A sampling of rare Black Sabbath video and recordings

 

The 32 minute uncut version of "Warning"! The only live version of "Sleeping Village" (with added stanza)!

The Complete Live at Lausanne, Switzerland April 29, 1970 has been released, revealing another holy grail, the lost original version of "Warning" live and "Sleeping Village" live!

All as a clean recording!

Download the MP3 here, and the FLAC version here (the latter might have been sourced from the lossy Youtube version.)

See my article here about the significance of these findings.

What's amazing as well is the performance of "Blue Coat Man"! Apart from the fact that it's incredibly performed by Iommi, Ward, Butler and Osbourne, who are on fire, and apart from the fact that the quality is outstanding, is the fact that this rare cover song is from April 1970!  For the first time, we have confirmation that Black Sabbath--not Earth--were playing blues covers all the way into 1970.  And when you listen, you can hear why!  Whether as Earth or Black Sabbath, these guys were blowing away their blues-rock competitors throughout Europe!  Why the band won't give an official release to this material is beyond comprehension--it's brilliant and deserves to be heard by Sabbath fans worldwide.

 

 

The Dumfries '69 Show!

At long last, the Holy Grail of live Black Sabbath recordings, their first known recorded performance in Dumfries Scotland on 11/16/69, has been released!!  You can find the MP3 version in the video above and the flac files at Guitars101 here.  This show was recorded by Alex Wilson (of Iron Claw), who recovered it ten years ago and sold it to the Osbournes, after which not much was heard, save for the leaked blues cover "Wee Baby Blues" (listed as "Early One Morning" or erroneously as "Early Morning School").  Then, on 9/11/15, the entire show was unofficially released, much to surprise and joy of fans everywhere! 

Black Sabbath played two sets this night, though Wilson only got the last song of the first set (and a little of "Black Sabbath"), though all of the second set was recorded.  The original set included some of the same songs, except for "Warning" and "Song for Jim." 

This features the original versions of "Warning," "Wicked World" and "Behind the Wall of Sleep," which were recorded for the demo and the self-titled debut album, but which were cut for length by Rodger Bain.  It's also the only known live recording of "Warning," as well as the only appearance of the original length version of this song!  This is also their only recording of these blues covers, many of which they'd played when they were known as Earth, and some which go back as far as Iommi and Ward's Mythology days.  Black Sabbath would shortly ditch their blues covers in favor of their own songs. 

Setlist:

 

1. Black Sabbath (the recording begins during the concluding section; nothing before this was recorded)

 

2. Let Me Love You Baby (a Willie Dixon song, covered famously by Buddy Guy in 1961 and later by the Jeff Beck Group on their debut album Truth, though that version is very different.)  This is a great song and the final one of the first set.

 

3. Song for Jim w/flute and drum solo (This starts off the second set.  It's an instrumental version of "Song for Jim" with Iommi doing a wonderful flute solo, and Bill's drum solo is also fantastic and unique; According to a trusted source whose been correct on several occasions, there is a recorded version of "Song for Jim" with vocals, presumably on the five-song "For Jim" demo, which Jim Simpson and the band have.)

 

4. Warning (18 minute version; although a small piece is cut out of the bridge leading to the final reprise of the main vocal melody, you can hear the original sections that Bain cut from the studio version. Iommi feels this version flowed better, and as suspected, you can hear the embryonic version of an extended and haunting acoustic section that Iommi would go on to perform live in the Seventies, often with "Orchid," but which never made it to an album.  There should be a demo version of the self-titled debut album which also has the original length version.)

 

5. Wicked World (this is the original version with a jazzy interlude/middle-eight section, also cut, presumably for time, on the album version)

 

6. Behind the Wall of Sleep (this is the original longer version with a great jazzy outro, again cut by Bain for the studio version).

