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Mob Rules (1981)
“We were all going through a lot of problems at that time, most of it related to drugs. Even the producer, Martin Birch, was having drug problems, and it hurt the sound of that record. Once that happens to your producer, you’re really screwed.

“Mob Rules was a confusing album for us. We started writing songs differently for some reason, and ended up not using a lot of really great material. That line-up [Iommi, Dio, Butler, Ward] was really great, and the whole thing fell apart for very silly reasons—we were all acting like children. But I think we needed to split with Ronnie and gain a little breathing space to be able to do what we’re doing with him now.”

Born Again (1983)
“When we first put that line-up together [Ian Gillan, Iommi, Butler, Ward], it was only on paper—done purely by lawyers. Ian is a great singer, but he’s from a completely different background [Deep Purple], and it was difficult for him to come in and sing Sabbath material.

“To be honest, I didn’t like some of the songs on that album—and the production was awful. We never had time to test the pressings after it was recorded, and something happened to it by the time it got released.”

Headless Cross (1989)
“That was the first album I wrote with [drummer] Cozy Powell, even though we had known each other for almost 20 years. That album was put together very quickly, and we produced it ourselves. I like Headless Cross very much, but I wouldn’t compare it to Dehumanizer, because they’re very different.”

Dehumanizer (1992)
“Getting back together with Ronnie James Dio was a little rough in the beginning—there were all kinds of egos bouncing around. We had been separated for 10 years, and it took us a long time to get to know each other again. Tony Martin had been our singer for the last three albums, and I must admit, I did feel bad that we had to let him go. But the truth is, he wanted to get out. He was getting more into writing for other people instead of performing Sabbath material. He understood the situation with Ronnie, so it really wasn’t a problem.

“Before we [Iommi, Dio, Butler and drummer Vinny Appice] started writing Dehumanzer, we talked about what we wanted. We decided to make a very heavy Black Sabbath record that had a real natural sound and a ton of doomy riffs—nothing too jolly. The material is sort of a cross between the old stuff and Heaven and Hell. It has a raunchy sound—something I think has been missing from Sabbath over the last few years. This is very much a classic Black Sabbath record. In fact, I didn’t expect it to come out quite this good!”

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