There are many unsung heroes in Metal music and Geoff Nichols is far from the least of them. When he is recognized, it is usually for his contributions to Metal with the group BLACK SABBATH where he has been the resident keybordist for better than twenty years now.
Nichols tenure within the world of BLACK SABBATH began not as the group's keyboardist but as a writing partner and bassist in what was to be a post-SABBATH group featuring Tony Iommi and Ronnie James Dio. As most know the story this collaboration of talents eventually revitalized the SABBATH moniker with the landmark "HEAVEN AND HELL" album and the rest, as they say, is history.
Nichols has been the most consistent member of SABBATH, save Tony Iommi, and has at various points contributed guitar, vocals, bass and once an entire discs worth of lyrics to the SABBATH cause. For most of this time Nichols has been content to stay hidden away from the spotlight and focus on the music. The man's immeasurable contribution to SABBATH can easily be heard on each disc issued since 1980 and all the tours which followed and still the man can walk through an arena and not be recognized, well except in the following instance. After what was then thought to be the final curtain call for the legendary group's reunited original lineup I caught Nichols wandering the concert grounds and extricated a few thoughts from the man.
DAVID LEE With the exception of Tony you have been the most consistent member of BLACK SABBATH, twenty years for you, is it all ending the way that you would have wanted it to?
GEOFF NICHOLS Yeah, it has come full circle hasn't it with the ultimate lineup, the original lineup and obviously the kids that are coming to the shows approve. For me, I have done it all with SABBATH now, I have played with every singer now anyway.
DL Was that your voice I heard there in addition to Ozzy's?
GN Yeah.
DL This has been advertised as SABBATH's final run as a group but each member has something else cooking as a solo act is it the same with you?
GN Yeah, well we don't know what is going on yet because everybody has their concepts going. Whether Tony will take his solo thing on the road we don't know yet but he probably will and I will do that. It still remains to be seen what will happen with that but myself, I have been writing film scripts and have been dabbling in that. There are four individual scripts actually and one of them has a lot of interest in it so we will see how that goes and I will write the music for them as well if they happen.
DL Could you give me a taste of what one of them is about?
GN Well, I don't want to give too much of it away yet because I still have to go and get them registered and all that but the idea is really in the concept right now. They are very unusual, nobody has really done anything like them and I am trying to keep them a little bit guarded really because there are a lot of people who could take the idea and call it their own. It is the kind of stuff, like stuff from the X- FILES. One is a paranormal one, one is a straight Sci-Fi one, one involves a lot about different groups who are involved with the paranormal but not in the typical way that you see groups portrayed in films. The concepts are all kind of different and if I can pull it off, well, we will see.(laughs)
DL Better left unsaid at this point then?
GN Yeah, exactly. You see that it is the thing, once the idea has been given away, anybody can do it. It is like a song really, if you have got a good hook line in it and you don't record it first and someone else does it then it is hard to prove that it was yours, it is just like that in this business.
DL Something else that is one with this business is ego and you seem to have had yours well in check given your relationship with BLACK SABBATH, having been a member for so many years but spending most of that time either on the side of the stage or hidden from view?
GN My love is for the music and at the end of the day when I get to the door I check my ego because it is the music that is most important. You know, certain people have to have egos to do what they do and some do have more egos than others and maybe they need that just to get up on stage but everybody has their own thing and their own way. I think that I have kind of worked hard to get where I am to get what I have got and I don't need to have all of the spotlight that is on the rest of the band. I will talk to people and they will say, "Don't you get upset not being photographed with the band?" and I have to say "No!" I enjoy and accept what it is they ask me to do and it is great, I mean I live these guys and we all come from Birmingham and I have known them all for thirty years so, I am very happy with it actually.
DL Your first involvement in the world of SABBATH was actually as part of the group QUARTZ where Tony Iommi managed you?
