Released: September 18, 1970

Songwriter: Bill Ward Ozzy Osbourne Geezer Butler Tony Iommi

Producer: Rodger Bain

[Verse 1]
What you gonna do?
Time's caught up with you
Now, you wait your turn
You know there's no return
Change your empty rules
You join the other fools
Turn to something new
Now, it's killing you

[Verse 2]
First, it was the bomb
Vietnam napalm
Disillusioning
You push the needle in
From life, you escape
Reality's black drape
Colours in your mind
Satisfy your time

[Bridge 1]
Oh, you, you know you must be blind
To do such things like this
To take the sweet that you don't know
You're giving Death a kiss
Poor little fool now
Your mind is full of pleasure
Your body's looking ill
To you, it's shallow leisure
So drop the acid pill
Don't stop to think now

[Bridge 2]
You're having a good time, baby, but that won't last
Your mind's all full of things, you're living too fast
Go out, enjoy yourself, don't bottle it in
You need someone to help you, stick the needle in, yeah

[Verse 3]
Now, you know the scene
Your skin starts turning green
Your eyes no longer seeing
Life's reality
Push the needle in
Face Death's sickly grin
Holes are in your skin
Caused by deadly pin

[Verse 4]
Head starts spinning 'round
You fall down to the ground
Feel your body heave
Death's hand starts to weave
It's too late to turn
You don't wanna learn
Price of life is high
Now, you're gonna die

Black Sabbath

From their start as a heavy blues-rock band called Earth in 1968, Black Sabbath survived over four decades with a total of 19 studio albums and numerous hits, but only “Paranoid” reached the top 10 UK Singles Chart, putting together one of the greatest rock bands of all time and setting the standards for music in their genre.

Virtually every single heavy metal band has cited the early Black Sabbath albums as a major musical influence and Black Sabbath have at least played some part in laying the foundations for most of heavy metal’s sub-genres, including thrash metal (“Symptom of the Universe” and “Into the Void”), doom metal (“Black Sabbath”) and stoner metal (“Sweet Leaf”). The band also explored many rock sub-genres, including hard rock (“Paranoid”), blues rock (“N.I.B.”), psychedelic rock (“Planet Caravan”) and, of course, the traditional heavy metal, being one of the precursors of this genre.

They were ranked by MTV as the “Greatest Metal Band” of all time and placed second in VH1’s “100 Greatest Artists of Hard Rock” list. Rolling Stone magazine ranked them number 85 in their “100 Greatest Artists of All Time.” They have sold over 70 million records worldwide. Black Sabbath were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame in 2005 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006. They have also won two Grammy Awards for Best Metal Performance.