Throwback Thursday: Born Again Unmixed Demos, by Black Sabbath

We're doing something a little different today on Throwback Thursday, again (as I've reviewed hundreds of albums at this point and quite frankly I'm bored of the way I've been doing things). Today we are revisiting an old favorite of mine, sort of. During my normal internet browsing, I came across something interesting: an unmixed version of Black Sabbath's infamous 1983 record Born Again. I'll get to why that got my attention in a moment.

When Black Sabbath was recording this album, the band was already in pretty rough shape. They had just lost their second singer within only a few years, as Ronnie James Dio (as well as drummer Vinnie Appice) had both left the band due to tensions going on. Losing Ozzy Osbourne had been a huge blow before. Getting Dio had managed to bring them back some, but losing him just left them wondering what they were going to do.

This is when guitarist Tony Iommi and bassist Geezer Butler met with former Deep Purple vocalist Ian Gillan to talk about starting a new band. Instead, they billed it as a Black Sabbath album due to pressures from management. The album also saw the return of the newly sober and original drummer Bill Ward (at least for recording the album) to round things out.

So what had happened was the band was all done recording the album and feeling pretty good about what they had done. They were digging how everything sounded even though it had not been mixed or mastered yet. They sent it off to the mixing and mastering people and that was that. Or so they thought. When they heard the finished product, to them it sounded like absolute rubbish and nothing like what they had been hearing on the monitors in the studio.

The production quality was murky and muddy beyond all belief. It sounded like some no name band's demo tape, though if they knew at least a little bit about production. This is what you hear on the version of the album that is still distributed to this day. That said, though I rag on it the production has definitely grown on me. I find that it adds this spooky, haunting, and eerie charm to it. It makes the experience that much darker and fun.

So what did the original music sound like before the post-production mucked everything up? Well now we can find out. In 2004, these unmixed tracks surfaced to the public, as one of Ward's ex-girlfriends sold the tape that he had gifted her of these tracks during the recording process to someone who put it out as Born Again Unmixed Demos on a Japanese bootleg label. It is now available either to buy from them or if you know where to find it for free. Plus, it's also on YouTube.

Now that we have gotten the context of the album out of the way, let's talk about the tape itself.

Let's start with some of the main differences:

1. IT'S NOT MUDDY AT ALL. Everything is pretty clear. In fact, it sounds pretty close to being a finished album as it is. You hear so many more little details in the way that they played things that got lost in the final mix and master of the record. A good example of this is hearing Ward's drum pattern at the beginning of "Zero the Hero". You can hear just how much more there was to it and it's cool as hell. It's a lot less bass heavy as well.

2. A lot less reverb on some of the tracks - particularly in the vocals and drums. Honestly, this is something that I miss from the final album. I feel it made the songs have a larger and grander presence, especially in the title track. I felt it allowed the music to breathe a little more and be more foreboding in places. However, this is something I can still live with given the fact that everything else sounds crystal clear and powerful.

3. There is a nearly five minute long version of the dark, ambient instrumental track "Stonehenge". This is not necessarily something I feel was a crime to have cut short from the final record, but it is definitely cool to hear this tune in a longer, more fleshed out way.

4. There is a track on here that didn't appear on the original version of the finished album, "The Fallen".

5. The track "The Dark" is missing. That is kind of a bummer because it builds up the tension and dark atmosphere for "Zero the Hero".

6. The vocals are just a little too high in the mix in one or two tracks, but not to the point where it is unlistenable or unenjoyable.

7. You can hear the tape hiss a bit louder at the beginning of some of the tracks. Plus, you can hear a bum note or two before some tracks kick in.

8. Different track order, but that isn't that big of a surprise.

This is the closest we are ever going to get to hearing Born Again the way the band wanted it to be heard. The original track tapes have since either gone missing or been destroyed. Either way, there will never be a remix. In 2011 the band remastered and re-released the album with the missing track "The Fallen" as well as some live tracks from that era.

That said, this is definitely worth your time if you are as much of a Black Sabbath enthusiast as I am, but don't pass up the official final version of the record either. Like I said, even though the production was shoddy, it still comes together to make an album that I feel is very well written and performed. It will grow on you over time, especially since there is absolutely nothing else out there that sounds anything like it.

Born Again Unmixed Demos, by Black Sabbath receives 3.5/5 stars.

Track List:

1. Hot Line
2. Keep It Warm
3. The Fallen
4. Digital Bitch
5. Stonehenge
6. Trashed
7. Zero the Hero
8. Born Again
9. Disturbing the Priest

Listen to the full album here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VoG8p0uwMS0&list=PLYcMy-nHE0MeEIled0odZznhKVAXgo7m2