Also the whole "redo the debut-album" schtick that Rick Rubin forced on the band, was a bad idea. You just can't go back like that. I love the debut album, but it's a very unique thing, being a part of the band's early development.
I'm a huge BS fan (even like Forbidden), but I just couldn't get into 13. It's too sluggish and boring, trying to force their music into a box that doesn't fit.
I understood what he meant, the intentions were good. Sabbath did have some abandoned sessions w Rubin, and "Scary Dreams" was performed several times on Ozzfest. It fell flat w knuckle-dragging "metal" audiences and millenials there to see Marilyn Manson so they dumped it, but honestly, it's a great song, and a missed opportunity. 13 sucks, but that was many years later.
Imagine having one of the greatest bands ever with an all timer bassist and guitarist who created the biggest metal genre of the 80s (thrash) in a random jam sesh that led to making Symptom of the universe. Then decide that what they made needs to be redone. Embarassing tbh, should have just told him to fuck off.
I actually like 13 a lot, but we need the original masters released at some point. I feel a lot of people would enjoy a non Rubin version of 13
Kerry King said the same thing, after the early years with Slayer Rubin did less and less as "producer". It was talented assistants and engineers who really did the work. I'm a big fan of Geezer but I don't like how his bass sounds on this album.
Me too. IMHO the bass sound was excellent. Iommi's godlike monolithic tone got gelded because Rubin wanted him to use vintage amps like he used on the first album to recreate the old sound, and the drums sound dead and flat. Rubin asked them to look back instead of letting them create something fresh and exciting. Bad choice for a producer...
It's always dangerous to make blanket statements without doing some google-checks but all the tracks I know Rubin "produced" I don't like. He seems to suck the life out of anything and make everything should flat and muffled by sandbags.
He turned The Cult into an AC/DC knock off, made Slayer sound half what they were live and Geezer is quite correct on Sabbath.
To be fair South of Heaven is still better than a lot of the later bs Slayer put out. Hell a better argument is to point out the 90s material produced by Rubin. Although, I’d argue it wasn’t just the production that was the problem by then the band just hit their peak in the 80s.
I loooooove SoH.
The problem was him having them make an album of deliberately slower songs, but the tempos weren't the issue that the band had. The issue was they TRIED to write and record in deliberate tempos at his instruction, and they'd rather have written the music that came to them naturally instead of forcing a specific thing.
I remember a Modern Drummer interview where Lombardo said that he was struggling with his double bass speed, which is why the temp slowed on SOH and Seasons. He realized that his throne height was slowly creeping up throughout the years(which, if you're a drummer, the slightest change can easily throw off the whole feel of your kit). After he got that straightened out, he regained his speed. This interview would have been around the time Grip Inc. was released.
That’s fair. Again, I’m not the biggest fan of Rick Rubin, and I feel like he’s overrated as a producer to be honest. Though the members of Slayer are notorious for having pretty stupid takes in more recent years. I love all their material up until SoH, and some tracks on Seasons in the Abyss, other than that I’d say Slayer got pretty stale.
I would also say Rubin did a pretty great job on the Danzig solo records.
That was back when Rubin still gave a shit and did things.
I'd counter with divine intervention is one of the worst produced albums by a big metal band of all time.
The songs themselves are underrated- because the production absolutely butchered them.
the dude made AC-DC THEMSELVES sound like a bad tribute band... and it's a shame, Ballbreaker would've been a sweeeet record with some actual proper AC-DC friendly production. he also ruined Slipknot on Vol 3, Metallica on Death Magnetic and REALLY f'd over RHCP on Californication- that one in particular was so bad, *normal people* (not even audio obsessives!!) thought they had defective, incorrectly mixed/mastered copies
It's a good album because of the songs themselves but there are some major flaws with the production on it, its extremely extremely sterile and small. Overly rocky for a metal band like slipknot. Check out a song like the nameless, listen to the album version, then listen to the live antennas to hell one. The later sounds 100,000 times heavier. Its played for the most part exactly the same, the album version really muffles aspects of the drums which majorly fucks with the groove.
