on my first listen. some tasty riffs, they are a bit familiar sounding but it's fine. i need a few more listens to decide how i feel about it, but i leave you with this : it could have been much worse!

First impressions are that it's underwhelming at best. Ozzy sounds summarily bad throughout, Brad Wilk can't swing for shit, and the tasty riff here and there do not a great Sabbath album make. Shit is phoned in.

Brad Wilk is playing what he's told to play. use your head.

doesnt mean he cant swing.

I don't see what his sex life has to do with anything

looking forward to picking this up next week

not a huge fan of the first 3 tracks but I like where it goes from there

Looking forward to getting this next Tuesday

yep! i think Best Buy has an exclusive bonus track, 'Naivete In Black'.

It's ok I guess. I don't understand the reviews that give this 9/10's though.

i've listened to most of it now - its OK, not as bad as i thought it would be. Would have sounded better with Bill Wards patented pounding of the skins. And Ozzy's vocals are mixed too far out in front.
But yeah, 9/10 is a bit high. Good though. But won't even come close to making my year-end list.

One good thing, though --- it's LIGHT years better than the new Megadeth

This just about nails it. Good record, about on-par with my expectations, but not "killer" by any stretch. (Although I do agree that Ozzy is mixed too high, his vox aren't as terrible as I expected.)

Never got much into Ozzy-era Sabbath. Doubt that's going to change with this release.

Dio!

meh, the music itself wasn't half as good in the Dio era

I'm digging it after the first listen. Damaged Soul kicks ass.

Agreed.

I have given this about 3 solid listens now and I've come to the conclusion that it is slightly better then I expected it to be. I have been waiting a long time for a new Ozzy-fronted Sabbath record and for it being this late in Iommi, Geezer and Ozzy's career.. this is about as much as you can ask for. I surely was not expecting Iommi to reinvent the wheel or anything.

Brad Wilk's performance is exactly what is called for on this record, anyone who bitches about his "non-swing" should have another listen of The Devil You Know.. Vinny Appice half-assed that record in Homer Simpson fashion.

To be honest I don't think Bill Ward could have done much better or had any viable creative input to really change the sound of this record, after all he's been working on that solo album since what...2000? But I still would have rather had him there for the sake of it being the original 4.

Iommi is his usual self, still rocking that same tone. Nice to hear some acoustic playing this time around again but how many times is he going to change around that Hole In The Sky riff? I think he did it on 3 separate occasions on this record if I am correct but lets be fair, Iommi has written so many good riffs and if anyone should be allowed to recycle old riffs then it should be him.

Geezer is loud as fuck and I wouldn't have it any other way, truly underrated bass player. He still get's that demonic flow going.

As for Ozzy, this is easily the best record he has been involved with since No Rest For The Wicked. Yes he sounds like crap but.. it fits.. so well, I was expecting much worse to be honest. Ozzy somehow makes it work or rather his engineer did, maybe turn him down one notch or two though.

Now this record is nowhere near perfect, but it will do. It surely blows away Forbidden.. However does it beat Dio's swansong? In some ways, yes but in a lot of ways it won't. Defiantly a grower but certainly not shit in the least.

Colour me satisfied, 7 / 10

yeah Geezer sounds amazing on this

i will be buying it tuesday as well

Popoff's review is up on the main site. I found it hard to read, as if he did not reread himself before posting it.

I hate his reviews.
I'm looking forward to hearing this new Sabbath, the samples i've heard sound pretty damn good

Zeitgeist is pretty much Planet Caravan Part II. Not that it's a bad thing.

I like it, though not as much as I thought I would. BUT the more I listen to it, the more I enjoy it.

Overall I'm glad it exists, if for "Damaged Soul" alone.... That track is a fucking scorcher. It's everything I could ask a Sabbath song to be in 2013.

Also, I don't hate Ozzy's vocals... He's clearly not in his prime, and there's obviously lots of production tricks happening, but I appreciate that he's trying to recapture at least some aspects of his old school distinctly Sabbath (not solo) vocals... I mean lets face it, he hasn't been hitting those SBS powerful high pitch screams in a long time. I can hear the age, and history of drugs in his vocal delivery, in particular on Zeitgeist. You can tell he doesn't have the lung power he used to, as he strains on sections that require more push. To that extent you can tell he plays it safe at times...Yet I don't mind it, at all.

Iommi riffage is just fucking godly.... I'm high as fucking shit right now, in the middle of the last solo in "age of reason", and I got that fucking feeling you get....you know that feeling....it's somewhere between your gut and your balls.

In fact the more I write about the album, the more I'm thinking about it...and as I think about it, I can say I'm relieved. The album is "safe" if anything, but if it's "sabbath safe", I'm so fucking down. I don't really care how others feel about it....I got what I've wanted for fucking aeons.