Snowblind Covers
My eyes are blind, but I can see Link to heading
On September 25, 1972, Black Sabbath released their fourth album: the somewhat aptly titled “Vol. 4”. There hadn’t been a volume 1, 2 or 3 prior, and the new name was a last-minute change by the record company - the original working title for the album - also the name for the sixth track - reflected its creation amidst copious piles of cocaine: “Snowblind”.
Much has already been written of the song and album themselves in the fifty-two years since they were released, and I have no interest into wading into the “which Sabbath album is best” discourse. (If you’re interested in reading more about the album creation itself, this is a good article). Today I just want to focus on ranking the performances of artists who have covered this particular track in the time since, for no other reason than there are more than enough to make a decent list out of. (In fact, some of these have already been covered in this Rolling Stone article)
If you’ve never listened to the original, you should probably remedy that before diving into the list here - here’s the 2021 remastered version:
Studio Recordings Link to heading
I decided early on to split out recorded versions from live one-offs and rank them separately.
X. Jazz Sabbath Link to heading
Jazz Sabbath is, as one might surmise, an instrumental-jazz-Sabbath-cover-trio. They are the real deal, though - at the helm is Adam Wakeman, the touring keyboard and guitar player for Sabbath and Ozzy on a few tours. I ranked this last because - although I like jazz and I think this is well played - this didn’t do anything for me. Something is lost in translation here. If you heard this playing in a restaurant, would you recognize it as Snowblind?
X-1. Jason Molina Link to heading
I’m not too familiar with the work of Jason Molina as a whole, other than his connection to my home state of Indiana: he was one of the earliest artists on the great Bloomington-based record label Secretly Canadian. Sometime in the late ’90s he recorded two Sabbath covers: “Solitude” off Master of Reality and this one. It’s technically a cover, though it’s fairly abridged - the whole track is just over a minute long, and just includes the chorus. There is plenty of emotion in it, so maybe that was enough to get the point across.
X-2. Evoken Link to heading
Released on Dwell Record’s second Sabbath tribute album, “Hell Rules 2”, funeral-doom mainstays Evoken stay surprisingly close to the source material here. They slow things down a bit, the vocals very between death-growls and spoken-word choruses, but otherwise it’s fairly recognizable?
X-2. System of a Down Link to heading
My initial reaction to this was that it’s too far removed from the original to do it justice, while not being far enough in the SOAD vein to be a great System song either. It’s grown on me after more listens - ultimately it has most of core elements of a traditional System song, and the recognizable abrupt change from wacky and frenetic vocals (though not from Daron) to some soulful Serj moments.
This was included on the second “Nativity in Black” tribute album*, which came out in 2000 - after System’s self-titled release but before their breakout “Toxicity”. This was around the time that Serj recorded the song “Patterns” with Tony Iommi for his solo album - I’m pretty sure the story of why they did this cover is mentioned in his new memoir, but I can’t quite remember it. If anyone has that book and can send me an excerpt, I’d appreciate it - I already returned my library copy!
*The song was also included on “The Osbourne Family Album”, which included dialogue from the show interspersed with songs like Eric Clapton’s “Wonderful Tonight”. The early oughts were a strange time.
X-2. Brownout Link to heading
The Austin, TX based Latin-Funk band Brownout has released two Black Sabbath cover albums (Brownout presents Brown Sabbath I & II) as well as a cover of Public Enemy songs (Feature of a Brown Planet).
Out of any band taking the song out of its typical stoner rock genre, for me this one can’t be beat.
Note: there is a studio recording of this to merit being in this list, but this performance is the one to watch.
X-2. Sleep Link to heading
Originally recorded during their work on “Sleep’s Holy Mountain” (but not included on the album itself until the 2009 reissue), this cover was released by their label Earache Records on the tribute album “Masters of Misery” in 1995. I don’t know if anyone can confirm this, but the legend here is that Tony Iommi heard this version and praised Sleep as the inheritors of the Sabbath crown - leading to Earache promoting the band more, Sleep departing to a larger label and recording Jerusalem / Dopesmoker.
X-3. Black Label Society Link to heading
Before Zakk Wylde* started the heavy metal band Black Label Society, he played lead guitar with Ozzy Osbourne’s band throughout the 90s - not exactly a lightweight. This version really makes it his own, though - compared to the original, this one is positively syrupy. For a song about uppers, this is a shot of morphine - slow, down-tuned, fuzzy.
*Stay tuned
X-4. Green Lung Link to heading
A lot of these covers have been pulled from record company tribute albums, and I don’t know how many are worth your time - other than this one. Magnetic Eye’s Vol. 4 Redux has some of the best bands in the scene - Spirit Adrift, Haunt, Thou - covering the album in full.
There’s are two distinct styles for covers: “bands trying to put their own spin on the material” and “bands trying to faithfully execute to the original high bar”. For the latter category, I don’t know of any band nailing it like Green Lung.
Live Versions Link to heading
Here we get to the one-offs and concert only recordings.
3. “GMO Blind” – Mac Sabbath Link to heading
I’m including this here because 1) I think it still counts for the purposes of this list and 2) it’s fun. If you aren’t familiar, Mac Sabbath is a fast-food-themed Black Sabbath cover band. They sing parody versions of Sabbath songs while wearing fast food costumes. (Is a parody song technically a cover? Legally, no)
They tour a lot and don’t have any recordings, because presumably the draw here is just seeing the live show. It does look fun.
2. John Frusciante Link to heading
John Frusciante - better known as the guitarist for Red Hot Chili Peppers - performed this cover during a show in San Fransisco in 2001. There only appears to be this recording of it in existence, which is fortunate - it’s a great acoustic cover.
1. Converge Link to heading
This track was recorded live during a show on Converge’s 1999 European Conquest tour and released on the Y2K 7" alongside covers of Vio-Lence and The Cure. Your opinion on this version probably tracks closely with your enjoyment of Converge - if you like those vocals, you’ll appreciate them here. If you’re looking for clean vocals closer to the original material, you’ll want to look elsewhere.
1. Smashing Pumpkins feat Amalie Bruun Link to heading
Amalie Bruun is the Danish artist behind the black metal project Myrkur. Smashing Pumpkins is… Smashing Pumpkins. Based on those two facts, I did not expect this cover from the 2019 Download Festival to be as good as it is.
Well, that’s all I could find. If you happen upon other versions of this, contact me via some social media platform and I’ll add it to the list. If anyone has other Sabbath songs with extensive covers, please review them yourself!