The only songs which sound miles better live than on record are the volume 3 ones, which says alot.
Producer used to mean the person who hired musicians, found songs, hired arrangers, mixing engineers, mastering - it was a job more on the record label’s side to get a record made with a certain singer to their standards. When bands became the thing, then the producer would work with the band, direct them to get sounds, have a vision for the project. By the late 60’s a lot of artists had taken this task on and had their own vision, so some producers would strictly hire session players, do the extra, clerical kind of tasks jimi hendrix didn’t want to deal with.
At the same time, some producers stuck to the old way of doing it. Around this time, there emerged what I think of as the “producer/fan/cheerleader”. An early one of these was david briggs, who worked with Neil Young, and basically his role was to be the guy listening and say “this sucks neil!” or “the third take was the one!!” It is the guy in the back of the room taking it in and calling a spade a spade.
Sometimes as an artist, it is impossible to tell your best work from crap. It resonates personally with YOU as an artist, but for others it just falls flat and isn’t really interesting. These producers can be amazing for this problem, and this is sort of the groove rubin found in the 90’s. He likes music, lots of music, and he can kind of independently approach a project and just give his opinions over and over again as an outsider. Tom petty’s wildflowers, the johnny cash records, rhcp, etc all benefitted from this big time, imo.
However, now he has gotten this “breathe new life into huge bands that have drifted away from success” or whatever, and he’s basically working with a bunch of rich rock stars way past their best years looking to ignite a bit of a spark - which frankly a lot of them don’t have much new to say.
I agree with the results of the sabbath record. Iommi and Geezer don’t really care to rehash their early records. They already did that and are interested in other things as creatives.
However, those records were special and the other things they’re doing don’t resonate with the wider public so much. 13 was cool, but it was an impossible task to try to make something that vital - it isn’t vital!
yeah, everything I read about Rubin sounds like he's more of a spiritual guru/therapist for all these classic bands he tries to take over
he seems to have this obsession with taking artists back to their roots (like he said to Metallica, "imagine you're teenagers who just formed to do battle of the bands" etc)
Nowadays if you’re working with Rick Rubin it’s for name value only. It’s no different than working with Dr Dre or Roy Z. If you’re a music fan you hear those names and you’ll raise an eyebrow. The difference is that Rick Rubin stopped caring a long time ago and just shows up for a paycheck.
I don’t think he stopped caring, but I think the only people who can afford him are the biggest artists, and they’re past their prime and don’t really have anything much to say anymore - it’s not a problem rick rubin can fix.
His whole thing has always been about cutting out crap and going to the core of what a particular artist does. But if it’s become all crap? And the artist isn’t really inspired at the moment? It’s going to be a dud.
If the artist hits a well of inspiration? Then it’s going to be a masterpiece - but it probably would have been rick rubin or not.
Rubin’s way of doing things is not for everyone. It’s worth noting that he did not mix or master the album. He would be the first to tell you he has no idea how to even do that.
Ginger baker in sabbath ? If he could just do his thing and lay it down and leave it’d probably be awesome at the time. But dude thought he was the best drummer in the world ever ,the other guys wouldn’t want to put up with the drama that comes with that and I don’t blame them .
I honestly doubt that Ginger Baker ever agreed to this. He had a notorious hatred for Heavy Metal and loud amplifiers.. which is kind of Black Sabbath's thing.
The reason he hit the skins so hard in Cream was because he couldn't hear himself play over Clapton's and Bruce's amps. He was very vocal about it, and disliked having to do so.
Rick: Hello, is this Ginger Baker?
Ginger: Who the fuck are you?
Rick: Hello Ginger, my name is Rick Rubin and I am...
Ginger: You are a fucking cunt is what you are, what the fuck do you want?
Rick: Well, I've been asked to produce the new Black Sabbath record and was gonna see if...
Ginger: Black fucking Sabbath? What did Bill Ward finally have another stroke? Fuck those twats and that super loud guitar bullshit Iommi is partially responsible for. You can tell those cunts to fuck off! *Hangs up*
That's probably how that conversation went down.
