Things got awkward behind the scenes for the final studio album of Black Sabbath. Black Sabbath guitarist Tony Iommi is revealing the strange circumstances surrounding the recording of the band's final studio album. He claims legendary producer Rick Rubin refused to communicate directly with his bandmates.
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The 78-year-old musician discussed the experience during a recent interview with Planet Rock's Ian Danter. He explained that the recording sessions for 2013's 13 were frequently uncomfortable. According to Iommi, Rubin preferred communicating with him rather than speaking directly to singer Ozzy Osbourne or bassist Geezer Butler.
"Rick wouldn't talk to the others," Iommi recalled, according to Blabbermouth.
.He said: "We were in Los Angeles and I came back for the weekend off. Rick phoned me on the Friday and said, 'Oh, could you come up with a song like 'Planet Caravan' to record on Monday?' I went, 'What?!' [He said] 'You come up with a song. [I went], 'Blimey!' So, I worked on this idea and he said, 'We can record it Monday.' But nobody else [in BLACK SABBATH] knew. So, we got in there Monday, and Rick said, 'We're going to put this song down.' Geezer went, 'What song?!' [Rubin replied], 'Well, Tony's done a song here. We're going to put that down.' [Geezer] went, 'I don't even know what it is. I don't know what key is.' And that's sort of what happened, and we ended up putting it down. But it was it was such an awkward situation."
Black Sabbath Shares Awkard Experience
The guitarist explained that he became responsible for relaying the producer's instructions, creating confusion among the musicians. Despite the confusion, the musicians recorded the track.
His latest remarks aren't the first time Black Sabbath members have expressed frustration with Rubin's approach. During a 2022 interview with Eddie Trunk, Butler criticized the producer's insistence that the musicians approach 13 as though they were recording a follow-up to their self-titled 1970 debut.
He said, ""Some of [the '13' album] I liked, some of it I didn't like particularly. It was a weird experience, especially with being told to forget that you're a heavy metal band. That was the first thing [Rick] said to us. He played us our very first album, and he said, 'Cast your mind back to then when there was no such thing as heavy metal or anything like that, and pretend it's the follow-up album to that,' which is a ridiculous thing to think."
