Black Sabbath / Depeche Mode Connection?

This past week, I got an email asking me something I had never seen before. It was in relation to the Born Again cover art. They had asked me if I knew anything, because the cover art for Black Sabbath's Born Again and the Depeche mode single "New Life". Let's get right to the pictures - here they are side by side..

They look amazingly similar, don't they? Born Again was released in the summer of 1983. The New Life CD single by Depeche Mode was released at some point in 1981. I contacted the webmaster of what appeared to be a popular Depeche Mode site (here), and asked them. They hadn't seen the Black Sabbath cover art at all, so my email was a surprise to them. They posted about it on their forums, no one seems to really know there what the connection is. Here's what I know about the situation (as copied from my post in that forum).

At the time, Sabbath was managed by Don Arden (Sharon Osbourne's father). Don apparently wasn't terribly keen on Sabbath (as the rumours go), and just (again, as the rumours go) slapped together any piece of crap and sent it to Sabbath, figuring they wouldn't like it, and wouldn't use it. That is what ended up being used! Again, as rumours go, Tony Iommi liked it, and wanted to use it.

Yes, the Sabbath cover art is credited to Steve Joule. Whether Steve was influenced by the DM cover, or where he blatantly stole from it, or whether it was a horrendously huge coincidence, or if there's another image that both folks used, I do not know.

That's about the extent of what I know of this cover image (except there's a good story in Garry Sharpe Young's Sabbath book on how Sabbath actually tried to have a live version of the baby cover art on stage - thankfully that idea went away quickly). I've placed a few inquiries about this, but as of yet haven't heard anything.

If there's anyone reading this that has concrete information as to where Depeche Mode got the image from, or knows how to contact Steve Joule, I'd appreciate hearing from you about it. In the meantime, we'll definitely have to go with the fact that the two images seem to be related in some way, but as to how - who knows?

UPDATE: I got a resolution to this story, I was contacted by Steve Joule, the guy who did the cover art for Born Again. His story (with some more pictures) is on the Born Again page on my site.

Posted by Joe Siegler at 8:29 PM

Iommi to Judge a Guitar

GUITAR WORLD INVITES YOU TO DESIGN YOUR DREAM GUITAR

Contest To Be Judged By Guitar Greats Tony Iommi, Joe Perry And Tom Morello; Fender To Build Winning Design

New York, NY (May 10, 2004) Every guitarist dreams of designing his own guitar. But unless you're blessed with the fame, talent or money of a rock god there isn't an axmaker on earth that would consider custom-crafting your amateur ideas. The July 2004 issue of Guitar World (shown here) wants to make your guitar dreams come true with its first-ever guitar design contest. Wait, it gets better.

Guitar World and premier guitar-makers Fender Musical Instrument Corporation are not only offering the chance to design a guitar, but also to have it judged by three true hard rock icons Black Sabbath's Tony Iommi (#1 on GW's list of the Greatest Metal Guitarists), Aerosmith's Joe Perry, and Rage Against the Machine's Tom Morello.

Relax, you don't even have to be able to draw. Scrawl your design on a cocktail napkin or map it out on graph paper via CAD engineering. One winning design will be built to spec by the Fender Custom Shop.

Some of the entries will appear in Guitar World during the next several months. The winner will be announced in the October 2004 issue, with the winning entry appearing in the magazine in January 2005.

Submit your entry by August 1, 2004 to: Guitar Design Contest, c/o Guitar World, 149 Fifth Avenue, 9th Floor, New York, NY 10010. Entries will not be returned.

Posted by Joe Siegler at 8:34 PM

Bob Daisley Update

In going through my email this morning, I ran across one from one of my site visitors, Annette Smith from Victoria, Australia. She had quite a few updates on what's going on with Bob Daisley. Instead of me just translating her email, I'll just post it as is. Check it out.

I've just been looking through the latest news section on your website and can let you know a bit more info about Bob's projects. (There seem to be plenty at the moment!)

The (now self-titled) Living Loud CD has been released in Australia (and possibly New Zealand). Deep Purple toured here a few weeks ago and the launch coincided with that tour.

Living Loud is Daisley/Kerslake/Barnes/Morse, as in your news item - but the special guest on the cd is Don Airey, who is now playing keyboards for Deep Purple, since Jon Lord left. With Don and Steve Morse in the country, and Jimmy Barnes a bit of a legend out here it was good timing for the launch.

