The flamboyant ambassador of Metal’s substratum is dead.  I am diverted from my next indicated thing to do.  I am compelled to pause and digress and re-listen to one of my all-time favorite bands, Type O Negative.  I fall into memorable moments, to enhance my first discoveries of Peter Steele.

I don’t want to believe he’s died.  I’ve felt in shock since the early morning sad news of today arrived.  Peter Steele – a brilliant musician, songwriter, singer has died.  His death is a tragedy and heartbreaking.  His passing is an enormous loss to the Metal community and to music period.

In music, he challenged life itself in a poetic, prophetic, charismatic and extraordinarily insightful way.  A world observer, a teller of tales, a renaissance man, a man from the future, a powerful force in today’s maladies and life challenges.

This man will not be forgotten.  I raise my goblet of water and praise him.  I thank him, and I burn candles and desire incense aromas to fill our house, now illuminated in his honour.  Candles burning outside flicker, and the sea crashes onto the shore.  We are still.  We are in memory.

Peter, you will be celebrated forever.

–Bill Ward

H! Everyone.
Our radio show airs on Saturday, April 17th.  We pay homage to Rob Zombie this month in our “Great Metal and Rock Bands” segment.  We’re playing seven incredible Zombie tracks.  Also, we’ll be playing new stuff and the very best of metal music.  Check us out.

Stay strong, stay safe.

–Bill Ward

If you’ve ever wanted to get a glimpse of what goes on when Bill does his monthly Rock 50 show, today’s your day! We have for you a clip filmed during a recent episode showing Bill doing his thing. You can view it below.

If you’ve never checked out Bill’s Rock 50 show, you should check it out! The schedule of upcoming episodes is available at our Rock 50 page here.

Thanks to Matt Hughes for the clip.

Dear Friends,

The radio show airs on Saturday, March 27th this month. Bands you can expect to hear will be Dew Scented, Cradle of Filth, Dimmu Borgir, Old Man’s Child and newly released bands. In our series titled “Great Rock and Metal Bands and Artists,” this month’s featured band will be Traffic. Primarily a Midlands-based band in England, UK, Traffic represented a completely original and outspoken musical message to listeners throughout the world. Dynamic and everlasting, Traffic have come before us, played, and have attached their influence to rock’s finest moments.

Check us out. I think it’ll be a very good show.

–Bill Ward

London Times – Black Sabbath 40^th Anniversary Article Disclaimer

I’ve just finishing reading the London Times article for Sabbath’s 40^th Anniversary of the album Black Sabbath, dated Saturday, February 13, 2010.  The interview I did for this piece was with journalist Will Pavia, and at the time, I felt it was a good interview.  My interview with Will was then added to the broader article written by journalist, Chris Ayers.

The headline of the article reads (partially) “their seminal album began as a gimmick, and they would rather be remembered as a hard rock band.”

Besides this unflattering headline, I’m particularly pissed off about the following, and I quote: “…Bill Ward ….told the Times.  Although it started as a gimmick, he said, ‘it matured into something that was almost waiting to arrive.’”

The way these sentences are constructed gives the impression that I called Sabbath a “gimmick,” or that I agree with the statement “it started out as a gimmick.”

I want to make it very clear to my fellow band members, musicians and our beloved Sabbath listeners worldwide, the word “gimmick” NEVER came out of my mouth.  I don’t own it – I’m not the source of the word “gimmick.”  There isn’t anything ‘gimmicky” about Sabbath as far as I’m concerned.

I consider the article roughshod at best.  It’s sad that on our 40^th Anniversary a more supportive and heralding composition could not have been written.  There IS a nice picture of the band and a nice picture of Oz with Sharon and Kelly.

I thought the light-hearted, or sarcastic look (depends on your point of view) at how to headbang, titled “Headbanging for Beginners,” was more slagging than anything else.  I’d like to remind whoever put that segment together that headbanging was a true phenomenon that began during the 60s and was a fulfilling form of expression and reaction to the music playing.  “Unison” headbanging mushroomed in 1969 and has remained intact up until today.  For me, it is a personal communion with every single fan. It’s positive energy; it’s healthy; it’s true love, even if, as the writer quirked in “Position 4,” I quote, “Keep body bent over after song to adjust balance and avoid collapse.  Experience sore neck and two-day headache.”

Even if the writer’s being “ha ha” about the segment, he or she is ever so slightly making a derogatory statement, in my opinion, about what most in Metal consider “sacred ground” and/or “sacred personal identity.”

Come on London Times.  Sabbath is homegrown British – one of Britain’s great bands, loved all over the world.  Perhaps if you can’t meet the occasion with a more positive headline, at least get this right:  Tommy Iommi (sidebar insert) is not Sabbath’s guitar player.  However, TONY Iommi is… 40 years, guys, and counting.

Respectfully,
Bill Ward

H! Everyone.

The hardcore radio show is this Saturday, February 27th. We’re featuring Judas Priest in our new format “Great Rock and Metal Bands and Artists.” Last month, we featured Cream and some of their greatest work. I thought the new segment worked rather well, and I think it’s important to feature bands that have helped to influence and shape the sounds we listen to today.

Also this Saturday, we’ll be playing more Mnemic and Scar Symmetry. I hope to get some Behemoth, Celtic Frost, Exodus and brand new Zombie lined up also.

OK, so for all you Metal music lovers out there, I think it’ll be a very good show, but you’ll have to take a listen to find out if you agree with me or not.

Stay strong and rock forever,
Bill Ward

Bill recently did a couple of interviews with a few magazines, and we want to make sure you see them, as there’s some cool stuff to read.

