With so many blanks to fill on the Known Audios list, I've realized that I need to start writing some reviews for these shows with no comments. But with 714 known audios and 210 known videos (to date), I would have to write a review every day for 3 years to complete this list! And with everything else I have to do for this site, it's just not going to happen that quickly. But after a recent visit to a local bookstore, I came up with an idea…

One of the largest tape trading communities out there are the Deadheads, thanks to liberal taping policies of the Grateful Dead. I've always had tons of respect for the dedication and generosity of the Deadhead tapers, who have been so diligent in their research and preservation of The Dead's live history. If you want just one example, have a look at the encyclopedic Deadbase books and you'll find reviews, set lists and stories for just about every show that the Grateful Dead performed. There are even sections of the book dedicated to the various taping methods that the Dead tapers employed through the years! This body of work is so humongous that it has required several books to cover it all!

While perusing one of these mammoth Deadbase volumes, I noticed how many different individuals had contributed to their tape reviews. I couldn't help but think how awesome it would be to write a similar book for Black Sabbath! And while I've been slowly going through their live tapes one-by-one, I can't see doing this all by myself. I think it would be more interesting to get multiple perspectives, rather than just one singular viewpoint on each known live recording. Besides, it would be so difficult for one person to write consistently unique and interesting comments for EVERY show. It's kind of like doing the play by play for a ball game, where you have to constantly come up with different ways of saying the same stuff. This is why I'd rather see more people take part in these reviews, especially the guys who already know these shows inside out!

Whenever possible, I'd especially like to get comments from the tapers themselves on the recordings they made. I think this would help us get a much better understanding of why a show sounds the way it does. Also, the taper will often remember some of the visual aspects of the show that are impossible to glean from just an audio recording. Best of all, aspiring tapers can gain some insights from the people who have 'been there and done that'!

So – I'm putting out the call to you Sabbath collectors and enthusiasts to submit your own reviews for inclusion on the Known Audios and Videos lists. If this idea proves to be a success, there's a good chance that I might get this published in book form in the very near future.

But before you start sending me your reviews, please have a look over the following guidelines and suggestions. There are certain facts that I need to know about the shows you are reviewing, so please use the form topics below as a template for your review

Also, I'd much prefer reviews of audios or videos which do not already contain comments on the Known Audios and Known Videos lists. The main idea here is to fill in the blanks so each show is represented. I will accept 2nd opinions or additional comments on shows which already do contain comments IF you have new insights or comments that haven't been brought up already. I may allow multiple reviews of the same show in the near future, but for now, let's cover the neglected ones!

Review Format and Guidelines

Each review should contain the following information.

Date of show:

Venue / City / State (if applicable) / Country:

Set List:

Original Source: How was the tape originally recorded? Is it an audience sourced recording, soundboard, FM broadcast, or something else?

Lineage or bootleg title of source (if known): In other words, what path did your recording take before it reached your hands? An example of a lineage path would be something like – “Analog Audience (Sony Walkman Cassette) > 2 nd generation cassette > CD-R”. Some people get even more complicated with their lineage descriptions, tossing in even the editing software they use. This information is helpful, but unnecessary unless a lot of re-processing has been done. It's important to know WHERE your tape came from so we know what grade of recording you're appraising.

Bootleg source: If this recording came directly from a pressed silver CD bootleg, which one was it? Any information regarding label and serial # are helpful, but optional.

Running Time: If your source is from CD, give us the exact running time. If it's from cassette, just approximate it to the nearest 5 minutes increment. [Note: While running times are helpful in determining the completeness of our source tapes, these can vary due to tape speed.]

Complete show: Is this the complete show or were there cuts? If there were cuts, where are they? Exact times at which the cuts occurred are helpful, but quite optional!

Quality: Please choose between the following grades – Excellent, Very Good, Good, Fair or Poor. Do not use numerical grades! I realize that quality grades are often quite subjective, but I will detail my own rules of thumb for appraising tape quality below. In short, you should be assessing the overall fidelity, clarity and listening experience of a given recording. These should be rates as follows.

