Back to the Beginning: the map Ozzy Osbourne left behind, and the charity number everyone got wrong

Fri, 18 Sep 2026 12:46:27 +0000

Every branch of heavy music sent a band to Villa Park on 5 July 2025 to play in front of the man who sang the first record. The map holds up when you check it. The money story did not.

Friday the 13th, 1970

Black Sabbath put out their first album in the UK on 13 February 1970, a Friday, on Vertigo. Tony Iommi has said the whole thing was recorded in a single twelve-hour session on 16 October 1969 (Rolling Stone). The first thing you hear on it is rain. Then a church bell, then thunder. Then Iommi’s riff, slow and loud, with so much air between the hits that you can hear the room. Ozzy Osbourne comes in over it sounding like a man who has just seen something he was not supposed to see.

Tom Morello on Real Rock Lab

Back to the Beginning: the map Ozzy Osbourne left behind, and the charity number everyone got wrong

Friday the 13th, 1970