Black Sabbath
Live At Last

THE REVIEW

One of the must-see bands for anyone tentatively venturing into electric music. Everyone knows what "Paranoid" is, everyone knows who Ozzy Osbourne is, anyone daring to listen to even just one album of any rock band from the last 30 years knows who the Black Sabbath are. It's not so automatic that they are appreciated by everyone, nor that all the releases of a band, for better or worse, that has gone down in history, should be appreciated.

However, the present "Live At Last" is a record to forget, unless the frenzy of unrestrained collecting leads some hapless person to spend some small change purely for culture and musical knowledge. There are many classics, many masterpieces, but presented in a dull guise, with little grip and technically limited. Proof of this is that this album was not initially released (the semi-bootleg recordings date back to 1972, the official release is of 1980), it was reissued with proper remastering in the 90s and as part of the double compilation "Past Lives"; on all three occasions, the offering was at least ignored, and not without reason.

The first track is "Tomorrow's Dream", a minor piece of the band (and also one of the most underrated), the band starts tight and grinds the main riff; the singer starts too and... sings badly. A nasal scream that does not recall the passion (never technical) that Osbourne puts into studio albums. Even the band behind him continues determined, but never breaks out of the mold, and the simple riffs that compose the piece flow without scratching. An opener with no impact.

A bit better with "Sweet Leaf", Osbourne's voice is still debatable, but at least the "doom ante litteram" riff hits harder. The sounds do not enhance the next track, "Killing Yourself To Live" (from the album "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath"), which appears muddied and played by guitarist Iommi in a, shall we say, scholastic manner. "Cornucopia" is the next track, and a composition like it, which focuses on the alternation between slow and heavy riffs and more up-tempo parts, is not significantly re-proposed: the tempo changes are not very incisive, and the song passes without leaving a mark of itself.

Not bad is "Snowblind" (from "Volume 4"), which, despite being penalized by the not excellent sounds, is played decently, and even the frontman seems more at ease at the microphone. Always as long as one does not expect any special vocal performance. It continues with the famous "Children Of The Grave", which suffers from a general rhythmic "lightness" (in fact, the drummer does not appear particularly inspired, even though the compositions are not so airy as to allow for feats or technicalities).

Arriving at "War Pigs", in a slightly sped-up version, one notices more agility and more power in general, especially rhythmically. Before the end of the album, here comes the self-referential "Wicked World", which in its 19 minutes presents solos and jazzy intervals. Interesting but not indispensable, especially since the duration is excessive and, frankly, Black Sabbath do not possess the technical mastery necessary to keep attention high for the entire piece.

They couldn't close but with the classic "Paranoid", performed decently though with the now usual mediocre performance by Osbourne (really horrendous in some passages, to be honest).

The dull and anonymous sound marks the fate of this LP for the most part, and the highly questionable performance of the frontman. Sabbath has never been particularly renowned for technique either live or in the studio, but that doesn't change the fact that this "Live At Last" depicts an off-form band that seems like a pale cover band of the creators of "Black Sabbath" and "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath".