Refusing to sing the tracks written with Walker, Ozzy and Sabbath headed out to Toronto, where studion time had been booked, having to not only record an album, but write the darn thing at the same time.
“We hired a cinem wich was freezing and we wrote songs there during the day and recorded them at night,” states Tony.”there was so much pressure that something had to give because we had no idea wheter what we were doing was good or bad.”
Such were the time constraints that bill stepped into the breach drawning on his former talent as the singing drummer in The best, and contributing vocals to two tracks, Swinging the chain and his self- penned It´s allright. It wasn´t enough to rescue what is best described as a mixed bag of an album.
“ In the circumstances I thought we did the best we could,” states Bill. “We were taking care of business ourselves, we didn´t have millions from the record company and, despite the booze and Ozzy´s departure we tried to experiment with jazz and stuff the way we had in the early days. Songs llike Johnny Blade and Air dance I still like.”
The final kick in the teeth fot the classic Sabbath line- up came on the European leg of the Never say die tour where the band elected to take new American kids on the block Van Halen outon the road with them. Riding high on the success of their self- titled debut and led by flamboyant frontman David Lee Roth and guitar whiz-kid Eddie Van Halen, Van Halen triumphed very night while Sabbath seemed a shadow of their former sleves.
“It really was the end,” states Geezer. “David Lee Roth ripped off everything that ozzy did and Warner bros did everything for them and we found it hard to keep up.”
“By then we felt we really meant nothing, that everything we´d done meant nothing and that it didn´t matter.” Adds Ozzy, despondently. Tony had already talked about working with American singer Ronnie James Dion / ex- Rainbow/ and informed therest of the band that he felt the future lay with Ronnie. Geezer and Bill were initially less certain, but went along with Tony´s decision. Izzy was officially fried from the band in early ´79 with Geezer threatening to follow him, leaving briefly before returning.
“When Ozzy left,. I cried,”recalls Geeezer. “It was horrible, but I knew he didn´t believe in what we were doinganymore. In a strange way, it was the best thing that could´ve happened then because if we´d made another album with Ozzy it wouldn´t have worked” “when Ozzy left, I felt disillusined,” adds Bill. “I felt lower than rocking horse shit.”
Tony saw things in a different light. “The split with Ozzy felt very final and was very sad, but I saw it as a challenge. I felt we had to come up woth something new which was as goog as what we´d had.” Reflects Iommi. “I f we´d carried on as we were there´s also a very good chance we´d all be dead,”
Ozzy himself csaw the situation as a culmination of four years of frustration. “Everyone knew I´d become frustrated beacause for me the challengehad gone,” he ecplains. “In the early days we took no prisoners.