Review Summary: “The night is gone and the light shines on, where darkness once would hide…”
“On Headless Cross, Tony had just come into the band and he assumed 'oh, Black Sabbath, it's all about the Devil', so his lyrics were full of the Devil and Satan. It was too much in your face. We told him to be a bit more subtle about it, so for Tyr he did all these lyrics about Nordic gods and whatnot. It took me a while to get my head around that…”
- Tony Iommi, Autobiography
Imagine your lyrical content being so satanic – Black Sabbath tell you to tone it down.
Tony Martin, you legend.
As for ‘Tyr’?
This album, here?
One of their best, easily.
Yes – I’m taking this record’s namesake and placing my hand in Fenrir’s mouth on this one – it’s just that good.
Same can be said of ‘Headless Cross’.
No track-by-tracks, no glossing.
First, the band.
Tony Iommi – the Godfather of Heavy Metal (go home, Ozzy) – has grown as a musician, in style and fret-craft, since ‘Headless Cross’. Wherein the preceding album was more all-out, metallic shredding on his part – here, his tuning is “bluesier” and more acoustically oriented, without excluding the formerly mentioned shredcraft.
I would say this makes the guitars on the album more wholesome – a definite bonus.
It’s a joy, listening to this man’s evolution throughout the Sabbath repertoire – fifteen albums in and this demigod still rips – without two fingertips, may I add.
"After this run, we're going to have some time off. I've got to have an operation on my hand. It's sort of a major thing I need to get done and I've been putting it off. The cartilage has gone from the thumb in my fingering hand. It's been like that for a year, to be honest. I've been taking anti-inflammatories and all sorts of stuff to try and calm it down. But it's inevitable - I have to have the operation - the bone is rubbing on the bone."
- Tony Iommi, The Aquarian, 2010
When you’re dealing with a drummer with as titanic a calibre as Cozy Powell – you can’t help but turn up the drums in the mix to 11.
Some have praised and, more importantly here, some have criticized the loudness of Powell’s drums in the production of this album.
Honestly, I never noticed nor found any fault with it until I read up on such nitpicks.
Cozy dominates this album as soon as you hit “play” – ironically, with ‘Anno Mundi’ being one of the slower tracks - he absolutely, positively pounds through the entire track like a stampeding mastodon.
“I was there from Day 1 and everybody else has come and gone, and come back, and gone again. And I’m the only one that stayed there and I think now it [Headless Cross] deserves to be ‘Black Sabbath’ more than anything – particularly with people like Cozy in the band, who we’ve known since before Black Sabbath and obviously, with a great drummer as Cozy – I think it deserves to be kept to that sort of name, as Black Sabbath, and we’re portraying the band as it should be now…”
- Tony Iommi, MuchMusic, 1989
Hold up.
Can you hear him?
Are you near him?
Hear him crying out for life – our frontman, Tony Martin.
His vocals - so good, Iommi once used his original guide recordings instead of the later ones, no ad-libs needed (Headless Cross, ‘Nightwing’).
For all the masquerading Sabbath “fans” who refuse to lend an ear to this man and his work with the band – the “Dio is great and all but Ozzy is made for Sabbath” guys - yeah, I’m talking to you, have you listened to these albums?
Key word, listened – not skimming them off, glossing over them on youtube, skipping half the tracks, just to say you’ve “heard everything”.
More importantly, actually hearing this record, with Mr. Martin delivering his best – hearing what he has to say.
“I do study lyrics a lot. Sometimes I can get stuck on one line for weeks. Other times it will flow like water. I never know… But I do know that it has to have a beginning, middle and end story that flows. If it doesn’t have that, I have to either work it to death until I have the exact line, or I never listen to it ever again!
I am always inspired by the music and the words ‘tell me’ if it’s gonna fit.”
- Tony Martin, Gibson interview with Peter Hodgson, 2011
Landing themselves an actual bassist this time - Mr. Neil Murray (Whitesnake, Badlands, Gogmagog, Brian May) – in all honesty, I’ve not much to say of the bass.
Look at it as a detriment if you want, but personally, I’ll say the bass on ‘Tyr’ is just a tad more audible than it is on ‘Headless Cross’.
This is a phase in Sabbath’s timeline where the bass is not all that important to the music – Geezer Butler was way off Sabbath’s radar, at least at the time this was recorded, but he would return with them on ‘Cross Purposes’, four years later.
What can be said of note, however, is Geoff Nichols – the fifth member of Sabbath, for this album.
His work here is delivered quite well, a no-brainer considering the content and themes.
Check out my recommended listening tab for the band he played guitar for – Quartz – a competent hard rock/metal outing.
And now, the music.
No bad tracks – literally, none.
All killer, no filler.
From doomy, atmospheric, nigh hymnic songs (‘Anno Mundi’, ‘Jerusalem’, ‘The Sabbath Stones’) to ripping, screaming, all-out, devil-horn metal (‘Law Maker’, ‘Valhalla’, ‘Heaven in Black’).
It’s all here.
I’ll lend a mention to the excellent atmospherics of ‘Valhalla’ – with its introduction track(s); ‘The Battle of Tyr/Odin’s Court’ – Iommi and Martin team up for a sombre, serene build-up for the impact this epic triad will bring to you.
Let me pause, once more, and just shower ‘Law Maker’ for the absolute battering ram of a song that it truly is.
Make no mistake, this song doesn’t sing of some foreboding figure or other – it’s just Iommi thundering in, laying down the law - and listen, you shall.
“BM: Why was the song "Feels Good To Me" included on the album "Tyr"? It's good song and all, but it seems to clash with theme of what is quite clearly a concept album. Was it thrown on there just to be a "radio friendly" track?
TM: Yup!”
- Tony Martin, Brendan Millet interview
There.
There’s even a slow one – for your girlfriend.
Now we’re talkin’. This album is whole.
And for the people who hold this as detriment?
Okay, Ozzman, let's try it your way - hop on to, say, 'Volume 4' - do you actually listen to 'Changes'?
Later-era slow tracks like 'Over and Over' (Mob Rules), 'When Death Calls' (Headless Cross), 'Dying for Love' (Cross Purposes) and this one absolutely smoke Ozzy-era ballads, which are often the worst songs of that time ('It's Alright', 'She's Gone', 'Changes').
Jesus Christ, Ozzy, stay away from ballads.
And Post Malone... (cough)
Anyway, a beautiful song - nothing wrong with it whatsoever.
“'Feels Good' was the single so, yes, it was on there for radio, we did a video for it, which is the weirdest thing. Shot partly in London in an old theater, and partly in sunny LA with a girl on a motorbike.!! You have to see it."
- Tony Martin, Andreas Eriksson interview
Overall – a political calibre of criminally underrated.
A must-listen for any true Sabbath fan.
Though not originally intended as a “concept album”, intrinsically it functions as one – and quite well at that - the mythical, mountain journeying, God-fearing, dragonslaying motifs are worn (literally) on its sleeve.
A thunder-moulded runestone of epic metal - with much to be heard and yet more to say.
The more you listen, the more you’ll find.
“You say you walked through the valley, you say you've seen the signs.
Echoes call you from a distant age, or is it in your mind?”
- Jerusalem
Rock hard, ride free and speak no evil.
Until the next time.