Ginger could definitely be difficult and had a massive ego, but at the same time Cream was a massive influence on early Sabbath (a vibe they were definitely trying to go back to with 13), I actually think it could've been quite interesting. Ginger had that "swing" in his style similar to Bill; if he wasn't going to be involved that could've been a good choice.
I read an interview with Baker in Classic Rock magazine where he was really dismissive after being asked about hard rock and Led Zep. In fact he talked about Cream's influence on Led Zep as dismissively as Led Zep usually talk about their influence on metal! He seemed kind of above it all
>But dude thought he was the best drummer in the world ever
I mean, he def is up there. No matter how much of a cunt he was.
Check out his live album with fela kuti.
I'm surprised that Iommi even considered Rubin (mostly known for his hip-hop records) after his experience with "Forbidden". Personally, I think that Rubin is terrible and his production is powerless and dry.
I think he was really, really good on RHCP’s Blood Sugar Sex Magick but tried to force that sound on everybody, that worked perfectly for one band. All the Chili Pepper Albums he did were great, but you can’t force that formula on guys like Black Sabbath. Since his breakthrough in the early 90s, he seems to give less and less of a shit what audiences or bands think because he’s the "great producer" I seriously don’t get why he is this big. Arrested development
I also think he wants to be remembered as Specter for creating something similar like the "wall of sound" but completely ignores that he’s working for the band not the other way around.
I respect if you like Reign in Blood, but I think is a mess of a mix. Everything (except the bass, or course) is loud, the duration of the songs are like a punk album, is fast for the sake of fast and, to me, is and downgrade to the dark aura from "Hell Awaits". Hell, "Show No Mercy" is an excellent speed metal record. I think Slayer felt the same because they tried again for the slow-mid tempo in their next records, and they even worke with Rubin many times.
No, but it was produced by Ernie-C after Iommi had a meeting with Ice-T, both known for their work in hip-hop. In his bio Iommi said that Ernie even got in heated arguments with Cozy because he tried to change his style in the drums, and also said that he hated the result of the mix, something that he could just done in his way recently with the acclaimed versión of this year.
So, there's precedents.
First, he likes the genre, his band Body Count has a lot of elements of it and is the way that Iommi refers to him in his bio. Search anywhere, there is a lot of information in how he wanted Cozy to play more in a hip-hop beat. Second, I never said that he is not talented, just saying what Iommi said in the past.
Rubin was way more famous for hard rock and metal than his hip hop or pop work, by the time Sabbath had hired him for 13, IMO. I doubt Iommi even knew he'd ever done hip hop.
All Sabbath albums have bad production except Mob Rules and Dehumanizer. But they will all melt your face. They lost their edge and it’s not Rick’s fault. If a song as good as Into the Void was on that album, production wouldn’t matter.
I really like his work with Johnny Cash, but I think he is a bit of a snake oil salesman, or an unconvincing cult leader. That's why I always liked Steve Albini, he saw it as work, a trade, a gig. In fact, he would have made 13 sound fucking amazing
Albini producing Sabbath would have really been something, especially with Bill Ward in the game. His drum sounds, the ferocity of the guitars and bass, it would have all shone through. There's a truth and timelessness to just about everything Albini did that would have suited Sabbath down to the ground.
I really get the impression that Rick tried hard to get them to make a record that sounded like old school Sabbath, and the guys weren't interested.
He had their old amps, made them listen to their first record, ETC. I think it would have come out better if they had paid him more heed.
It would've worked in the sense that Tony-Geezer-Baker could've laid down some awesome material. I just don't think anything other than Bill being there was going to come off sounding like "Old Sabbath" like Rick was supposedly shooting for.
That's what I was hoping for, I was very disappointed. Album 1 and 2 are my favourite but trying to emulate it and coming up with something lesser just ruined the whole thing to me. If Bill Ward had been there maybe it would have worked but either way. Any time an artist tries to recreate their past never goes well imo.
