but supposedly Geezer Butler did most of the work.

Born Again is not a very succesful album IMO. First of all the choice of Ian Gillan as the new singer in Black Sabbath turned out to be a big mistake. Secondly most of the songs sound uninspired and trivial. Thirdly the sound quality is way below average. I´m not impressed and it is safe to say that I´m very disappointed. A 2 star rating is all I can give. Their worst effort by far up until then.