Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
Unusual Rock Trivia?
- Thread starter Aberdumbie
- Start date
-
- Tags
- rock
Donovan Leitch sang along on the song Billion Dollar Babies by Alice Cooper.
That's a hard one to nail down, there are some great songs from their previous records.
Black Sabbath needed 3 minutes of filler to finish their second album - so Tony Iommi wrote their biggest hit in 4 minutes.
June 1970, Black Sabbath were a few days into recording their second album at Regent Sound Studios. Their debut album had dropped four months earlier and climbed to No. 8 in the UK. Now they were rushing to finish the follow-up before their first American tour.
The album was nearly done. "War Pigs," "Iron Man," "Hand of Doom" - heavy, sprawling tracks, most of them five minutes or longer. The band had honed this material during grueling residencies where they played four 45-minute sets a night, stretching jams until songs like "War Pigs" ran close to forty minutes.
Then producer Rodger Bain did the math. The album was three or four minutes short of the length required to officially qualify as an LP.
Tony Iommi needed to write something. Fast.
When the others went out for lunch, Iommi stayed behind and began playing a riff - a simple figure alternating between E and D, punctuated by a sharp chord change. The basic idea took him about four minutes to sketch out.
When they returned, Iommi showed them what he had. Bill played around with some drum patterns, Ozzy hummed a melody, and Geezer sat in the corner with bits of a script from a BBC radio play, scribbling lyrics about depression and alienation on the pages. Within an hour they had a complete song.
Producer Rodger Bain heard it and told them to record it immediately.
The band protested. "You're joking," they said. "We're just messing around. We just made it up."
"Well that's great," Bain replied. "Let's do it!"
Ozzy sight-read Geezer's hastily written words as he sang them. Two takes later, they had a track.
Nobody thought much of it. Iommi called it "a bit of nonsense" - a throwaway to fill a gap. At 2:46, it was barely half the length of everything else on the album. Geezer thought it was "too light" and objected to including it at all. "You can't put that on the album," he argued, "go straight from 'War Pigs' to a three-minute pop song." He thought it sounded too much like Led Zeppelin's "Communication Breakdown."
But Vertigo Records heard the track and made a decision: they were changing the album title from War Pigs to Paranoid. The artwork - a blurred figure in a pink leotard meant to represent a "war pig" - had already been commissioned. Too late to change it now.
The single came out in August. By October, "Paranoid" had hit No. 4 on the UK singles chart. The album went to No. 1.
The band was astonished. Geezer remembers hearing the chart announcement on the radio in the van: "WHAT?!? We all nearly died. We just couldn't believe it!"
Ozzy ran around his house screaming, "I'm on the radio! I'M ON THE RADIO!"
"Paranoid" became Black Sabbath's only Top 10 hit - their only Top 20 hit, period. It landed them on Top of the Pops. It became an inescapable setlist closer for the next five decades, regardless of who was singing. Rolling Stone ranked it 13th on their list of the 100 Greatest Heavy Metal Songs of All Time.
Years later, Iommi reflected on the irony: "Out of all our stuff, that's always the one that people put on compilations, use in TV themes and in films. And it took probably four minutes to write."
Geezer eventually admitted he was wrong to fight it. "Thank God no one listened to me," he said. "'Paranoid' was the biggest thing we ever did."
On July 5, 2025, Black Sabbath played their final show at Villa Park in Birmingham. The last song they performed together was "Paranoid" - the three-minute throwaway that renamed an album, defined a genre, and outlasted everything else they ever wrote.
(Sourced from Iron Man: My Journey Through Heaven and Hell with Black Sabbath by Tony Iommi, 2012; I Am Ozzy by Ozzy Osbourne with Chris Ayres, 2009; Into the Void: Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath by Geezer Butler and Benjamin Welton, 2023; Rat Salad: Black Sabbath, The Classic Years 1969-1975 by Paul Wilkinson, 2007; Black Sabbath: Symptom of the Universe by Mick Wall, 2013; and The Complete History of Black Sabbath: What Evil Lurks by Joel McIver, 2016)
#BlackSabbath #TonyIommi #GuitarHistory #HeavyMetal #Paranoid #ClassicRock
June 1970, Black Sabbath were a few days into recording their second album at Regent Sound Studios. Their debut album had dropped four months earlier and climbed to No. 8 in the UK. Now they were rushing to finish the follow-up before their first American tour.