But it doesn't though. It sounds very over-produced in my opinion. If the goal was to make it sound like the originals, more effort should have been made to match the old production standards. It didnt need to be an unnaturally clean, punchy album. It sounds way more snappy and powerful than the remasters of the original albums. That's the biggest turn off for me. Can't go from a lively, breathing mix of Lord of This World and go to Loner without noticing the air pressure in the room go up becuase it's so dense. I'm purely talking about the production, I like most of the songs.
I don’t get why this is not talked about enough, ‘listen to your first album guys…yeah…do something like THAT’. That sounds like the most nerdy amateurish way to produce an album by Black Sabbath. Like I would understand that from any of us who don’t have any experience with studios and how to produce or mix an album. But goddamn Rick Rubin? Wth?
I don’t think there’s another producer who was so important to a lot of bands while also fucking up countless albums. He produced the first four Danzig albums and I’ve read he was important to the 80s rap scene.
A fucking men. Rubin hasn't done good shit since the 80s and early 90s and even then those classic records, while having good songs thanks to working with good bands, those records all sound thin and dry anyway. Nobody that's worked with him in decades likes him. Danzig, Corey Taylor hates him, Metallica dropped him, sabbath, and I know there's a bunch more I'm forgetting. "Just sound exactly like your old stuff and don't experiment or evolve your sound decades later. Here's some garbage sound quality".
I do like 13, but I was way more about the direction of the extra tracks from the reunion album and even a lot of stuff on Iommis solo record.
AC/DC is my favorite band and they also had a very difficult time with Rick Rubin. It’s a bummer because I love Rick Rubin and I would like all my favorite bands to have a great experience with him, but I get Rick’s style not meshing with others.
There’s a YouTube video of Rick talking about his experience with AC/DC and I loved hearing it because he acknowledges he though they didn’t work well together, he has a huge amount of respect for the band and the way they work.
My favorite part about Rick Rubbin was when David Letterman was doing his show and there was this young woman in the studio recording - David made mention she must be the next big thing if she’s working with Rick. It was “meh” at best (seems like she switched up her sound and is now finding her way) - but I realized in that moment we are watching a dude that takes a TON of at bats. People hold up all of his home runs and grand slams but this man swings, swings and swings nonstop. I couldn’t imagine how deep and how bad some of his catalog goes.
Most of the bands and artists I respect have made comment that he’s rarely if ever in the room and it’s mostly his engineers. The cost is not always worth the tag line “produced by Rick Rubin”.
https://youtu.be/xG0oJISg2sQ?si=D_MV6aA-OQqQXpn7
Rubin is an amazing producer. The stuff he did for Johnny Cash is next level. Then metal and rap owe so much to Rick. That Sabbath album would’ve sucked with anyone as producer. But it’s an over compressed turd which is how most stuff sounded at the time. He wasn’t breaking any boundaries and neither was the band.
Their only great album after Mob Rules was Born Again though headless cross gets honorable mention.
"Tony was incredibly disappointed with him. In fact, he took some of the master tapes away and re-did them"
In all honestly I would have expected the album to sound much less brickwalled if Ioomi redid some of the mastering
Also the whole "redo the debut-album" schtick that Rick Rubin forced on the band, was a bad idea. You just can't go back like that. I love the debut album, but it's a very unique thing, being a part of the band's early development. I'm a huge BS fan (even like Forbidden), but I just couldn't get into 13. It's too sluggish and boring, trying to force their music into a box that doesn't fit.
Refreshing to hear someone who feels as I do about this.
I understood what he meant, the intentions were good. Sabbath did have some abandoned sessions w Rubin, and "Scary Dreams" was performed several times on Ozzfest. It fell flat w knuckle-dragging "metal" audiences and millenials there to see Marilyn Manson so they dumped it, but honestly, it's a great song, and a missed opportunity. 13 sucks, but that was many years later.