At the Purple concert I was handed a flyer advertising the two Living Loud shows, which were on the same nights as the final Melbourne & Sydney Purple show. (Late gigs - sort of an after-party). Billed as a "World first, exclusive Australian release Living Loud CD available Monday April 26". Both bands also appeared on TV - one week Purple, the next week Living Loud.

www.bobdaisley.com www.livingloud.com.au (listen to track snippets)

liberation music catalogue LIBCD6094.2

I don't know if the cd's available through amazon.com yet, which is your preferred online seller.

I got mine through www.sanity.com.au When they say it's available to ship straight away they really mean it. I think they are able to supply to overseas buyers - check the website. I've bought stuff readily available and stuff on import from them. (Some Brian May cd's that they had to order in from europe took less than 4 weeks, even though they say it may take 45 days). Note - they will charge your credit card as soon as your order is accepted.

In regards to the Blizzard of Ozz / Diary of a Madman "situation" with Ozzy - the sleeve notes (cd liner) show the following :

"In 2002, Daisley's and Kerslake's performances were removed from the original 'Blizzard of Ozz' and 'Diary of a Madman' albums after they sued the Osbournes for non-payment of royalties and 'lack of credit' issues and those original classic versions were lost. Bob Daisley and Lee Kerslake wish to highlight that this album is in no way any kind of retaliation to what the Osbournes did to the originals, as Daisley intended to re-record some of those songs when the time was right. That time is now!"

Hopefully, if you mention this info on your website, you can mention Bob's disclaimer.

My favourite track is the third one - Every Moment A Lifetime (Barnes/Daisley/Kerslake/Morse). It has a really bluesy feel - Gary Moore fans should love it. Which brings us to...

Gary's website lists a June release date for "Power of The Blues" - 2 tracks co-written by Bob Daisley. (I think he played on them all???)

Hope you enjoy the Living Loud CD - I really like it.

Kind Regards,
Nette.

The Living Loud CD is actually available through Amazon.com, but it's an expensive import. Click here or on the CD cover art shown above to order it from Amazon.com. Amazon's UK store also has it available for sale here. If I find more details or another good link for the CD, I'll report back. As was said in the email above, you can listen to sound clips from this album here.

Posted by Joe Siegler at 6:34 PM

We're Back on a New Server!!

Well, I'm back. It was really scary there for a bit, but I'm back online with my new host, as you can see by this news item. It's actually a copy of something I wrote for next issue of my newsletter, so that's why some of it talks about the newsletter.

First off, I wanted to say that this issue was actually prepped on Friday May 21st, but that was the same day I found out about my hosting problems, so I shelved it - I decided it wasn't worth risking being totally shut off to deliver an issue of the newsletter - it's the same reason the newsletter hasn't been delivered in a month or so now. So the issue you're reading now is as it was prepped on Friday May 21st, except for this message from me. I still have a handful of submissions that came in after the 21st which I will include in the next issue. Additionally, I've now changed the name of the mailing list from "Black Sabbath Mailing List" to "Pilgrims of Sabbocracy" - I've put that at the top of the list before, but I've changed the subjects of the list - they used to be "Black Sabbath #xxxx" - now it's "Pilgrims of Sabbocracy #xxxx". If you are using mail filters on the list, you'll need to change them.

Additionally, I've upgraded to the newest version of the mailing list software at the same time, and it changed a bit what gets sent out on the list. That text at the top about info is hard coded - I can't remove it (yet), and there's much more detailed information at the bottom of the issue about how to unsubscribe, what email you're signed up with, etc, it should make it easier to understand how to unsubscribe.

Now, onto the website... On Friday the 21st of May, my old host essentially told me to take a hike. It was far more polite than that, and they did send me a few msgs saying they didn't want to just cut me loose, which is why there was a site at all the last few weeks. My old host basically allowed a 5Gb transfer limit per month. Over the last three months, I've been doing 85Gb a month as a peak (with the release of Black Box & the Ozzfest announcement) - but I averaged about 50-60Gb a month before that spike; that's still 10 times over their limit. They've let me slide for awhile - I've known I've been way the hell over their limit, so I'm grateful for them for allowing me so much bandwidth overage without booting me or charging (!) me.

So I started looking into other options, and my level of traffic is very high, so that pretty much put me out of all the shared account web hosting options out there. I had to go with a dedicated server. The problem is that dedicated servers can run HUNDREDS of dollars a month, and where I am with my life, I simply CANNOT afford to pay for that. Just bought a new truck, and the wife and I have been talking about having a kid, so there's no way I can lay out the money myself to pay for a dedicated server. I had to have help.

