Test your knowledge of Black Sabbath's biggest hits, deep cuts and iconic moments.
A few Sabbath riffs are unmistakable from the first bars: the slow crawl of 'Iron Man', the fast charge of 'Paranoid' and the marching riff of 'War Pigs'. Fans call these on the riff alone, before Ozzy sings.
Every big riff has a backstory a quiz can use: a guitarist who lost two fingertips and kept playing, a song built on the 'devil's interval', and a last-minute track that became the biggest hit. Facts fans love.
With Sabbath the riff is the fingerprint. These four chapters move from the riffs everyone knows to the down-tuned deep cuts and the mid-tempo look-alikes, so you find out which Iommi riff you can actually place.
Some Sabbath riffs are unmistakable: the slow climb of 'Iron Man', the fast charge of 'Paranoid', the air-raid siren and march of 'War Pigs'. These are the ones a casual fan lands without thinking, so treat them as the round's opening handshake.
This is where the quiz is really won. Tony Iommi's guitar states the song before Ozzy Osbourne sings a line, so you learn to ID a track from the riff and Geezer Butler's bass locked underneath it. Wait for the vocal and you have usually lost the point already.
Sabbath riffs share a tuning and a mood, which is exactly the trap. 'Children of the Grave', 'Into the Void' and 'Symptom of the Universe' all crawl at a similar heavy, mid-tempo weight, so telling them apart by riff alone is the real dividing line.
The hardest rounds reach past the singles for 'Sweet Leaf', 'Snowblind', 'N.I.B.' and 'Supernaut'. These lean on the even heavier tuning of Master of Reality and Vol 4, and knowing them from a short clip marks you as a serious Sabbath head.
The big riffs are easy, but Sabbath's tracks share Tony Iommi's tuning and doom-laden mood, so the challenge is telling similar riffs apart. Placing 'Children of the Grave' next to 'Into the Void' by the riff alone is the hardest part of the quiz.
Expect the classics 'Paranoid', 'Iron Man', 'War Pigs', 'Children of the Grave' and 'N.I.B.', with heavier deep cuts like 'Sweet Leaf' and 'Snowblind' in the harder rounds.
That is the real test. Iommi's guitar states the song before Ozzy Osbourne sings, so a clip of the opening riff, with Geezer Butler's bass under it, is usually enough for fans to place the track.
They practically invented the heavy-metal riff, and their songs are built to be known by it. Placing 'Iron Man' or 'War Pigs' from the first bars is a satisfying test of a metal fan's ear.
Black Sabbath formed in Birmingham, England, in 1968, with Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward. They released their self-titled debut in 1970 and are widely credited as the founders of heavy metal.
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