![\"Who](\"https:\/\/faroutmagazine.co.uk\/static\/uploads\/1\/2025\/06\/Who-is-on-the-cover-of-Black-Sabbath-album-\u2018Paranoid-Far-Out-Magazine-1140x855.jpg\")
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(Credits: Far Out \/ Album Cover)<\/p>\n
Wed 11 June 2025 2:00, UK <\/p>\n
It\u2019s a source of fierce debate among Black Sabbath<\/a> fans as to which one is the Birmingham heavy metal pioneers\u2019 defining album. Anything post-Ozzy Osbourne can safely be pushed aside, and the preceding three LPs from 1975\u2019s Sabotage start to see their magic ebb, although still containing fantastic cuts such as \u2018The Thrill of It All\u2019 and \u2018You Won\u2019t Change Me\u2019. From 1970\u2019s eponymous debut, however, Black Sabbath boast an astonishing five-album run of occultist doom blues that stands as metal\u2019s essential foundational oeuvre.<\/p>\n While fights may break out over their best, there\u2019s little dispute as to Black Sabbath\u2019s perfect introduction. Released only a few months after their debut, 1970\u2019s Paranoid saw the band tighter, meaner, lyrically more evocative, and the riffs dialled up to immortal heft.<\/p>\n Featuring live staples \u2018War Pigs\u2019, \u2018Iron Man\u2019 and its proto-punk stomper of a title track, Paranoid pulled the self-titled Black Sabbath away from its woodland coven shadows towards an unnerving anchorage in grim reality, flashing a grubby riposte against the hippy hangover yet to realise peace and love was over, and channelling Vietnam\u2019s napalm storm clouds.<\/p>\n Such heady thematic dwellings informed the original idea to name their second LP War Pigs after the album\u2019s opener. Due to potential controversy with American troops still in Vietnam and the \u2018Paranoid\u2019 single doing well on both sides of the Atlantic, Warner Records rejected the title and pushed for their sophomore to be named after the current hit.<\/p>\n The art department hadn\u2019t got the memo, however. Still operating under the War Pigs brief, Keith McMillan, responsible for Black Sabbath\u2019s first four album covers and later promo video director for Kate Bush<\/a> and Mot\u00f6rhead, travelled to Buckinghamshire\u2019s Black Park in Wexham. He dressed his assistant, Roger Brown, in pink and yellow garb, wielding a sword and shield, and sporting a motorcycle helmet. Shots were also made with Brown donning a pig mask, but deemed a little too on the nose with no surviving archive of the scrapped swine snaps.<\/p>\n Supposedly approximating what a \u201cwar pig\u201d may look like, McMillan somewhat obscures the absurd costume with long photography exposures and glowing effects. Shot at night, ultraviolet lights and flashes that warped the test shoots were enough for the label, grabbing it quickly in a panicked need for any artwork, pronto.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n