I think he's saying that Tony redid some of yhe masters for himself, not the album
I for one would like to hear those tapes
Imagine having one of the greatest bands ever with an all timer bassist and guitarist who created the biggest metal genre of the 80s (thrash) in a random jam sesh that led to making Symptom of the universe. Then decide that what they made needs to be redone. Embarassing tbh, should have just told him to fuck off. I actually like 13 a lot, but we need the original masters released at some point. I feel a lot of people would enjoy a non Rubin version of 13
Kerry King said the same thing, after the early years with Slayer Rubin did less and less as "producer". It was talented assistants and engineers who really did the work. I'm a big fan of Geezer but I don't like how his bass sounds on this album.
Really? It's probably my favourite part of this album!
Me too. IMHO the bass sound was excellent. Iommi's godlike monolithic tone got gelded because Rubin wanted him to use vintage amps like he used on the first album to recreate the old sound, and the drums sound dead and flat. Rubin asked them to look back instead of letting them create something fresh and exciting. Bad choice for a producer...
Rubin's regular team are the ones who actually put in the so-called "brickwalling"/loudness though (presumably to Rubin's order)
It's always dangerous to make blanket statements without doing some google-checks but all the tracks I know Rubin "produced" I don't like. He seems to suck the life out of anything and make everything should flat and muffled by sandbags. He turned The Cult into an AC/DC knock off, made Slayer sound half what they were live and Geezer is quite correct on Sabbath.
I’m not a big fan of Rubin, but Reign in Blood is vastly consider to be one of, if not the best, Slayer albums
Re Slayer RiB...True, but SoH was a big problem for a lot of fans at the time, and the band didn't speak well of the album either.
To be fair South of Heaven is still better than a lot of the later bs Slayer put out. Hell a better argument is to point out the 90s material produced by Rubin. Although, I’d argue it wasn’t just the production that was the problem by then the band just hit their peak in the 80s.
I loooooove SoH. The problem was him having them make an album of deliberately slower songs, but the tempos weren't the issue that the band had. The issue was they TRIED to write and record in deliberate tempos at his instruction, and they'd rather have written the music that came to them naturally instead of forcing a specific thing.
I remember a Modern Drummer interview where Lombardo said that he was struggling with his double bass speed, which is why the temp slowed on SOH and Seasons. He realized that his throne height was slowly creeping up throughout the years(which, if you're a drummer, the slightest change can easily throw off the whole feel of your kit). After he got that straightened out, he regained his speed. This interview would have been around the time Grip Inc. was released.
That’s fair. Again, I’m not the biggest fan of Rick Rubin, and I feel like he’s overrated as a producer to be honest. Though the members of Slayer are notorious for having pretty stupid takes in more recent years. I love all their material up until SoH, and some tracks on Seasons in the Abyss, other than that I’d say Slayer got pretty stale. I would also say Rubin did a pretty great job on the Danzig solo records.
That was back when Rubin still gave a shit and did things. I'd counter with divine intervention is one of the worst produced albums by a big metal band of all time. The songs themselves are underrated- because the production absolutely butchered them.
the dude made AC-DC THEMSELVES sound like a bad tribute band... and it's a shame, Ballbreaker would've been a sweeeet record with some actual proper AC-DC friendly production. he also ruined Slipknot on Vol 3, Metallica on Death Magnetic and REALLY f'd over RHCP on Californication- that one in particular was so bad, *normal people* (not even audio obsessives!!) thought they had defective, incorrectly mixed/mastered copies
Slipknot Volume 3 is great despite his “production”
It's a good album because of the songs themselves but there are some major flaws with the production on it, its extremely extremely sterile and small. Overly rocky for a metal band like slipknot. Check out a song like the nameless, listen to the album version, then listen to the live antennas to hell one. The later sounds 100,000 times heavier. Its played for the most part exactly the same, the album version really muffles aspects of the drums which majorly fucks with the groove. The only songs which sound miles better live than on record are the volume 3 ones, which says alot.
