{"id":593355,"date":"2026-08-23T09:00:10","date_gmt":"2026-08-23T09:00:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/593355\/"},"modified":"2026-08-23T09:00:10","modified_gmt":"2026-08-23T09:00:10","slug":"watch-black-sabbath-play-paranoid-in-august-1970-before-it-hit-the-uk-charts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/593355\/","title":{"rendered":"Watch Black Sabbath play Paranoid in August 1970, before it hit the UK charts"},"content":{"rendered":"

Black Sabbath<\/a>\u2019s Paranoid is such a timeless classic heavy metal<\/a> anthem that it’s almost possible to forget that there was a time when it was box-fresh and startling to virgin ears.<\/p>\n

For instance, when Sabbath played the Jazz Bilzen festival in Belgium on August 21, 1970, their signature song had yet to break into the UK charts, or trouble European radio airwaves, so it\u2019s easy to imagine how confusing it was for an audience of stoned hippies gathered to see the likes of Cat Stevens, The Kinks and Dizzie Gillespie, to find Ozzy Osbourne wailing about insanity, depression and suicidal thoughts over that Tony Iommi riff.<\/p>\n

Actually, you don\u2019t have to imagine, because there\u2019s priceless footage of Sabbath\u2019s performance on the band\u2019s official YouTube channel<\/a>. And it\u2019s a wonderful snapshot of heavy metal history.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Famously, Sabbath knocked out Paranoid in 30 minutes purely to add another three minutes of music to their second album<\/a>. Ozzy Osbourne and Geezer Butler initially didn\u2019t want to jam on Tony Iommi\u2019s \u2018throwaway\u2019 riff at all<\/a> because they considered it a Led Zeppelin rip-off.<\/p>\n

Latest Videos From Louder<\/p>\n

\u201cOzzy and I thought it was too close to Communication Breakdown by Led Zeppelin<\/a>,\u201d Butler recalled. \u201cWe always loved Zeppelin in them days, sitting round on the floor smoking dope and listening to that first album. So when Tony came up with the riff to Paranoid me and Ozzy spotted it immediately and went, \u2018Naw, we can\u2019t do that!\u2019 In fact we ended up having quite a big argument about it. Guess who was wrong?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI remember going home and I said to my then-wife, \u2019I think we\u2019ve written a single\u2019,\u201d Ozzy recalled. \u201cShe said, \u2018But you don\u2019t write singles.\u2019 I said, \u2018I know, but this has been driving me nuts on the train all the way back\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

You may like<\/p>\n

Paranoid reached number 4 on the UK singles chart on August 29, 1970. Its parent album, Paranoid, became Sabbath\u2019s only number 1 album of the decade one month later<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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