Released May 10th, 2005
The following press releases and articles come courtesy of Gigante Media and Sanctuary Music Group.
'OHMWORK' IS THE THIRD SOLO BAND PROJECT FROM THE LEGENDARY BASS GUITARIST AND LYRICIST
GZR,
the quartet led by legendary Black Sabbath bass guitarist and lyricist Geezer
Butler, will release its new studio album Ohmwork
through Sanctuary Records on May 10, 2005.
Ohmwork is Butler’s first
album in eight years.
The 10 songs on Ohmwork are
"Misfit," "Pardon My Depression," "Prisoner 103,"
"I Believe," "Aural Sects," "Pseudocide,"
"Pull The String," "Alone," "Dogs Of Whore" and
"Don't You Know." "I Believe" is the first single.
Butler is joined by vocalist Clark Brown and guitarist Pedro Howse, his longtime
collaborators, and new drummer Chad Smith. Ohmwork is Butler's third solo band release. His first project under
the GZR banner was 1995's Plastic Planet
while 1997's Black Science was
credited to Geezer. Howse has worked on all three albums. Brown performed on Black
Science.
"I feel that this album is more like our first album, Plastic
Planet. On this album I wanted to strip everything down to the bare
essentials, so every song would have a live band feel, which I think we
achieved.”
The band went hurtling into the studio with a hectic 10-day recording schedule. “There’s a spirit of spontaneity and freshness that can only be achieved when you approach a record in that manner,” recalls Geezer. “It’s the way the first two Sabbath albums were done. Black Sabbath was recorded in two days and Paranoid took a week and that’s what I wanted with my new record – 10 days done ‘n’ dusted.”
A
potent, tangible band dynamic is crucial for Butler. He does not ever want an
album credited to "Geezer Butler" when it is a true band effort.
"It's important to me that we have a band identity, because the album is a
band collaboration. Everyone brings their own specialties to the songs, and we
all know our capabilities, and we all work extremely hard together," Butler
says.
Butler is proud of the fact that GZR's music appeals to both young metal fans as
well as Black Sabbath fans. He attributes this fact about cross-generational
appeal to heavy metal's very essence.
GZR touring plans are being put together for Fall 2005.
“I
prefer stripping songs down to their most raw, basic sounds and blasting them
out!” says Terry ‘Geezer’ Butler. With
over 35 years of experience in the game, the vast majority as the rock solid
bass power underpinning the mighty Black Sabbath sound, then surely this is one
musician who knows a thing or two when it comes to blasting things out!
Ohmwork
(Sanctuary Records) is Butler’s first album with GZR
since 1997’s Black Science.
But unlike other legendary rockers of note, the delay between releases is
not because he’s spent his recent years locked away like a mad professor in
search of the ultimate solo album, no, the real reason for the hiatus was the
small matter of a reunion between the original Black Sabbath members after
twenty years apart. And it is the spirit of Black Sabbath that Geezer cites when
searching to explain the spark that finally sent the members of GZR
– completed by guitarist Pedro Howse, vocalist Clark Brown, and drummer Chad
Smith – hurtling into the studio in October 2004 with a hectic 10-day
recording schedule to hit.
“There’s
a spirit of spontaneity and freshness that can only be achieved when you
approach a record in that manner,” recalls Geezer. “It’s the way the first two Sabbath albums were done.
Black Sabbath was recorded in
two days and Paranoid took a week and
that’s what I wanted with my new record – 10 days done ‘n’ dusted.”
Geezer
maintains that there is a certain intensity of musical vision that can only be
achieved when you’ve stripped out every unnecessary distraction in a search
for the heart of each song. Tracks
such as the vicious album opener “Misfit” or the wry but booming “Pardon
My Depression’ are positively dripping with fear and loathing for the modern
world.
“I
like recording an album while it’s still fresh, that way you can treat it like
an exorcism of ideas and pull the feelings right out of your soul, because
it’s only then that you’re truly capturing something real.”