My first thought was to use the site itself to sustain it. Problem with that is that it would require turning the site into a moneymaker, which is something I'm sure I could do - it's certainly popular enough - in the month of May I had 1.5 Million page views and about 13.4 million hits. So yeah, the possibility of using the site to pay for itself certainly exists. But I didn't want to do that for two reasons. First there's far too much of the Internet which is a wasteland of ad banners, popups, and interstitials - I really did NOT want to turn my site into that. I do run ad banners on my site, but they don't generate revenue, they just link to things I think people would be interested in. I hand pick all the ads that do appear on my site. The second reason I didn't want to use my site to make money is the fact that I don't own the intellectual property that my site is based off. I've been lucky in the 9 years I've been running the site that the legal owner of "Black Sabbath" (that's Tony Iommi and his management company, Blue Flame) haven't told me to stop, or asked me to give them the domain name. If they ever wanted it, I would gladly give 'em the domain name and use something else. But they've been kind to me to allow me to continue doing what I'm doing, so I didn't want to rock the boat so to speak.

I then turned to a few business associates who put me in touch with a MAJOR (and I mean U2/Madonna level of stuff) type of web hosting company. They said they'd be willing to host it at no cost to me. In fact, I'd make money personally, since they'd be paying me. That was the problem with that option. They wanted to buy the site from me, own it, and then hire me back to maintain it. That's all well and good, but the problem with that is that the minute I piss off someone or do something the company doesn't like, they can tell me to take a hike, and they'd own everything. There's NO WAY I wanted that kind of option - in fact, I told the guy I talked to "I'd rather let it die before I did something like that". I really never thought I'd hear myself say that, but I really would rather take the site down before I had to sell it to someone else and have no control. What makes this site work for me personally is the fact that I've built it up since I started it in mid 1995 somewhere (I forget exactly when I did that). Over the years, it's been me that's dictated when things get updated, when news reports get done, etc.. It really is a labor of love, and the minute I turn it into something that I am paid for, or is moneymaker, the entire dynamic changes, and it would become something I HAVE to do, not something I WANT to do, which is a huge deal to me. So yeah, I'd rather let it die before I do that. That pretty much ended my talks with the hosting company - and given the kind of discussion I had with that guy, I kind of put the idea of a hosting company hosting it for free via ad supported stuff or a similar arrangement out of my head.

So with those options out, I had to figure out how to pay for it, which my mind first turned to contributions from users. I considered this for a bit, but user contributions aren't a good option, as it's not reliable income. The problem is that the web hosting cost is a regular monthly fee, and I could NOT rely on variable income to sustain it. I'm always open to contributions if you want to help, but I really didn't want to turn the site into a pay site, so that wasn't thought about too much, although it would have been cool to go with "A Fan Supported Fan Site" motto - it just wasn't realistic from a financial model.

That left me with two final options. Find someone to pay for it, or the aforementioned take it down. I suppose I could have crippled the site to bring it within bandwidth limits, but I did NOT want to do that. What it is is what's made it popular, and I don't know if I could castrate the site to make it work with my current host. Fortunately, we never got to the "taking it down" option. However, on Saturday June 5th, one the talks I had with a few people (who I will not name) asked one question I had about my proposal to them to have 'em pay for it. The question was "Will this allow you to remain independent?" I said, yes, and the deal was closed. This benefactor is now sending me monthly checks for the web hosting of my Black Sabbath Fan site, and for that I cannot express how grateful I am. Thing is, the benefactor wishes to remain anonymous - they'd rather not say who they are, so I'm not saying. But my heartfelt thanks goes out to them - you wouldn't be seeing this message
if it wasn't for them.

So that's where we are. The fiasco of the last month is over. The site is back on it's new host. As I prep this, according to my activity logs on the old server, just about everyone is seeing the site on the new server. If however, you aren't (you'll know - there's messages saying "This is the old server" and "This is the new server"), give it a day or two, the DNS change hasn't reached your ISP's servers. Not everything is working right on the website yet, I haven't restored the database with the mailing list archives - but most everything else is up and running again - the polls, the ads, and the mailing list.

So thanks once more to my secret benefactor, and don't forget - Ozzfest 2004 is coming up. If you have ticket stubs, or newspaper adverts, I'd like to see them. If you don't want it for yourself, I wouldn't mind getting the section of your newspaper with the advert. You can email me to get info on how to send me that stuff.

Posted by Joe Siegler at 5:39 AM

The New Sabbath Keyboardist

Tonight I was poking around looking to see if I could find any information out about who is playing keyboards for Black Sabbath on the Ozzfest 2004 tour. There's been no official statement about this on the Ozzfest site, and my queries about whether Geoff is involved were given a polite "no comment". OK, so something's up with keyboards.

