Dio has stated that while he and Appice were not interested in drugs, Iommi and Butler were using cocaine very heavily at that time. I finally opened this up and found time to check it out and I’m honestly blown away by this 40th anniversary edition double LP.

Iommi now is more on the right side, aggressive and detailed (not sounding like a bootleg distant,muffled and on the center) , keyboards now low on the mix on the left, snare drums now sounds very present and strong (not distant and low as the original), Geezer storming bass on center, and finally Dios' voice clearer than ever, much better than the original. Iommi also admits that the band had to cancel a show at Madison Square Garden when the bombs blew out the tubes in all the amps during the first note of the first song "War Pigs".The first is the vinyl original, then the CD back covers for the 1996 Castle version, the 2008 Rhino/Warner version, and the 2010 Deluxe Edition. Iommi, in his drug-addled state, misunderstood what he was being told and came to the conclusion that Dio was not only mixing the album without him, but was trying to push his own vocals much too prominently in the mix.

Geezer Butler has referred to this album a few times in interviews as “Live in the Studio Evil”, a reference to a lot of the overdubs on it. The US cassette release has, as its first side, sides 1 and almost all of 2 except for "Iron Man" which fades out at end of Side 1. I always clean new albums after opening them and usually replace their factory sleeve with a MOFI one as to not transfer any factory contaminants back onto a newly cleaned LP.

War Pigs" contains a drum solo from Vinny Appice, and "Heaven and Hell" contains a guitar solo from Tony Iommi. citation needed] Iommi also contends that he and bassist Geezer Butler were concerned about Dio already rehearsing with other musicians for a proposed solo album offered to him by Warner Brothers Records. In his 2011 memoir, Iommi was considerably less harsh in his summation of Dio's behaviour, stating "By then Ronnie did come over a little more. After that there was no point due to Dio’s ageing voice (which was still great, but not matching a decade ago) There you have the REAL story. Listen to ‘voodoo’ ‘children of the sea’ and ‘heaven and hell’ ,metal doesn’t get much heavier than that.

I knew it would be better than the other two and put it on the stereo and was really pleased to hear (properly) Sabbath live. I was worried before Hammersmith came out that it would just be another failed attempt to capture the Sabbath live animal in the wild, but it worked. The first was the 1980 release of the unsanctioned Live at Last album, and the second was former lead vocalist Ozzy Osbourne's 1982 release of a live album consisting entirely of Black Sabbath songs. This album was bought for me as a birthday gift by one of my best friends when I was in high school. As usual this “super deluxe” box set is filled with all manners of Dio era Sabbath goodies, poster, book and I believe a tour booklet?

Tension, however, had been building for some time between the band members, with rock journalist Steffan Chirazi observing in 2008 that the story behind the creation of Live Evil is one of "quiet yet savagely visceral turmoil and a band collapsing under their weight of silence, unspoken accusation, and an unforgiving schedule. Ronnie and I would ride in one car, Geezer and Tony in another car, and everybody was breaking away from each other a little bit.