The album was nearly done. "War Pigs," "Iron Man," "Hand of Doom" - heavy, sprawling tracks, most of them five minutes or longer. The band had honed this material during grueling residencies where they played four 45-minute sets a night, stretching jams until songs like "War Pigs" ran close to forty minutes.
Then producer Rodger Bain did the math. The album was three or four minutes short of the length required to officially qualify as an LP.
Tony Iommi needed to write something. Fast.
When the others went out for lunch, Iommi stayed behind and began playing a riff - a simple figure alternating between E and D, punctuated by a sharp chord change. The basic idea took him about four minutes to sketch out.
When they returned, Iommi showed them what he had. Bill played around with some drum patterns, Ozzy hummed a melody, and Geezer sat in the corner with bits of a script from a BBC radio play, scribbling lyrics about depression and alienation on the pages. Within an hour they had a complete song.
Producer Rodger Bain heard it and told them to record it immediately.
The band protested. "You're joking," they said. "We're just messing around. We just made it up."
"Well that's great," Bain replied. "Let's do it!"
Ozzy sight-read Geezer's hastily written words as he sang them. Two takes later, they had a track.
Nobody thought much of it. Iommi called it "a bit of nonsense" - a throwaway to fill a gap. At 2:46, it was barely half the length of everything else on the album. Geezer thought it was "too light" and objected to including it at all. "You can't put that on the album," he argued, "go straight from 'War Pigs' to a three-minute pop song." He thought it sounded too much like Led Zeppelin's "Communication Breakdown."
But Vertigo Records heard the track and made a decision: they were changing the album title from War Pigs to Paranoid. The artwork - a blurred figure in a pink leotard meant to represent a "war pig" - had already been commissioned. Too late to change it now.
The single came out in August. By October, "Paranoid" had hit No. 4 on the UK singles chart. The album went to No. 1.
The band was astonished. Geezer remembers hearing the chart announcement on the radio in the van: "WHAT?!? We all nearly died. We just couldn't believe it!"
Ozzy ran around his house screaming, "I'm on the radio! I'M ON THE RADIO!"
"Paranoid" became Black Sabbath's only Top 10 hit - their only Top 20 hit, period. It landed them on Top of the Pops. It became an inescapable setlist closer for the next five decades, regardless of who was singing. Rolling Stone ranked it 13th on their list of the 100 Greatest Heavy Metal Songs of All Time.
Years later, Iommi reflected on the irony: "Out of all our stuff, that's always the one that people put on compilations, use in TV themes and in films. And it took probably four minutes to write."
Geezer eventually admitted he was wrong to fight it. "Thank God no one listened to me," he said. "'Paranoid' was the biggest thing we ever did."
On July 5, 2025, Black Sabbath played their final show at Villa Park in Birmingham. The last song they performed together was "Paranoid" - the three-minute throwaway that renamed an album, defined a genre, and outlasted everything else they ever wrote.
(Sourced from Iron Man: My Journey Through Heaven and Hell with Black Sabbath by Tony Iommi, 2012; I Am Ozzy by Ozzy Osbourne with Chris Ayres, 2009; Into the Void: Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath by Geezer Butler and Benjamin Welton, 2023; Rat Salad: Black Sabbath, The Classic Years 1969-1975 by Paul Wilkinson, 2007; Black Sabbath: Symptom of the Universe by Mick Wall, 2013; and The Complete History of Black Sabbath: What Evil Lurks by Joel McIver, 2016)
#BlackSabbath #TonyIommi #GuitarHistory #HeavyMetal #Paranoid #ClassicRock
Was watching The Waltons and checking on the cast members biographies. Found this tidbit about Ronnie Claire Edwards, who played Corabeth Godsey that shows you it’s a small world after all.