Key
to this mantra of keeping things real is the notion that GZR only really functions as a band and not as a whimsical solo
project. While GZR is clearly Butler’s baby it’s also one being reared by three
other equally enthusiastic parents (Smith, Howse and Brown).
“It’s
good to come together and blast things out as a band!” laughs the bassist.
“You can come up with as many song ideas as you like, but it’s only
when you play as a real band that you realize what’s any good!”
The
ideas behind the songs on Ohmwork will
be familiar to seasoned Geezer watchers and Sabbath heads alike: bad things in
life.
“When
you look at the world we live in today you have to wonder whether as a race
we’re meant to make it at all,” he says in a grim tone.
Religious zealotry, political manipulation, blind stupidity and a
generally (un)healthy black outlook on life are the totems on offer in GZR
world. Album closer “Dogs of
Whore” is inspired by Bush, Bin Laden and Cheney, and ties perfectly with
another Geezer-penned classic Sabbath’s infamous “War Pigs.”
“I
started out writing about warmongers 35 years ago and here I am today, still
having to do it. Politicians whore
the people of the entire planet for their own ends,” spits the bassist.
But it doesn’t stop there, in GZR’s
world we’re all a little bit responsible for letting it go on in the first
place.
“I
can’t believe that the world public is so naïve that we can’t see through
the lies on all sides. The song
“I Believe” is about having your faith or God hijacked by fanatics for their
own political ends. I mean, what
right has any religion to claim God as their own and then turn it from being
about love to being about hate and destruction?” says the lyricist behind the
Sabbath’s legendary protest anthem “Children of the Grave.” “Also, as a side-note; it was great having my son, Biff,
sing on this track. It’s the
first time we’ve worked together.”
However,
it’s not all global meltdowns and spiritual bigotry that GZR are focused upon. As
razor-minded singer Clark Brown explains in the album’s most stirring song,
the uncomfortable “Alone,” sometimes it’s the people you know best that
piss you off the most. “ “Alone” is about the times I needed something,
either a helping hand, or guidance or even just a kind word and pathetically
enough, the ones I thought I could rely on were nowhere to be found.”
“When
we’re young and unknowing of worldly ways - and the people that reside within
these ways - then we tend to trust what is handed to us and take some very good
advice from the so-called ‘wise’ ones.” continues the intense vocalist.
“Later on we realize that what has been given to us is tainted,
un-pure… rotten, to be exact. Words that were once gold we come to understand are not worth
anything. Not even to the most
desperate of men. So now we’re
older, but not wiser, from that good advice, or stronger from a foundation of
truth. We are ALONE with our own
ideas and ways of life. Alone with
the only one we can trust… yourself.”
Although
the record may have taken only 10 days to record, the genesis for Ohmwork
has been some five years in the making. “Originally
we started work five years ago,” explains Geezer.
“Clark came to England to work on some ideas but musically I was really
into experimenting with keyboard sounds. Eventually
I got bored with it and scrapped that entire direction.
I transferred all the best bits to a sampler and waited ‘til a pissed
off GZR mood took over.
“I’m
perfectly happy doing heavy music – it’s what I do best,” affirms the
bassist. “This was a keyboard
album five years ago, but it had to be scrapped because it isn’t me.
I love being part of a band with energy and aggression in the mix.
I have nothing against very experimental records, but I do think you have
to give it all or nothing – I tried to push things on [1997’s] Black
Science myself, but they do take forever to put together in the studio.”
The
title of Ohmwork came about because
all the songs were written in Geezer’s home studio and it was like
‘homework.’ ” But back home
in Birmingham, when one said the word ‘homework’ the ‘h’ sound was
dropped during the pronunciation and so it sounded like ‘omework’.
And since modern music can’t exist without electricity, (and since the
‘ohm’ is defined as a unit of electrical resistance) the title became Ohmwork.” Be assured,
however, that listening to this album will not be ‘work.’
Now,
enough reading. Get the album in
the deck and (as the man says) – “start blasting!”