Ozzy, happily, doesn't have much to say beyond belting out the tunes in his trademark yelp. When a female reporter sticks a mike in front of him after Sabbath's performance at the legendary California Jam, his incoherence is truly sublime. It's up to guitarist Tony Iommi to more lucidly recount various aspects of the band's history. --Kevin Filipski

In this video, we get great performances from Black Sabbath doing some of their best songs, such as "N.I.B.," "War Pigs," "Paranoid," and "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath." Actually, my favorite video is the last one: a BBC Top Of The Pops performance of "Never Say Die" from their 1978 album of the same same name, their last one with Ozzy. There are many insightful interviews, especially with Tony Iommi, who gets credit only for being a great guitarist but not enough for being an intelligent, throughtful and well-spoken individual. He is quiet-mannered, yet is forthcoming when talking about the band, and reveals some very interesting information which showed how much I didn't know about them. Drummer Bill Ward and bass guitarist Tony "Geezer" Butler are also very forthcoming, the latter in particular about his drug abuse. And yes, one of the videos shown is the Bill-Ward sung "It's Alright!" THE BLACK SABBATH STORY really is essential for helping you understand the whole story about one of the greatest rock bands of all time.

MOST RECOMMENDED, FOR FANS AND CURIOUS ALIKE


Good, But Not Enough   December 31, 2003
Sunshine Greeny
13 out of 15 found this review helpful

The video of this has been around ten yrs or more, so I wasn't expecting anything new. What's here is good ~ I get a kick outta the color version of them playing Children Of The Grave at an outdoor Cal Jam 74'...it's a strange juxtapostion between the atmosphere of the crowd, and the message of the song.

The opening track, N.I.B., is taken from a film that was made for TV in Paris, 1970, and as to why this ~ the ultimate live Sabbath footage ~ hasn't been released on DVD is beyond me.
This is when they were fresh and had a spark fueling what/how they played. Would you like to remember them as rock stars of the late 70's, or as a really freaky underground drug band of the early 70's?!..ha!..face it, that's when they cranked out their best material.

Anyway, a complete and comprehensive Sabbath DVD is yet to be:
it would need the entire Paris 70' footage, the Don Kirshner rock show footage, those hokey colored-gel background video's that are available on the Musikladen DVD, the COMPLETE footage of the Sabbath Bloody Sabbath video, and hopefully some other rare footage of them pre-1973, that I'm sure exists somewhere.


Love Sabbath but...   October 21, 2002
13 out of 15 found this review helpful

I love the footage they showed, however the makers of the dvd cheated the public. The back of the disc say the aprox running time 85 minutes. It's actually 60 minutes. Somone said Vol. 2 of the DVD is 45 minutes. Don't you think they could have released both volumes in one disc? I think so. Talk about milking the fans for cash.


Fake Widescreen Ruins This Footage   October 3, 2002
9 out of 10 found this review helpful

Black Sabbath fans will be very disappointed. While the VHS versions were great, these DVDs are presented in "fake widescreen," meaning they just stuck black bars on the picture, actually COVERING UP the upper and lower portions of the screen. No joke.

You wind up with headless shots of Tony Iommi, shots of Ozzy singing with only his nose and mouth visible, etc. It's absolutely ridiculous. Stick to the VHS versions.


A must for a true Sabbath fan ...   February 11, 2001
Pierre Becquart (Waterloo, Brabant Belgium)
7 out of 8 found this review helpful

The interview with Geezer and Tony is interesting while it gives a "human" view of their incredible performances. The best moments are from early live concerts. Parts are in Paris and include NIB. My preferred moment is a very poor quality black and white shot of Children of the Grave in the US. Only the mediums survived on the sound track ... which is again sad for Bill and Ozzie that have most of their part outside this frequency scope. I would hope that at some point better vintage material will come out, but in the meantime this is extremely valuable.