First up is an interview with ‘Sup Magazine.  This one is titled “Invasion Meets Sabbath“, and covers a wide range of topics from the much trodden ground of Sabbath’s beginning to the kind of tunes that Bill listens to and is into today.  It was originally conducted in the Summer of 2009.  Here’s a bit from that interview:

I’d agree that Metallica definitely picked up your baton in 1983 and they and Black Sabbath are easily the best metal bands ever for me. It feels to me there are lots of good new bands who understand what you were about back in the ‘70s, and I think that the next decade is going to be really exciting for metal. I guess Geezer wrote a lot of your lyrics, but you had this power and intensity. Where did you pick that up from?

Bill: Part of it came from our predecessors. There were great bands in the ‘60s. A lot of bands were referencing flower power and peace. I want to make it clear that I’m not being negative about that whole movement, but we were from Aston and there wasn’t much of a hippie era going on there. At least 50 percent of our day was spent looking at the guy across the street to see if he was going to run over and kick you in the head. That was our reality.

There still is a sense of counter culture in there though “Sweet Leaf” and “Children Of The Grave” and other antiwar songs.

Bill: Well, we were pissed off, you know? “Sweet Leaf” is a very aggressive song when we do it live. “Sweet Leaf” and “Iron Man” were the rallying points for all the young men coming back from Vietnam. And when I think about it– to be quite honest with you, Marek–I start to cry because life is precious and I can still see the audiences when we played those songs. All the vets were up the front, so all we could see were the vets. When those songs came on, they were trying to get out of their wheelchairs. They came to hear those songs. We’d give them our all. They were men that didn’t want to go to war. They were pushed into it and nobody thanked them when they came back.

The second of the interviews is a new interview from February of 2010 with the “Stay Thirsty Media” site.   This interview, entitled “Never Say Die!” has some tidbits which will be of particular interest to fans.  Here’s some tidbits to whet your appetite.

THIRSTY: What are you currently involved in musically? Does the Bill Ward Band still participate in the modern music scene?

BW: Oh yea! This year I’ve worked nonstop. I’m in the process of finishing up three albums, which are ALL my albums. When I write songs, I usually write everything (tracks), so I compose in guitar, bass, keyboards, melody arrangements, the vocals…just everything really. So I’m really active inside my own music…

THIRSTY: And how about playing live? Has the Bill Ward Band, or any other projects you may be affiliated scheduled an upcoming tour?

BW: I haven’t played live at all in a long time. The last time I played live was with ‘The Sabs’ (Black Sabbath) which was about four years ago. I’ve been really active in the studio, writing and spending time with a lot of musicians.

THIRSTY: On these upcoming albums, are you the sole musician or do you have a group accompanying you on the tracks?

BW: When I say I write, I write the parts and so forth, but I have other players that play the music. On the newest work, that’s coming out in the spring, Keith Lynch (Bill Ward Band veteran) is playing guitar. Paul Ill is playing some bass and then I have a couple of other guys that will play bass as well. Paul’s also from early years of the Bill Ward Band. And then I have my own drummer, Ronnie Ciago who’s playing on several tracks. I’m playing drums on several tracks too, so it’s pretty much a band album if you’d like. There are some guests coming onto the following two albums after the spring one, but it’s all under wraps right now [laughs]. They’re rock and rollers man…so they agreed to do it but now let’s get them all together in a room and nail it!

The Thirsty interview also talks about other things too, like Bill’s relationship with Ronnie James Dio, the early days with Tony Iommi in 1966, Jimi Hendrix, Michael Jackson, online music piracy, and of course Black Sabbath.   You won’t want to miss this one for sure!

Once there is some more concrete information about these albums (plural!) from Bill, we’ll be sure to pass it on.

H! Everyone.

Happy 2010.

Our first radio show of the year will have a new format included.  Instead of  the “show within a show,” which played classic/hardcore metal, we¹ll be playing a featured artist or band.  This new segment takes place after the noon break, as did the “show within a show.”  We’ll be playing artists from the 60¹s through to today.  Please let us know if you like the new segment.  Featured band this month is Cream.  Also appearing on the show:  Arch Enemy, Skeletonwitch, Type O Negative and Slipknot.

The show airs 11:00AM Pacific Time, Saturday, January 30th. I hope you can join us.

–Bill Ward

As you may or may not know both Geezer Butler & Bill Ward are vegans. Geezer has done spots for PETA, and while Bill doesn’t do that kind of thing too much, I did just run across a cool article about Bill’s diet called “Bill Ward – The Heavy Metal Vegan Pt 1“. It talks about his food choices, what he makes, and what it’s like being a vegan where he lives. There’s also a recipe available for “Bill Ward’s Enchilada Pie“. It actually looks good, I might have to try making it myself. This is part of a larger site (which is newly launched) called “The Rock & Roll Cook“.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Photo is (c) 2009 Christopher Wagner.

H! Everybody.

In my last news post, about the November radio show, I’d said the Christmas show was canceled. That’s changed! We’re airing the Christmas show on Saturday, December 12th.

Our Christmas show rarely plays traditional Christmas songs, and “Frosty The Snowman” and Rudolph,” lovable as they may be, will no doubt be appearing continuously on other radio stations. Wishing not to sound “ba-humbug,” we will be playing the best of the songs that have appeared throughout the year on our show, and that will include “The Last Baron” by Mastodon, and the jewel of Christmas shows past collection Type O Negative’s “Red Water/Christmas Mourning.”

I’ll be playing some of the greatest bands and artists in the world, who in their writing and performance, and sheer brilliance period, have brought hope to millions of people all over.

For those in hard times, I hope our two-hour show will play a part in helping you to sustain and feel more empowered. Music is the most powerful language on earth.

Peace and spiritual progress to us all,
Bill Ward