Tony Iommi

[phill_up]

Does anyone think this guy was innovative? Influential? maybe both? I was just a lad when this guy was kicking ass. I remember the song heaven and hell with Ronnie James Dio and the kind of eerie siren in the intro. I was thinking to myself "This is creepy". As I got older the creep factor wore off and now I'm thinking wow... All of the sabbath music has stood the test of time. The real trip is that 2 of his fingers have the tips cut off.

Comments?




"Zero the Hero" with the gillian dude is still a bad ass to this very day. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WL_svZmiGWw

[randyrhoadsguitar]

I think he was very influential. I mean being able to play like that with practically only three fingers... props to ya. Don't forget he practically (if he didn't) innovate metal guitar.

[Ace]

Iommi? Well other than inventing heavy metal and fronting a massively successful band for nearly forty years, what else has he done? It's not like he can play 320bpm!

[El Chiguete]

And there he doestn't need to play like that either to play a song that really grabs you by the balls!!!

[guitarsjb]

Words cannot describe his contribution to metal! Without him..would we be here?? Who knows.

[Jayster]

not even looking @ his monumentally influential playing style ;

Any of you fellows with light gauge strings or into down tuning - should say thanks Toni

[J_A / 540s]

One of the Godfathers of Metal.... A living riff machine for sure

[Newc]

The originator of the Heavy Groove, and the architect of heavy riffing.

Summon Dimebag and let him tell you who invented the heaviest riffs of all time. He'll say it was Tony Iommi.

Into The Void, Cornucopia, Children Of The Grave, Lord Of This World, Symptom of the Universe, the interlude in Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. Those riffs and grooves are the foundation on which all Metal afterwards was built.

It's safe to say that without Tony Iommi, what we know as Heavy Metal would not exist.

Then again, there was that Turkish band from the 50s.....

[shobet]

Pffft, he's only a fucking Brummy!

That will only mean something to the UK contingent here.

But I agree, his early stuff was ground breaking and innovative. To lose the tips of two fingers in a metal press and still be able to come up with the stuff on the those first 6 or so Sabbath albums!

[LastInLine]

I remember the song heaven and hell with Ronnie James Dio and the kind of eerie siren in the intro.

What siren?

[phill_up]

What siren?

You know that might have been an intro to a song when ozzy was singing. I thought black sabbath was devil worshipers when I was a kid. I will try to figure out which song it was. I wish he would re-master all of the old stuff. I had all of them on cassette and they are long gone.
That siren wasn't on War Pigs was it?

[LastInLine]

That siren wasn't on War Pigs was it?

Now you're talkin' .

[thebeggar]

Total riff machine for sure. He'd only need to play a couple notes and you'd know it was Iommi. I've heard people call Keith Richards the human riff, I think the same can be said of Tony Iommi. I also respect that he's still playing metal in much the same way he did when he started.
30 yrs of bustin out doomy gloomy riffs. Damn that's metal

[jimjones]

nobody has written as much music that i like to play/listen to as tony. he certainly has influenced me and just about anyone else who plays heavy guitar. love the dio era stuff the best.

[StukaJU87]

Black Sabbath was my intro into metal, probably circa 1976 or 77. I was just about 12 or 13 the first time I heard Paranoid. I have loved the early stuff up through Born Again forever. Iommi is the Metal Riff Master.