• Excellent: A perfectly enjoyable recording with optimal clarity and fidelity. While very small and unavoidable recording glitches may occur, these should only be brief ones. Most excellent recordings are from digital clones of soundboards or FM broadcasts, such as the Pre-FM versions of Asbury Park '75 and Worcester '83. Earlier audience recordings can rarely attain this level of quality, due to the limitations of the recording equipments available back in the 70's. Two notable exceptions would be Fresno '78 and Lund '77 which most agree to be at least “nearly excellent”. But thanks to portable digital units such as DAT and Minidisc, there have been many excellent audience recordings made of the past 10 years (Atlanta '99 and Toronto 2001 are two examples). Yet with digital recorders, tapers must choose good microphones and recording locations to make a truly excellent recording.
• Very Good: A slightly flawed, but still very nice recording. Most Sabbath bootlegs seem to fall within this range, since this is usually the best you'll get from using a consumer level portable recording decks. All it takes is one too many cuts, a slightly high recording level or a less than optimal recording position to get penalized to a VG rating. Some of the better early audience recording (such as Wichita '71, Tucson '72 or San Francisco ‘70) fall somewhere in here. Cassette recordings of FM broadcasts can often get bumped down to VG due to tape hiss or speed. Regardless of its shortcomings, a VG tape should have a high degree of clarity, meaning you should be able to discern each instrument fairly well.
• Good: Recordings at this quality level have slightly more annoying problems, such as a bit more tape hiss, cuts or is are lacking in frequency response. On the other hand, they are still clear enough that you can get a decent idea of how the band sounded that night. This is what I'd consider to be an “average” sounding bootleg, with many of the problems you'd expect. Koln '70 and Chicago '75 would be my examples of a “good” quality tape.
• Fair: Okay, now we've descended into the ‘bottom shelf' tapes, which only the completists should even bother with. Fair quality tapes are full of problems, but somehow have just enough clarity to allow you to understand what song is being performed. Recordings with a lot of tape hiss, wow and flutter, speed problems or were recorded from the pants pocket of some lazy taper deserve this rating. Both Chicago '71 and Dallas '71 come to mind when I think of ‘fair' tapes. Barely worth having!
• Poor: Only the bravest (or masochistic) audio enthusiasts would even bother to search out a tape that is nearly unlistenable, especially if there are better sources! I have several Sabbath shows in my collection that have earned such dishonor. These would include Sudbury '83 [recorded with a microcassette recorder; very narrow frequency response], Ypsilanti '74 and Rochester '71. Terrible!

You will more than likely encounter some shows that don't fit neatly into one of the above categories. In those cases, it is acceptable to approximate the quality range, such as by saying "fair to good" or "nearly excellent".

Summary (optional): A short synopsis of how you felt about the show. If you only had two or three sentences to describe this show, what would you say?

Your Review: Your main objective in reviewing a Sabbath ROIO should be to help other collectors decide whether this show is worth obtaining. It's not enough to say “this show sucked” or “the quality is really bad”. Even if these things are true, WHY is that so? If the tape has problems, try to describe these as well as you can. If the tape is muddy, describe what you CAN hear well and which frequencies (treble, midrange or bass) are affected.

Performance wise, If Sabbath was having an off night, you could give examples of where they goofed up. No, we're not keeping score here on who f*cked up the most; we're simply reporting the facts for reference. But if you're TOO brutal to the Sabs in your performance critique, you may not want to tell them your name to them if you finally do meet in person!

Be objective! Put aside any biases you may have about which lineup or songs you prefer and simply judge their performance for what it was. You can pretend you're producing a live album and need to figure out which songs are worthy of the record. Many performances may not live up to that sort of scrutiny, but this viewpoint may help you assess how well the band actually played. Also, take notice of the crowd response - and I'm not talking about the loudmouths who just wanted to gain immortality by shouting into the taper's microphone, "Wow man, what was in that dope?" Well, it could make for an amusing side note...

What songs or moments were the highlights? Take note of the moments that made some sort of impression upon you. It could have been Tony's guitar solo in “Lonely Is The Word” or the way that Ozzy really belted out “Dirty Women”, during an otherwise erratic performance.

However you may have felt about the show, where did the exceptions lie? If the show was mostly great, point out the weak moments. If the show mostly sucked, point out the good ones. It's the stuff that stands out that we want to hear about.

Most importantly, what made this show special or unique? This is one of the more important questions to answer, since this is often the deciding factor in whether to trade for a show. Maybe it was that one show where they performed “After Forever” or where Glenn Hughes completely forgot the words to “War Pigs”. Uniqueness is refreshing when you have so many tapes with the same set lists. We want to find those ‘one-of-a-kind' shows to make those same old songs just a tad fresher sounding.

What do I do when I'm finished?

Send it to rob@sabbathlive.com if you'd like to see your review included amongst the other audio/video reviews on this site. Since I do need to take the time to proofread your work, it may not get posted immediately. But if I do think your review is well written, helpful and fits the above criteria, it WILL be posted and possibly even get included in the eventual book. And of course, all writers will be fully credited for their submissions.

If you do send in a review, keep in mind that you are also giving SABBATHLIVE complete permission to reprint your review on the site and in the planned book. Also, SABBATHLIVE will retain exclusive rights to the usage of your text and cannot be reprinted elsewhere without obtaining permission from editor and webmaster, Robert Dwyer. If you would like to share your review on another site or publication, please obtain SABBATHLIVE's permission first. While it is not my intention to restrict the author's rights, it IS necessary to protect the work that is being for SABBATHLIVE as a whole from other web sites or would be authors who are looking to borrow our texts.