Most heavy metal fans know that Black Sabbath was deeply inspired by horror cinema early in their career. Hell, even their name comes from the 1963 Italian horror film Black Sabbath, starring Boris Karloff.
Now, the band’s legendary bassist, Geezer Butler, is pulling back the curtain and name-dropping some of the specific films that influenced them. Spoiler alert: one movie was so terrifying that the musician had to have a “local priest bless [his] house” afterward.
This all came up when I had the chance to ask Butler about his instrument of choice, Fender’s Precision Bass. The company is celebrating the 75th anniversary of the bass guitar this year. Among my questions, I snuck in one about Black Sabbath’s horror inspiration. Back in the early days, they would practice across from a cinema that showed horror films. This led to them writing songs about those movies, which inspired the band’s heavier doom sound.
Black Sabbath’s self-titled debut album was released in 1970
Dishing on the band’s fandom, Butler told me that he and guitarist Tony Iommi “were really into horror films.” He added, “We would go to the local cinema whenever a horror film was released. So, our love of horror obviously had a huge influence on our music and lyrics.”
“We would try to put into sound what we had seen at the cinema,” he continued, then naming a few specific films that inspired their music. “In those days, it was usually Hammer Horror films, like Dracula (1958), The Devil Rides Out, Village Of The Damned (1960), anything with Christopher Lee and/or Peter Cushing in. I was hugely influenced by Dennis Wheatley’s books, also.”
While a handful of horror movies made them who they are today, there was a clear standout. “The one horror film that scared the bejesus out of all of us was The Exorcist; that definitely made us go heavier,” Butler shared. “There are even backward vocals on one of the songs on the Sabbath Bloody Sabbath album, quoting some lines.”
“Of course, The Exorcist is tame compared to movies now,” the legendary bass player went on to say. “Back then, it was to horror what Star Wars was to science fiction movies. It changed the whole genre.”
Finally, Butler admitted that The Exorcist rocked him so deeply to his core that he had to seek spiritual help. “To make things worse, when we got back to the hotel after seeing The Exorcist, the actual priest who did the exorcism that the film was based on was on the Johnny Carson show,” he recalled. “So, knowing it actually happened scared us even more. We all slept with the lights on that night, and when I got home, I had the local priest bless my house!!!”
The post Geezer Butler Name-Drops the Horror Movies That Inspired Black Sabbath, Including One so Terrifying He Had a Priest Bless His House appeared first on VICE.