GN Well, he didn't really manage us. What it was is that the tour manager of SABBATH in the early days was our manager and Tony produced the album of the group I was in before I joined SABBATH. That is how it came about really and he (Tony Iommi) liked the way I worked in the studio, I wrote the lyrics quickly and I also played guitar and had a good sense of melody. Actually the guitar was my first instrument so it is kind of like my keyboarding , it leans toward my guitar playing so it kind of worked well with Tony. It was never a competitive kind of thing with Tony and I and with SABBATH being a guitar based group it just worked well.
DL I see that you have fully embraced the computer and use a small amount of equipment which is different from most of your contemporaries?
GN Yeah, I don't use much on the road, I have in the past though. On albums, the "LIVE EVIL" album for instance I used a Hammond on that. I used to use the big Mellotrons in the old days but with modern technology and with a sampler, though I know they are not exactly the same, I think that it is very easy to get that sound. That and a lot of the roadies don't like carrying around all of that big stuff!(laughs) But as I say I did use it a lot on the live album, actually I used the CX2 which is the equivalent of the Hammond B3 but it is more distorted to be more effective with the guitar sound.
DL Yes, you kind of pioneered that sound with maybe only Vincent Crane (ATOMIC ROOSTER) coming into the same neighborhood. They are looking for a keyboardist by the way.(laughs)
GN Yeah, I like Hammonds because they have a distinctive sound but I'd rather use some other things too because there are so many people who have established that kind of sound, DEEP PURPLE, EMERSON, LAKE & PALMER and they have kind of defined the Hammond Organ sound so I have kind of tried to move into sound effects and atmospheric effects which is just as good and helps me be a little bit more me. I am not the greatest keyboard player in the world, I admit that, but I do love to dabble with the sounds. I think that is just as effective for what I do as anything else really.
DL If this version of the band doesn't do another record then I guess "FORBIDDEN" will be the last word on BLACK SABBATH, are you happy to have left it there?
GN Well, I don't know about any of that really. We may record, who knows but that "FORBIDDEN" album, we did that all in only ten days really so I think that kind of shows.
DL Well, I know that I interrupted your moment of solitude here and will let you return to it but did want to take the opportunity to speak with you in case this truly is the end of the road for SABBATH.
GN Like I say, who knows but I will always be around, just check behind the speaker cabinets.(laughs)
Geoff Nichols' work with BLACK SABBATH can be heard on the following discs:
HEAVEN AND HELL
MOB RULES
LIVE EVIL
BORN AGAIN
SEVENTH STAR (BLACK SABBATH Featuring Tony Iommi)
THE ETERNAL IDOL
HEADLESS CROSS
TYR
DEHUMANIZER
CROSS PURPOSES
CROSS PURPOSES LIVE (VIDEO/CD BOX SET)
FORBIDDEN
REUNION
Nichols tenure within the world of BLACK SABBATH began not as the group's keyboardist but as a writing partner and bassist in what was to be a post-SABBATH group featuring Tony Iommi and Ronnie James Dio. As most know the story this collaboration of talents eventually revitalized the SABBATH moniker with the landmark "HEAVEN AND HELL" album and the rest, as they say, is history.
Nichols has been the most consistent member of SABBATH, save Tony Iommi, and has at various points contributed guitar, vocals, bass and once an entire discs worth of lyrics to the SABBATH cause. For most of this time Nichols has been content to stay hidden away from the spotlight and focus on the music. The man's immeasurable contribution to SABBATH can easily be heard on each disc issued since 1980 and all the tours which followed and still the man can walk through an arena and not be recognized, well except in the following instance. After what was then thought to be the final curtain call for the legendary group's reunited original lineup I caught Nichols wandering the concert grounds and extricated a few thoughts from the man.
DAVID LEE With the exception of Tony you have been the most consistent member of BLACK SABBATH, twenty years for you, is it all ending the way that you would have wanted it to?
GEOFF NICHOLS Yeah, it has come full circle hasn't it with the ultimate lineup, the original lineup and obviously the kids that are coming to the shows approve. For me, I have done it all with SABBATH now, I have played with every singer now anyway.
DL Was that your voice I heard there in addition to Ozzy's?
GN Yeah.
DL This has been advertised as SABBATH's final run as a group but each member has something else cooking as a solo act is it the same with you?
