Turn Up The Night – Black Sabbath

There are (and I’m putting this in quote marks) “purists” who do not recognise Black Sabbath with Ronnie on vocals as real Black Sabbath. These people think the original Ozzy sound is the only sound that qualifies as the real deal. I’ve heard them shorten the band to BS Sabbath or more generously Heaven And Hell. The bands lawyers would have to settle for H&H when everyone wasn’t getting on and Sharon and Ozzy’s legal team stepped in.

I’d argue if any of them actually spent some time with The Mob Rules or Heaven And Hell the album begetting the name of the band when Ronnie returned to the fold for the final time they would hear how much RJD brings to the cannon. There are people who don’t go for post Bon Scott AC/DC or Sammy Hagar fronting Van Halen. There are even people who think Iron Maiden were better before The Air Raid Siren and should have called it a day in 1982.

I’m not talking to those guys. I’m talking to you. Disciple of Dio. Worshiper of the voice of metal. The sort of people who can’t hear someone call out

“Sing me a song you’re a singer” without responding “Do me no wrong you’re a bringer of evil”, you know. Good folk.

To those people Turn Up The Night is a classic Sabbath single in the phase that saw the band transition from a jazz/blues/rock hybrid that fell into a swamp of radioactive evil and crawled around terrorizing the end of the 60’s into Landed Gentry of the 1980’s heavy metal scene.

Chugga Chugga Chugga goes Iommi’s riff with an urgency he didn’t feel in those early days.

“Roll of thunder, I’m suddenly under your spell, no rhyme or reason the time of the season but oh well”

Black Sabbath came into the 80’s wanting to party. The Mob Rules especially is a dexterous and fun heavy metal record. Sign Of The Southern Cross handled the hymnal element while the title track and songs like Voodoo and Country Girl spread the smiles a little wider than before. Iommi is keeping pace with the upstarts of the era like EVH and Ozzy’s own new gunslingers.

The band are hard as rock behind Dio. He’s nailing every single lyric. There have been 8 vocalists in Black Sabbath. Sometimes it’s just Tony and a bunch of guys he’s tricked into attending a meeting in a hotel conference suite like they were turning up for a pyramid selling scheme. You sign on the dotted line, give him thirty quid and you’re in Black Sabbath for the afternoon.

Ozzy is obviously the don. Dio the master of metal who graced us with his presence for two albums then back for Dehumanizer many moons later. Glenn Hughes and Ian Gillan were always on loan from Deep Purple really, but Gillan did a real turn on Born Again. Tony Martin made a hell of a record in The Eternal Idol. Cross Purposes, Headless Cross and Tyr all have tracks to recommend them too so he really is the Third Wife of this particular club. I’ve never been able to tell Ray Gillen from a box of shredded wheat or either of the two Dave’s who somehow must have got the gig on their own merit. I’m sure they did some stuff, but what do I know?

People who diss Dio have no idea how marvelous Sabbath were with him. If they only listened, they’d understand entirely. Turn Up The Night is as metal as any angry, shouty, brutal slab of raw face punching noise. It’s just fixing to get a little loose later on. Maybe with your siblings, maybe with your folks. Maybe both.

“Makes you need the movement, like a fire needs a spark to burn!”

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