When Vinny Appice played his first show with Black Sabbath on Aug. 31, 1980, at Honolulu’s Aloha Stadium, the 22-year-old drummer brought a steady hand and calming presence to the beleaguered metal veterans.
They’d already endured a tumultuous, albeit successful, year to that point. After years of increasingly drug-addled dysfunction and dwindling album sales, Black Sabbath fired frontman Ozzy Osbourne in 1979. They replaced him with Elf and Rainbow alum Ronnie James Dio and released the stone-cold classic Heaven and Hell in April 1980, putting them back in good critical and commercial standing.
But good fortune rarely lasted long for Black Sabbath, and four months after the release of Heaven and Hell, with tour dates still on the books, drummer Bill Ward abruptly quit the band.
Why Did Bill Ward Quit Black Sabbath?
Ward’s drug and alcohol addictions had reached a perilous new peak by 1980, and the drummer was struggling to come terms with an Ozzy-less version of Black Sabbath.
“One of the reasons why I had to leave the band was because I just couldn’t accept a Black Sabbath without Ozzy,” Ward told writer Mick Wall for his book, Black Sabbath: Symptom of the Universe. “That was the beginning of the end for me, of Black Sabbath. It was very difficult to play any original stuff with Ronnie. I have no axe to grind with Ronnie. I had a good relationship with him at that time. However, it was not Black Sabbath to me. I could not accept Oz not being there. So that was really the beginning of my downfall, if you like. I knew then, it was a question of how many more days I could exist in the band.”
READ MORE: Black Sabbath Live Albums Ranked Worst to Best
It all became too much for Ward to bear in late August 1980, when he walked out on Black Sabbath and left them in the lurch for their upcoming Denver show.
“It was the night before we were playing the McNichols Arena, which is an 18,000-seater which had been sold out for weeks,” bassist Geezer Butler told Wall. “And Bill decided that’s when he was gonna leave. He just got in his bus and he was gone. And I was so used to Bill saying things that he didn’t mean, I thought, oh, he’ll be back tomorrow, and he wasn’t.”
Black Sabbath were forced to cancel the Denver gig and scrambled to find a replacement drummer to finish the tour. It didn’t take long for Appice to come to the rescue.
Vinny Appice Saves Black Sabbath’s Skin
By 22, Appice had already proven his mettle by playing with Rick Derringer and his own band, Axis. The younger brother of Vanilla Fudge and Rod Stewart drummer Carmine Appice had just turned down a gig with Ozzy Osbourne’s solo band (“My brother warned me he really was crazy”) and was thus available to fill in with Black Sabbath temporarily.
Or so he thought.
“I went down to meet them and Tony [Iommi] walked in and he had my Axis album, and he said he really liked it,” Appice told Wall. “Then I went down the next day, and that’s when I met Ronnie and Geezer and had my audition. After we played for about an hour, everybody went to the pub and decided I was in the band till Bill came back. But as the tour went on, Bill didn’t return and then it was time to do another album — and Bill never returned. So I thought, this is good. Good for me, not for Bill.”
READ MORE: Revisiting Black Sabbath’s First Tour With Ronnie James Dio
Appice felt a kinship with Dio, a fellow New York Italian. “It was obviously easier to get to know Ronnie since we were both New Yorkers,” he told Vintage Heavy Metal. “We also shared a lot of interests and the same sense of humor. At that point I hadn’t had that much contact with British people, so it took a bit longer to get to know Tony and Geezer. It took a little bit of time to learn their humor and expressions, but I finally did.”
Musically, the chemistry instant and effortless. “It was like a machine,” Appice told Wall. “We played great together. I don’t have any luggage with me and we just focused on the music.”
Vinny Appice Returned to Black Sabbath Several Times Over the Years
After completing the Heaven and Hell tour, Appice took part in Black Sabbath’s next album, 1981’s Mob Rules. When Dio left Sabbath in 1982 to form his own eponymous band, Appice followed suit. Both musicians rejoined Black Sabbath for 1992’s Dehumanizer and 2009’s The Devil You Know, released under the Heaven & Hell moniker.
READ MORE: When Ronnie James Dio Played His Original Last Black Sabbath Show
“Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler, and Ronnie Dio — you’re talking about three absolute legends right there,” Appice told Vintage Heavy Metal. “Even though I played with them on and off since 1980, there was still something very special about looking over and seeing them on stage with me. I feel lucky to have played with them.”
Black Sabbath — Aug. 31, 1980, Honolulu Set List (Vinny Appice’s First Show)
1. “War Pigs”
2. “Neon Knights”
3. “N.I.B.”
4. “Children of the Sea”
5. “Sweet Leaf”
6. Drum solo
7. “Black Sabbath”
8. “Heaven and Hell”
9. “Iron Man”
10. Guitar solo
11. “Orchid”
12. “Die Young”
13. “Paranoid”
Encore
14. “Children of the Grave”
Black Sabbath Albums Ranked
From Ozzy to Dio and beyond, we look at all of the band’s studio LPs.
Gallery Credit: Eduardo Rivadavia