Ronnie Claire Edwards restored a 1911 Catholic church on Swiss Avenue in Dallas, Texas and made it her home after selling her mansion in Los Angeles to Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea in 2008.
Ronnie Claire Edwards restored a 1911 Catholic church on Swiss Avenue in Dallas, Texas and made it her home after selling her mansion in Los Angeles to Red Hot Chili Peppers bassist Flea in 2008.
When The Pretenders got their first record contract, Nick Lowe was given the task of producer. He recorded one track, a cover of The Kinks' Stop Your Sobbing, and declaired them a " Going nowhere band." and quit the job.....In came famed producer Chris Thomas, having worked with scores of acts from The Beatles,Pink Floyd, etc, to make one of the biggest and most iconic albums of the '80s.
A further connection to that song…Ray Davies was the father of Chrissie’s first daughter, Natalie.
I recently learned this and it certainly falls under the category of unusual rock trivia..... The cover art for Pink Floyds Animals was an inflatable pig tied between two smokestacks at the Battersea Power Station in London.... The inflatable pig broke free from its mooring causing fights at Heathrow to be delayed!
The line, "I woke up this morning and got myself a beer" from "Roadhouse Blues" by the Doors is based on a conversation Jim Morrison had with Alice Cooper.
The definition of being old:
When someone speaks of discovering some ancient trivia that you remember like it was yesterday!! lol
When a year 2000 car can get antique plates,
IMMusicRulz
Commercial User
John Ritter was an avid, lifelong fan of The Beatles. His fandom famously crossed over into his personal life and acting career, even extending to a special on-screen collaboration with Ringo Starr in 1978.
Ritter guest-starred in Ringo, an NBC musical comedy television special that aired in April 1978. Ritter played a quirky manager/producer for Ringo Starr's character in the made-for-TV movie.
The special also featured fellow Beatles bandmate George Harrison as the narrator, along with other big-name stars like Carrie Fisher.
Ritter’s appreciation for the band was deeply personal, which he incorporated into both his acting work and his final resting place. On Ritter’s hit sitcom Three's Company, he specifically requested that a Beatles poster be hung in his character Jack Tripper's bedroom. His love for the band was cemented with a tribute on his headstone, which features the famous lyric from The Beatles' song "The End": "And in the end, the love you take is equal to the love you make".
Ritter is interred at the Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Los Angeles, California.
IMMusicRulz
Commercial User
Chicago trombonist James Pankow is the older brother of actor John Pankow, best known as Cousin Ira on "Mad About You."
Needless to say, John Pankow (pictured above) is a pretty handsome guy in his own right! And pretty talented too.
Needless to say, John Pankow (pictured above) is a pretty handsome guy in his own right! And pretty talented too.
This is rock adjacent trivia.
Famed nature documentarian David Attenborough, who recently turned 100, was Controller (network head) of BBC2 in the 1960s. One of the shows he greenlighted was Monty Python's Flying Circus.
He is also the reason tennis balls are yellow. They used to be white, but he said white tennis balls could not be seen on (the then new) color television.
Famed nature documentarian David Attenborough, who recently turned 100, was Controller (network head) of BBC2 in the 1960s. One of the shows he greenlighted was Monty Python's Flying Circus.
He is also the reason tennis balls are yellow. They used to be white, but he said white tennis balls could not be seen on (the then new) color television.
Kinda like the "TV Yellow" Guitar finish legend!!!
When the TV show Friends was being put together, producers wanted to have R.E.M.'s Shiny Happy People as the theme song...On approaching RE.M. they were told that the band actually hates the song and didn't want to give it any more attention. Turning down millions of dollars a year in rerun royalties for the rest of their lives.
They had stopped playing the song live and even left it off a greatest hits album....It was created as a joke song but it blew up beyond any expectations.
They had stopped playing the song live and even left it off a greatest hits album....It was created as a joke song but it blew up beyond any expectations.
That's assuming that the show would've been equally successful with that theme song. Cool story though.
