I was really sceptical of the idea of a new Black Sabbath album with Ozzy on vocals, 35 years after Never Say Die (their last album with Ozzy). But the first single, God is Dead?, is really good. Thundering riffs from Tony Iommi and classic vocals from Ozzy make this track a worthy addition to the Sabbath canon (much more than the 2 studio tracks included on 1998’s Reunion album)
But the song goes on for too long. Much has been said about the fact that all the songs on the album are quite long (most are over 5 minutes, with 5 clocking above 7 minutes), but at 8:52, God Is Dead? is about 3 and half minutes too long. They’re paying Rick Rubin a lot of money to produce this record; he should have made them trim the fat and make it more concise.
I love long songs; hey, I’m a huge prog rock fan, so it comes with the territory. But you need the material the support the length. In this case it’s not there. But I’m still looking forward to the album!
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