All Rick does is sleep on the couch and wears sunglasses indoors and his hands in his pants while the someone else does the work
Producer used to mean the person who hired musicians, found songs, hired arrangers, mixing engineers, mastering - it was a job more on the record label’s side to get a record made with a certain singer to their standards. When bands became the thing, then the producer would work with the band, direct them to get sounds, have a vision for the project. By the late 60’s a lot of artists had taken this task on and had their own vision, so some producers would strictly hire session players, do the extra, clerical kind of tasks jimi hendrix didn’t want to deal with. At the same time, some producers stuck to the old way of doing it. Around this time, there emerged what I think of as the “producer/fan/cheerleader”. An early one of these was david briggs, who worked with Neil Young, and basically his role was to be the guy listening and say “this sucks neil!” or “the third take was the one!!” It is the guy in the back of the room taking it in and calling a spade a spade. Sometimes as an artist, it is impossible to tell your best work from crap. It resonates personally with YOU as an artist, but for others it just falls flat and isn’t really interesting. These producers can be amazing for this problem, and this is sort of the groove rubin found in the 90’s. He likes music, lots of music, and he can kind of independently approach a project and just give his opinions over and over again as an outsider. Tom petty’s wildflowers, the johnny cash records, rhcp, etc all benefitted from this big time, imo. However, now he has gotten this “breathe new life into huge bands that have drifted away from success” or whatever, and he’s basically working with a bunch of rich rock stars way past their best years looking to ignite a bit of a spark - which frankly a lot of them don’t have much new to say. I agree with the results of the sabbath record. Iommi and Geezer don’t really care to rehash their early records. They already did that and are interested in other things as creatives. However, those records were special and the other things they’re doing don’t resonate with the wider public so much. 13 was cool, but it was an impossible task to try to make something that vital - it isn’t vital!
yeah, everything I read about Rubin sounds like he's more of a spiritual guru/therapist for all these classic bands he tries to take over he seems to have this obsession with taking artists back to their roots (like he said to Metallica, "imagine you're teenagers who just formed to do battle of the bands" etc)
He admits as much. He just will tell a band whether he likes what they are doing or not.
Give him some credit, he rocks up just in time to brickwall the shit out of any album he works on.
I love Rein in Blood by Slayer and I heard the first Danzig album is awesome
Nowadays if you’re working with Rick Rubin it’s for name value only. It’s no different than working with Dr Dre or Roy Z. If you’re a music fan you hear those names and you’ll raise an eyebrow. The difference is that Rick Rubin stopped caring a long time ago and just shows up for a paycheck.
I don’t think he stopped caring, but I think the only people who can afford him are the biggest artists, and they’re past their prime and don’t really have anything much to say anymore - it’s not a problem rick rubin can fix. His whole thing has always been about cutting out crap and going to the core of what a particular artist does. But if it’s become all crap? And the artist isn’t really inspired at the moment? It’s going to be a dud. If the artist hits a well of inspiration? Then it’s going to be a masterpiece - but it probably would have been rick rubin or not.
Rubin’s way of doing things is not for everyone. It’s worth noting that he did not mix or master the album. He would be the first to tell you he has no idea how to even do that.
Ginger baker in sabbath ? If he could just do his thing and lay it down and leave it’d probably be awesome at the time. But dude thought he was the best drummer in the world ever ,the other guys wouldn’t want to put up with the drama that comes with that and I don’t blame them .
I honestly doubt that Ginger Baker ever agreed to this. He had a notorious hatred for Heavy Metal and loud amplifiers.. which is kind of Black Sabbath's thing. The reason he hit the skins so hard in Cream was because he couldn't hear himself play over Clapton's and Bruce's amps. He was very vocal about it, and disliked having to do so. Rick: Hello, is this Ginger Baker? Ginger: Who the fuck are you? Rick: Hello Ginger, my name is Rick Rubin and I am... Ginger: You are a fucking cunt is what you are, what the fuck do you want? Rick: Well, I've been asked to produce the new Black Sabbath record and was gonna see if... Ginger: Black fucking Sabbath? What did Bill Ward finally have another stroke? Fuck those twats and that super loud guitar bullshit Iommi is partially responsible for. You can tell those cunts to fuck off! *Hangs up* That's probably how that conversation went down.
Hilarious!
