I never expect much from reunions where formerly glorious bands show up with more or less original settings decades after their heydays, either for monetary reasons or just to show they still got it. Often such commitments end badly musically and economically, not delighting artists or public very much. Therefore I was very surprised when I first heard this. Though the project took over a decade to finish due to members being occupied with other pursuits and original drummer Bill Ward couldn't attend - replaced by Brad Wilk (formerly in Race Against the Machine and Audioslave) - it is about what I want to hear from a Black Sabbath reunion. As dark and heavy as ever before, filled with simple catchy riffs and familiar type tempo changes crowned by an almost pristine sounding Ozzy. I'm getting flashbacks to "Master Of Reality" and "Vol. 4", then slightly adapted to a 21st century sound making the music come out even harder and rawer. Not the least innovative, just giving the old fans value for money - good old Sabbath in an even meaner drag. And it was a success - topping both US and UK and a number of other lists, soon selling over a million copies. I've seen it's been criticized for having bad audio, coming through too loud and partly distorted, but I don't get that at all from this copy. I hear loud and strong, yet well balanced without any inappropriate distortion. Maybe the different issues and/or formats differ in that respect, or the fact that I play with a round stylus (Shure M44-7) smooth things a bit. Released all over the world on various formats as CD, 2xCD, Flac, MP3, AAC, DVD and blue-ray, some with three or four bonus tracks. To my knowledge only issued on vinyl in US and EU. First EU 2-LP vinyl had swirl labels as shown here and fully laminated fold/out cover with glossy lyric/credit/pic inners. (WLÖ*) (BLÄC*)
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