Disco de Black Sabbath: “We Sold Our Soul for Rock 'n' Roll”

Here's where metal all began. Doom, Black metal, Death metal...so many genres began with Sabbath. We Sold Our Souls For Rock 'N' Roll is very good place to start a Sabbath collection. Features all their more well known songs such as Paranoid, Iron Man, Changes...etc. A little disappointed that some of the songs that were just as good but not as popular were left out. Also no songs from the Dio era of Sabbath, I admit that that's not such a big deal though since they only had one good album with him. Again, a great place to start but I would recommend getting the actual albums too. Every Sabbath album is meant to be taken as a whole and, while the songs sound good apart from each other, your missing part of the experience if you just hear one or two songs of a particular album. It's been more than 30 years since Sabbath started and they are still one of the best. Very few have ever been able to match the ambiance, art and effect Sabbath achieved. Their material is as powerful in 2004 as it was 1970.

Man, this CD rocks. I was afraid it would suck when I bought it, but this is now one of my all-time fav CDs. It's very powerful and each song is different and worthy of being on this 'Best Of' collection. All Sabbath needs to do now is come out with 'We Sold Our Sold For Rock 'N' Roll 2.' That would be sweet. If you like any Metal or Hard Rock, then this CD will complete your collection. The highlights are Iron Man, Paranoid, Children of the Grave, The Wizard, War Pigs, Black Sabbath, N.I.B...oh hell, every song on the CD is excellent. Tony Iommi is awesome on guitar and does great on his distorded rhythm and powerful lead. Ozzy's voice is...well, i can't describe it, but he fits perfectly with Black Sabbath. If you watched THE 100 GREATEST ARTISTS OF HARD ROCK on VH1, you would have seen that Black Sabbath came in at #2, with Led Zeppelin at #1. Personally, I think they are a tie for the best hard rock band. Anyway, if you have Napster, download some songs off of here and you will see that Black Sabbath rocks, and that this is the CD to have.

A good introduction to Black Sabbath in all their sabbathy wonder. It's got all the classics here (well not ALL), as well as a few others that are just as good. I would've liked to see Electric Funeral on here, however.

1. Black Sabbath- 5/5 Creepy and awesome. The vocals here are chilling.

2. The Wizard- 4/5 Haven't heard another song that rocks as hard with a harmonica.

3. Paranoid- 5/5 Yeaaaaahh!!! Who doesn't love this one?

4. War Pigs- 5/5 Powerful.

5. Iron Man- 5/5 Definitely one of my favorite Black Sabbath songs, awesome riff.

6. Tomorrow's Dream- 3/5 Doesn't really stand out, but give it a listen anyway.

7. Fairies Wear Boots- 5/5 A nice weird song you can listen to over and over again.

8. Changes- 4/5 A good ballad. No guitars here though.

9. Sweet Leaf- 4/5 hahahaha... Ozzy loves his sweet leaf.

10. Children of the Grave- 5/5 Really good heavy song.

11. Sabbath Bloody Sabbath- 5/5 I just might love this one more than iron man. If you don't like this song than just stay away from Black Sabbath.

12. Am I Going Insane-3/5 A change of pace here, not that bad.

13. Snowblind- 5/5 Another classic.

14. N.I.B.- 5/5 The best song to end this cd. It's evil I tell you!

'We Sold Our Soul For Rock 'n' Roll'. Luckily, I bought this after I'd pretty much got all the albums its content is derived from. If you're a newcomer to Sabbath, only after a tape/CD of theirs to play at a party or if you just want to have one Black Sabbath overview in your collection then fine; I suppose this is what you'd probably stick with. But for me and (hopefully) other self-respecting Black Sabbath fans, this is only a so-so double-set choice and it's not a true ambassador of the group's power and repertoire. I understand the constraints present in CD technology at the time this went to press (back then 'Warning' and 'Laguna Sunrise' had to be struck off), but why couldn't Warner Bro.s have just splashed out on a dare and made it a three LP set back in 1976 and not a double in the first place?

To be sure, there's some fine tunage on here. 'Black Sabbath', 'The Wizard', 'N.I.B.', 'War Pigs', 'Paranoid', 'Sweet Leaf', but only the first two albums are given serious attention. 'Warning' might demonstrate Sabbath's origins in blues but, at ten minutes plus, it kills space that could have been given over to, say, 'Lord of This World' and 'Symptom of the Universe'. Weeping over the imperfect choice of tracks lifted from 'Volume Four' is pointless because that album has to be treated as an independent masterpiece, but the choice of the rest of the tracks is generally just ratable as being 'somewhat good' in my book. The scope of the recording is too limited and there's much that's missing. You have to wonder if any consideration was given for 'A National Acrobat', 'Planet Caravan', 'After Forever', 'Into the Void', 'Supernaut', 'Hand of Doom' or 'The Writ'.

Although crafted with the best intentions (to cash in on the glory by lifting only Black Sabbath's most commercially successful pieces plus one or two offbeaters), 'We Sold Our Soul....' is for the casual fan who will never understand why the hardliner fan might scowl at the track selection. Simply by their nature, greatest hits jobs just can't stretch to satisfy far beyond the 'mainstream' core and into the special interest suburbs. It's your money; do as you will and live with the consequences but there are other ways to sample a general slice of Sabbath. Castle Records has a few releases that should be of interest here. Try their 'Black Sabbath - The Collection' and, together with 'W.S.O.S.F.R.&R.', you'll have a much healthier perspective on what Sabbath once stood for.

This is a good place to get a first taste of the band that invented heavy metal, bar none. I have gone through several LPs and cassettes of this over the years before finally getting the CD. It's also much cheaper than the recently released "Symptom Of The Universe" set, if less comprehensive (that set covers the entire Ozzy Osbourne period, this one only goes up to 1975's "Sabotage").

From what I have read from interviews with the band, the Sabs really had no involvement with putting the compilation together, but nonetheless the person(s) involved generally showed good taste and judgement. Most of the tracks are drawn from "Black Sabbath," "Paranoid," "Master of Reality" and "Volume 4," with one track each from "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" (the killer title cut) and "Sabotage" (the utterly stupid "Am I Going Insane (Radio)").

Get this together with the phenomenal Dio-era "Live Evil" to begin exploring Sabbath, and then be adventurous and give a good, fair listen to the other Dio-era discs, along with the Tony Martin, Ian Gillan and Glenn Hughes-fronted lineups rather than just say "Black Sabbath is Ozzy and Ozzy is Black Sabbath, everything else stinks," as is politically correct to say. If you're open-minded to excellent heavy metal music, I don't think you'll be disappointed.

So, with my praise for this disc, why only three stars?

First of all, though I respect him for his role in making Sabbath what they are, I just don't understand the adulation over Ozzy Osbourne. He is not a singer (though he IS an entertainer) and played very little role in the actual songwriting. I believe what really made the early Sabbath great was the instrumental interplay between Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward.

Second, the CD release of this album cuts out "Warning" (an extended jam from the first LP) and "Laguna Sunrise" (an exquisite Tony Iommi acoustic guitar solo from "Volume 4") from the original release. There are other cuts that could have been elbowed to make way for these two - the aforementioned "Am I Going Insane?" and the braying "Changes" (for that matter, some of the heavier cuts from "Sabotage" should have been included - "Hole In The Sky" and "Symptom Of The Universe" are essential Sabbath).

Get this, then dig deeper.