{"id":625185,"date":"2026-09-15T08:12:29","date_gmt":"2026-09-15T08:12:29","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/625185\/"},"modified":"2026-09-15T08:12:29","modified_gmt":"2026-09-15T08:12:29","slug":"ive-got-cds-and-cassettes-full-of-them-i-just-cant-get-away-from-it-tony-iommi-has-a-massive-stockpile-of-unheard-riffs","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/625185\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cI’ve got CDs and cassettes full of them \u2013 I just can’t get away from it\u201d: Tony Iommi has a massive stockpile of unheard riffs"},"content":{"rendered":"

At 78 years old, Black Sabbath<\/a> legend and heavy metal pioneer Tony Iommi<\/a> is showing no signs of slowing down. A year on from the death of his Sabbath bandmate and longtime friend Ozzy Osbourne<\/a>, the guitarist is gearing up to release his first solo album in 21 years<\/a>, From the Dark, next month.<\/p>\n

He\u2019s the man behind some of the most influential and enduring riffs in the history of heavy metal \u2013 think Paranoid, Iron Man and War Pigs \u2013 so it stands to reason that Tony Iommi is sitting on a treasure trove of never-before-heard guitar parts just waiting for the right song or context.<\/p>\n

As he explains in a new interview with Classic Rock<\/a>, he is indeed sitting on a pile of currently unused riffs and guitar ideas, and explains how creating music is just part of his DNA.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve got CDs and cassettes full of them, thinking that if I ever get stuck I can go back and get one. But I rarely do,\u201d he explains. \u201cThough saying that, I\u2019ll probably never come up with another riff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Iommi continues: \u201cThe thing is, I don\u2019t have to do this. It\u2019s not about the money, because we don\u2019t need the money. But this [gestures towards the studio], this is what I do. I just can\u2019t get away from it. I have things I want to say.\u201d<\/p>\n

Quite how many riff ideas he\u2019s sitting on is anyone\u2019s guess, but we\u2019re sure to hear a bunch of them when his new album From the Dark drops on 23 October. In fact, we\u2019re even set to be treated to a little Iommi acoustic playing\u2026<\/a><\/p>\n

In July, the guitarist detailed his decision to incorporate some acoustic guitar playing on the new album, and how it ultimately boiled down to wanting to push himself outside of his comfort zone.<\/p>\n

\u201cI like to do something you don\u2019t really expect. And to be honest, I hate playing acoustic. I\u2019m not very good at playing acoustic,\u201d he confessed, before speaking directly on the track which features acoustic guitar, Legacy: \u201cOn that bit, I just thought it would be nice and different.\u201d<\/p>\n

The album will also feature a guest appearance from Brian May<\/a>, although Iommi wanted the Queen<\/a> legend to feature even more.<\/p>\n

\u201cI said to him, \u2018Play on some other tracks,\u2019 but he went, \u2018Oh no, it\u2019s your album,\u2019\u201d Iommi recalled recently<\/a>. \u201cThat\u2019s the relationship we\u2019ve had with each other for all these years. We\u2019ve played a lot together. He is a great friend.\u201d<\/p>\n

From the Dark arrives 23 October via BMG. Listen to its lead single World Alone below:<\/p>\n

\"Sam<\/p>\n

Sam is the Associate News Editor for Guitar.com and MusicTech. Thoroughly immersed in music culture for the majority of his life, Sam has played guitar for 20 years, studied music technology and production at university, and also written for the likes of Guitar World, Total Guitar, Metal Hammer and MusicRadar.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"At 78 years old, Black Sabbath legend and heavy metal pioneer Tony Iommi is showing no signs of…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":625186,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[1484,93,61,60,278],"class_list":["post-625185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-music","tag-artist","tag-entertainment","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-music"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=625185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/625185\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/625186"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=625185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=625185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=625185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}