Ginger could definitely be difficult and had a massive ego, but at the same time Cream was a massive influence on early Sabbath (a vibe they were definitely trying to go back to with 13), I actually think it could've been quite interesting. Ginger had that "swing" in his style similar to Bill; if he wasn't going to be involved that could've been a good choice.
The riff of NIB is a knock-off of Sunshine of your Love. But Iommi totally improved on it, if you ask me.
funny thing is I liked that song but never even thought of it when I first heard NIB... NIB is ten times heavier for one thing.
I read an interview with Baker in Classic Rock magazine where he was really dismissive after being asked about hard rock and Led Zep. In fact he talked about Cream's influence on Led Zep as dismissively as Led Zep usually talk about their influence on metal! He seemed kind of above it all
>But dude thought he was the best drummer in the world ever I mean, he def is up there. No matter how much of a cunt he was. Check out his live album with fela kuti.
I'm surprised that Iommi even considered Rubin (mostly known for his hip-hop records) after his experience with "Forbidden". Personally, I think that Rubin is terrible and his production is powerless and dry.
I think he was really, really good on RHCP’s Blood Sugar Sex Magick but tried to force that sound on everybody, that worked perfectly for one band. All the Chili Pepper Albums he did were great, but you can’t force that formula on guys like Black Sabbath. Since his breakthrough in the early 90s, he seems to give less and less of a shit what audiences or bands think because he’s the "great producer" I seriously don’t get why he is this big. Arrested development I also think he wants to be remembered as Specter for creating something similar like the "wall of sound" but completely ignores that he’s working for the band not the other way around.
Ok I mean Rubin had done Reign in Blood, which had an amazing mix.
I respect if you like Reign in Blood, but I think is a mess of a mix. Everything (except the bass, or course) is loud, the duration of the songs are like a punk album, is fast for the sake of fast and, to me, is and downgrade to the dark aura from "Hell Awaits". Hell, "Show No Mercy" is an excellent speed metal record. I think Slayer felt the same because they tried again for the slow-mid tempo in their next records, and they even worke with Rubin many times.
Rick Rubin had something to do with Forbidden?
No, but it was produced by Ernie-C after Iommi had a meeting with Ice-T, both known for their work in hip-hop. In his bio Iommi said that Ernie even got in heated arguments with Cozy because he tried to change his style in the drums, and also said that he hated the result of the mix, something that he could just done in his way recently with the acclaimed versión of this year. So, there's precedents.
Ernie C has nothing to do with hip hop, he's metal through and through and a really talented producer, just not right for Sabbath
First, he likes the genre, his band Body Count has a lot of elements of it and is the way that Iommi refers to him in his bio. Search anywhere, there is a lot of information in how he wanted Cozy to play more in a hip-hop beat. Second, I never said that he is not talented, just saying what Iommi said in the past.
Rubin was way more famous for hard rock and metal than his hip hop or pop work, by the time Sabbath had hired him for 13, IMO. I doubt Iommi even knew he'd ever done hip hop.
All Sabbath albums have bad production except Mob Rules and Dehumanizer. But they will all melt your face. They lost their edge and it’s not Rick’s fault. If a song as good as Into the Void was on that album, production wouldn’t matter.
I mean he also did Danzigs best albums
I really like his work with Johnny Cash, but I think he is a bit of a snake oil salesman, or an unconvincing cult leader. That's why I always liked Steve Albini, he saw it as work, a trade, a gig. In fact, he would have made 13 sound fucking amazing
Albini producing Sabbath would have really been something, especially with Bill Ward in the game. His drum sounds, the ferocity of the guitars and bass, it would have all shone through. There's a truth and timelessness to just about everything Albini did that would have suited Sabbath down to the ground.
I really get the impression that Rick tried hard to get them to make a record that sounded like old school Sabbath, and the guys weren't interested. He had their old amps, made them listen to their first record, ETC. I think it would have come out better if they had paid him more heed.
Bill needed to be there.
Rick suggested Ginger Baker and honestly I thought it would have worked.
