I’ve never heard an album drop off the bandwagon as fast as this one does. The opening four tracks are quite enjoyable in their own specific ways, while offering a new direction and new sound for the band. Unfortunately, after these four tracks, the album just falls off completely. The second half of this album turns into a repetitive slog of lazy recycled song ideas, boring compositional pieces, and just dull execution of said songs.

Obviously not as classic as ‘is this it?’, but ‘Room on Fire’ still showcases what made their debut record a breezy-going and entertaining piece of music.

A breezy-going entertaining soft garage rock album full of catchy simplistic hooks and beautifully defined instrumental work. If I had a bonfire on a beach, i’d play this album. It just has that vibe about it.

Derivative of themselves with full blown loud and heavily compressed modern metal production, an over bloated runtime, and a vital disconnect bringing this together as the swan song album. Still, I didn’t hate this. There’s some enjoyment to be had, and it’s mostly because there’s moments that feel like Sabbath are recapturing that early 70’s magic one more time. Most of the time, the drums are so flat and buried in the mix, and the guitar is insanely loud (ending ... read more

The worst Black Sabbath album. Holy shit.

How do Black Sabbath even recover from this?

The long awaited return of Dio that no one asked for.

This downhill spiral just keeps on going, and it’s hard to listen to.

Miserable listen.

Tony Martin’s vocals, occasionally, sound like a South Park parody song, or they just crash into a dull pit of boringness. Generic and lacklustre 80’s rock pop soundtrack music that does nothing whatsoever.

A nothing album when it comes to the instrumentation and production, but a terrible one with the vocals by Geoff. I couldn’t even listen to every song on this, because of his vocal contribution.

No chemistry between old band members and Ian Gillan, no creativity or originality behind this collaboration, nor is there any interesting or compelling qualities that either talented member brings to this album. An absolutely boring slog of an album with borderline insufferable moments and muddled production work.

Dio: let me do something worse than the last album, and you guys follow suit.

In an attempt to recapture the early 70’s magic of Black Sabbath without Ozzy Osbourne, they end up crashing and burning. They replaced Ozzy with Dio, and Dio’s vocal contributions to Black Sabbath feel so forced and unnatural. It’s laughably goofy with how try hard he is. His lyrics are a mix between a corny cliche checklist of gothic heavy metal iconography and an attempt at capturing the gothic poetry of Ozzy’s early songwriting works.

Children of the sea and Lonely ... read more

More enjoyable than technical ecstasy.

The new rock sound they explored in Technical Ecstasy, but with the occasional flamboyant and beautiful jazzy instrumentation gives this album some breathable and refreshing moments.

The title track is an easygoing song. ‘Juniour eyes’ is a catchy tune, maybe overstays its welcome, but still enjoyable to listen to. ‘Shockwave’ is a track that progressively gets better the more it goes on. ‘Air Dance’ is a smooth ... read more

A bloody boring album, honestly. Not one track stood out to leave any sort of mark on the listeners ears. Sabotage teased the demise of the OG Black Sabbath, but I never thought it would go downhill this fast.

This album is without a singular vision. It’s too safe, too conventional, and too stale. It’s okay for artists and bands to change their sound, and want to go a different direction, but bring something new to the table with your signature style, and actually have a ... read more

I was hoping this perfect album run from Black Sabbath would keep continuing, but unfortunately, it has come to a close. R.I.P.

Sabotage isn’t a terrible album. It’s a fairly enjoyable one, actually. The problem with the album is that it’s a complete mess. The abrupt end of ‘hole in the sky’ is already jarring to start with, but to have the stark transition to the interlude ‘don’t start (too late)’ just makes it even more jarring. If you take ... read more

Not on the same level as the previous four releases, but still good enough to say that this five album run is exceptional and almost perfect.

Yes, this album is awesome. But man, Changes is the most beautiful Black Sabbath song. I can’t get enough of it’s spine-shivering chorus, watery-eye instrumental, and simplistic introspective verses.

Hell yeah!