 

7. Wee Baby Blues, (aka. "Early One Morning" and erroneously referred to as Early Morning School. "Early One Morning" is Elmore James's slightly reworked version of Robert Johnson's "I Believe I'll Dust My Broom," made famous by James as "Dust My Broom" and "Dust My Blues." John Mayall's Bluesbreakers did a version on their A Hard Road album.  Iommi and Ward originally covered this song in Mythology under the title "Dust My Broom."  But while the version Osbourne sings here is melodically the same as "Early One Morning," it's lyrically Big Joe Turner and Jimmy Reed's "Wee Baby Blues," which is itself a later version of Gitfiddle Jim’s (aka. Kokomo Arnold) 1930 song “Rainy Night Blues,” which may be the predecessor of them all!)

 

8. N.I.B. (This version has different lyrics and is a straight love song without any of the diabolical connotations Butler later gave it for the studio version; it seems like Osbourne defaulted to the earlier version, which he was known to do).

 

9. Blue Coat Man (erroneously referred to as Blue Blood Man; "Blue Coat Man is a song from Eddie Boyd, and released in 1952 on his Eddie Boyd Sings and Plays album.  Sabbath's version follows Eddie's reworked version from his 1967 album Eddie Boyd and his Blues Band, Featuring Peter Green, significant for featuring Peter Green and John McVie, as well as Aynsley Dunbar, who wrote "Warning." 

 

 

 

Rare LIVE Footage of Walpurgis: 6/21/1970:

 

 

 

Live footage of the band performing the first 2 minutes and 48 seconds of “Walpurgis” at Neiderradeyeling Stadium (Radstadion) in Frankfurt, Germany.  It is the second known video recorded footage of Black Sabbath, and the first and only of “Walpurgis.”  This was a festival, with Deep Purple as the headliners.  The lineup this day were: Deep Purple, The Byrds, Family, Black Sabbath, Edgar Broughton Band, Steamhammer, Badfinger, Chicken Shack, Jackie Lomax, Chuck Berry, Nosferatu, Screaming Lord Sutch, Bo Diddley, Heavy Jelly, Little Free Rock, and Ashton Gardner & Dyke

 

The original version of "Warning" by Aynsley Dunbar Retaliation:

 

 

The original version of "Evil Woman (Don't Play Your Games with Me)" from the band Crow:

 

Black Sabbath recorded their version on November 10th, 1969 at Trident Studios. Thanks to the Deluxe Edition of Black Sabbath, we now know they recorded a version with horns and flute, as well as the more stripped down one that appears on the album and single. Unlike Crow's original, which became a top-20 hit on U.S. charts by January 1970 (it was released in October 1969), Sabbath's version (released in the UK on January 9th, 1970) failed to chart at all.

Sabbath Links
 

BlackSabbath.com: At long last, the official Black Sabbath website is here!

 

BillWard.com: The one and only Bill Ward has a great site with songs, interviews, Bill's radio program, and a regular dose of Bill's love and wisdom.

 

GeezerButler.com: Black Sabbath's bassist and primary lyricist, the Irish Bard has a site of his own that's definitely worth checking out, with pictures, downloads and links to Butler's favorite animal charity sites. 

 

Iommi.com: Rock's greatest guitarist has his own site, complete with message boards, downloads, bio, tour-dates, and other goodies.

 

Ozzy.com: The inimitable Ozzy Osbourne has a site loaded with videos, photos, fan-activities, shop and Ozzypedia.

 

Sabbathlive.com: Thought this was gone? Well, technically it is, but that doesn't mean the old info's not still around Here's an archived cache of the site as it stood back in the day. Lots of great articles here, as well as a detailed timeline of the band's shows over the years. Not all the information on the timelines is current, as new knowledge has superseded formerly held beliefs, but overall, it's a wealth of material that's worth checking out.

 

Black Sabbath and Family Footage. Some intriguing rare items and videos here: Edtrader, known on Youtube for posting some great bootleg live performances, has a page of rare videos, as well as a list of things that were known to be filmed, but are currently lost.