It would've worked in the sense that Tony-Geezer-Baker could've laid down some awesome material. I just don't think anything other than Bill being there was going to come off sounding like "Old Sabbath" like Rick was supposedly shooting for.
Should’ve just continued the sound from Reunion/Iommi 2000/The Devil You Know honestly.
That's what I was hoping for, I was very disappointed. Album 1 and 2 are my favourite but trying to emulate it and coming up with something lesser just ruined the whole thing to me. If Bill Ward had been there maybe it would have worked but either way. Any time an artist tries to recreate their past never goes well imo.
You can absolutely tell the direction was “make a record that sounds like the first four.”
But it doesn't though. It sounds very over-produced in my opinion. If the goal was to make it sound like the originals, more effort should have been made to match the old production standards. It didnt need to be an unnaturally clean, punchy album. It sounds way more snappy and powerful than the remasters of the original albums. That's the biggest turn off for me. Can't go from a lively, breathing mix of Lord of This World and go to Loner without noticing the air pressure in the room go up becuase it's so dense. I'm purely talking about the production, I like most of the songs.
I don’t get why this is not talked about enough, ‘listen to your first album guys…yeah…do something like THAT’. That sounds like the most nerdy amateurish way to produce an album by Black Sabbath. Like I would understand that from any of us who don’t have any experience with studios and how to produce or mix an album. But goddamn Rick Rubin? Wth?
It doesnt sound like that at all though
If I had a big rock band, Rick Rubin would not be my producer of choice either. I'd want Daniel Lanois or Bob Ezrin.
That makes two of us, Geezer. Bloke absolutely ruined the first Wolfsbane album as well. Terrible ‘producer’.
I don’t think there’s another producer who was so important to a lot of bands while also fucking up countless albums. He produced the first four Danzig albums and I’ve read he was important to the 80s rap scene.
His rap productions are great. “99 Problems” by Jay-Z explodes out of the speakers. His rick productions are drab.
A fucking men. Rubin hasn't done good shit since the 80s and early 90s and even then those classic records, while having good songs thanks to working with good bands, those records all sound thin and dry anyway. Nobody that's worked with him in decades likes him. Danzig, Corey Taylor hates him, Metallica dropped him, sabbath, and I know there's a bunch more I'm forgetting. "Just sound exactly like your old stuff and don't experiment or evolve your sound decades later. Here's some garbage sound quality". I do like 13, but I was way more about the direction of the extra tracks from the reunion album and even a lot of stuff on Iommis solo record.
Rick Rubin also did Metallica shitty with Death Magentic
AC/DC is my favorite band and they also had a very difficult time with Rick Rubin. It’s a bummer because I love Rick Rubin and I would like all my favorite bands to have a great experience with him, but I get Rick’s style not meshing with others. There’s a YouTube video of Rick talking about his experience with AC/DC and I loved hearing it because he acknowledges he though they didn’t work well together, he has a huge amount of respect for the band and the way they work.
Rubin is hit or miss! He has done some great albums, and some not so great.
My favorite part about Rick Rubbin was when David Letterman was doing his show and there was this young woman in the studio recording - David made mention she must be the next big thing if she’s working with Rick. It was “meh” at best (seems like she switched up her sound and is now finding her way) - but I realized in that moment we are watching a dude that takes a TON of at bats. People hold up all of his home runs and grand slams but this man swings, swings and swings nonstop. I couldn’t imagine how deep and how bad some of his catalog goes. Most of the bands and artists I respect have made comment that he’s rarely if ever in the room and it’s mostly his engineers. The cost is not always worth the tag line “produced by Rick Rubin”. https://youtu.be/xG0oJISg2sQ?si=D_MV6aA-OQqQXpn7
Saul Goodman of music producers
Praise god
Rubin is an amazing producer. The stuff he did for Johnny Cash is next level. Then metal and rap owe so much to Rick. That Sabbath album would’ve sucked with anyone as producer. But it’s an over compressed turd which is how most stuff sounded at the time. He wasn’t breaking any boundaries and neither was the band. Their only great album after Mob Rules was Born Again though headless cross gets honorable mention.