So I'm looking around tonight, and I ran across some information that seems to indicate that there is a keyboardist in place. I found the tourdates for Ozzfest 2004 listed on Adam Wakeman's website here (in the news section). Anyway, the following text appears above the list of tourdates..

Adam will be playing Keyboards with Ozzy Osboune on the OZZFEST shows around America at the following venues.

Now I must state that neither Adam's website, nor the Ozzfest website state that Adam will be playing keyboards with Black Sabbath on the tour, but given that (at least officially) Geezer came over with Ozzy from Ozzy's solo band, as did Mike Bordin (at least until Bill formally signed on), I have to think that Adam Wakeman will be coming over from Ozzy's band as well to play keyboards for Black Sabbath on the tour. Once I get some sort of official confirmation of this, I'll be sure to post it. If you head to Adam's site, check out the pictures - he's definitely younger looking than the other guys in the band - no doubt.

Also, for the record, Adam is the son of Rick Wakeman, longtime Yes keyboardist, and the man who handled the keys on Sabbath's 1973 disc, "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath".

Interesting news, this is. If true, it would be the first time since Don Airey handled keyboards for Sabbath back in 1978 on the Never Say Die album that anyone other than Geoff has been behind the ivory. Geoff Nicholls has been a very long standing member of the band, so I hope it's something he's got commitments for and can't do it, as I think it would be a shame for Geoff not to be invited back.

UPDATE: When I got up on Saturday morning, I checked my email and saw that Adam's website had been changed from saying that he was playing with Ozzy on Ozzfest to saying he's playing with Black Sabbath on Ozzfest - I guess that sort of means it's official, eh?

Posted by Joe Siegler at 8:43 PM

Ozzfest Updates

The picture to the right is what's on the official Ozzfest site when you look up band information on Black Sabbath. It includes Bill Ward. Previously, the same picture was there, but with Bill Ward cropped out.

The obvious meaning of this change is that the situation has been worked out with Bill Ward. After I saw this picture, I checked with my contacts with Bill Ward, and got told there is no official announcement available. There is also no announcement on the Ozzfest site, either - so I'm not actually sure what IS going on.

Here's my guess. Bill Ward will play Ozzfest with Sabbath, but for some reason no one is talking about it yet. Given that they took the time to mention that Mike Bordin was going to play drums, the same courtesy should be taken to say that Bill Ward will actually play.

UPDATE: In an update to my update, about two hours after I posted this, the following text appeared on the Ozzfest site:

I guess that means Bill's on board, eh? However, it's not the same as it was the last two reunion tours. See below.

One other thing I did find out today - Geoff Nicholls won't be on keyboards. I thought today to ask that for no particular reason. The response back I got was "No, I believe it's someone from Ozzy's band". If this turns out to be true, it will be the first time that anyone else besides Nicholls will be playing keyboards in TWENTY FOUR years in Black Sabbath. I believe this would mean John Sinclair. I wrote to Ozzy's office looking for confirmation of this, and got "I cannot comment on this", so once I hear something official, I'll update. Anyone want to start a petition to get 24 year Sabbath veteran Geoff Nicholls back on board? :)

Posted by Joe Siegler at 8:46 PM

Site Hosting Update

I'm still with my old host. Given that my news page is still active, I'm doing this update today.

I've eyeballed a replacement host for the site, but with the traffic I do, the target will cost me anywhere between $149 and $189 per month in costs - that's definitely something I cannot afford to pay. Not even a chance. I've investigated a couple of options who might be willing to fund the site, but those negotiations are still ongoing. I'm really hoping one of them can come through, because otherwise I might have to consider the possibility that the site might have to go down because I cannot afford to pay for it. But that's a last resort sort of thing - I really hope it doesn't come to that.

Right now I'm doing about 85-90Gb of traffic a month. That's up a bit because of the Black Box release and interest in Ozzfest 2004. Before this, I was still doing about 50-55Gb of traffic a month - which is way over the 5Gb I'm supposed to be with at my current host. I mention this on the off chance someone viewing this site runs a web hosting company and might be willing to help out. The projected costs I'm looking at are less about the actual bandwith, and more about the amount of pageviews, cgi processes, and database use I have.

As a reminder, a few things are offline at the moment to help keep my levels a bit lower. Right now, my ad banners are offline, the mailing list is inactive, and I have the timeline page offline (as it's the single biggest and popular page I have). I hope to have the situation resolved shortly, and have full functionality restored, but I don't have a date for that yet.

Posted by Joe Siegler at 8:48 AM