{"id":13022,"date":"1971-07-21T00:00:08","date_gmt":"1971-07-21T00:00:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/?p=13022"},"modified":"2013-07-20T11:31:43","modified_gmt":"2013-07-20T11:31:43","slug":"album-review-black-sabbath-master-of-reality","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/album-review-black-sabbath-master-of-reality\/","title":{"rendered":"BLACK SABBATH – Master Of Reality (1971) | Album \/ EP Reviews @ Metal Forces Magazine"},"content":{"rendered":"

BLACK SABBATH
Master Of Reality<\/strong><\/span>
\n\"\"
\nVertigo (1971)<\/span>
Rating: 9.5\/10<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

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Album number three from Black Sabbath<\/a> and boy, these guys just don\u2019t let up. Suddenly the sound is darker, dirtier, the instruments down-tuned to create some type of cosmic sludge as \u2018Sweet Leaf\u2019 bludgeons the senses like some drug-induced dragon.<\/p>\n

Master Of Reality<\/em> is suddenly the heaviest album on the planet; stoned on doom and lost love it writhes like the greatest concrete serpent that ever lived \u2013 and still does \u2013 crushing towns in its wake.<\/p>\n

The muscular coils here are once again created by Tony Iommi\u2019s monolithic riffs, Geezer Butler\u2019s bellowing bass, Bill Ward\u2019s drums of doom and Ozzy Osbourne\u2019s foghorn yowl. Just when you thought the band couldn\u2019t come up with more classics \u2018Sweet Leaf\u2019 jerks the system, hitting the ears with what can best be described as music\u2019s most endearing and known \u201ccough\u201d before the slug-like riff enters the arena. Once again Black Sabbath are infectious, accessible and yet so darn brooding.<\/p>\n

\u2018After Forever\u2019 lightens the mood. It\u2019s a pacey, spaced-out blues affair featuring some of Geezer Butler\u2019s best lyrics; this time around he muses over religious themes as the drums and bass clank along. As a track it\u2019s one of Black Sabbath\u2019s most direct, lacking the ominous weight of others yet still as potent. However, those of you who thought that Sabbath had wimped out would\u2019ve no doubt been surprised by the medieval style brief jig of \u2018Embryo\u2019, but the smiles are soon wiped from the faces as \u2018Children Of The Grave\u2019 chugs in with sinister aplomb.<\/p>\n

Three albums in and we\u2019re wondering where Tony Iommi plucks all those riffs from, while lyrically it\u2019s further war-torn commentary, condemning friction and yet still sounding like the sort of track that soldiers would march to war with. Ward\u2019s drums are once again pummelling, as is Butler\u2019s bass, and a few seconds before the three-minute mark we\u2019re treated to one of Sabbath\u2019s darkest ever episodes \u2013 a brief stint into the underworld of black riffage.<\/p>\n

By the time we\u2019ve flipped over to side two for a breath we\u2019re treated to the folky and serene nature of \u2018Orchid\u2019, a brief instrumental that leads us into the gloom of \u2018Lord Of This World\u2019. Once again it\u2019s a multi-levelled kingdom of doom, a track which trudges at mid-pace, Ozzy\u2019s vocal laced with a mesmeric effect as Ward trundles along with bone-splintering effect.<\/p>\n

Moments later the danger seems to have passed as \u2018Solitude\u2019 drifts in on a summer breeze, a mere whisper on the wind as flute accompanies a strumming guitar. \u201cSunshine is far away, clouds linger on\u201d<\/em>, Ozzy sighs, Sabbath once again hypnotizing us with their moody magic, this time around providing wistful structures and folky dynamics until the yawning \u2018Into The Void\u2019 blocks out the sun. It\u2019s another slow motion chugger that typifies that Black Sabbath sound, drawing to a close what is without doubt the band\u2019s weightiest album \u2013 even with those dreamy folk-inspired moments.<\/p>\n

Neil Arnold<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

BLACK SABBATHMaster Of Reality Vertigo (1971)Rating: 9.5\/10 Album number three from Black Sabbath and boy, these guys just don\u2019t let up. Suddenly the sound is darker, dirtier, the instruments down-tuned to create some type of cosmic sludge as \u2018Sweet Leaf\u2019 bludgeons the senses like some drug-induced dragon. Master Of Reality is suddenly the heaviest album […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-13022","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-black-sabbath"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13022","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=13022"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13022\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13031,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13022\/revisions\/13031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13022"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13022"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.metalforcesmagazine.com\/site\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13022"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}