GN Yeah, well we don't know what is going on yet because everybody has their concepts going. Whether Tony will take his solo thing on the road we don't know yet but he probably will and I will do that. It still remains to be seen what will happen with that but myself, I have been writing film scripts and have been dabbling in that. There are four individual scripts actually and one of them has a lot of interest in it so we will see how that goes and I will write the music for them as well if they happen.
DL Could you give me a taste of what one of them is about?
GN Well, I don't want to give too much of it away yet because I still have to go and get them registered and all that but the idea is really in the concept right now. They are very unusual, nobody has really done anything like them and I am trying to keep them a little bit guarded really because there are a lot of people who could take the idea and call it their own. It is the kind of stuff, like stuff from the X- FILES. One is a paranormal one, one is a straight Sci-Fi one, one involves a lot about different groups who are involved with the paranormal but not in the typical way that you see groups portrayed in films. The concepts are all kind of different and if I can pull it off, well, we will see.(laughs)
DL Better left unsaid at this point then?
GN Yeah, exactly. You see that it is the thing, once the idea has been given away, anybody can do it. It is like a song really, if you have got a good hook line in it and you don't record it first and someone else does it then it is hard to prove that it was yours, it is just like that in this business.
DL Something else that is one with this business is ego and you seem to have had yours well in check given your relationship with BLACK SABBATH, having been a member for so many years but spending most of that time either on the side of the stage or hidden from view?
GN My love is for the music and at the end of the day when I get to the door I check my ego because it is the music that is most important. You know, certain people have to have egos to do what they do and some do have more egos than others and maybe they need that just to get up on stage but everybody has their own thing and their own way. I think that I have kind of worked hard to get where I am to get what I have got and I don't need to have all of the spotlight that is on the rest of the band. I will talk to people and they will say, "Don't you get upset not being photographed with the band?" and I have to say "No!" I enjoy and accept what it is they ask me to do and it is great, I mean I live these guys and we all come from Birmingham and I have known them all for thirty years so, I am very happy with it actually.
DL Your first involvement in the world of SABBATH was actually as part of the group QUARTZ where Tony Iommi managed you?
GN Well, he didn't really manage us. What it was is that the tour manager of SABBATH in the early days was our manager and Tony produced the album of the group I was in before I joined SABBATH. That is how it came about really and he (Tony Iommi) liked the way I worked in the studio, I wrote the lyrics quickly and I also played guitar and had a good sense of melody. Actually the guitar was my first instrument so it is kind of like my keyboarding , it leans toward my guitar playing so it kind of worked well with Tony. It was never a competitive kind of thing with Tony and I and with SABBATH being a guitar based group it just worked well.
DL I see that you have fully embraced the computer and use a small amount of equipment which is different from most of your contemporaries?
GN Yeah, I don't use much on the road, I have in the past though. On albums, the "LIVE EVIL" album for instance I used a Hammond on that. I used to use the big Mellotrons in the old days but with modern technology and with a sampler, though I know they are not exactly the same, I think that it is very easy to get that sound. That and a lot of the roadies don't like carrying around all of that big stuff!(laughs) But as I say I did use it a lot on the live album, actually I used the CX2 which is the equivalent of the Hammond B3 but it is more distorted to be more effective with the guitar sound.
DL Yes, you kind of pioneered that sound with maybe only Vincent Crane (ATOMIC ROOSTER) coming into the same neighborhood. They are looking for a keyboardist by the way.(laughs)
GN Yeah, I like Hammonds because they have a distinctive sound but I'd rather use some other things too because there are so many people who have established that kind of sound, DEEP PURPLE, EMERSON, LAKE & PALMER and they have kind of defined the Hammond Organ sound so I have kind of tried to move into sound effects and atmospheric effects which is just as good and helps me be a little bit more me. I am not the greatest keyboard player in the world, I admit that, but I do love to dabble with the sounds. I think that is just as effective for what I do as anything else really.
DL If this version of the band doesn't do another record then I guess "FORBIDDEN" will be the last word on BLACK SABBATH, are you happy to have left it there?
GN Well, I don't know about any of that really. We may record, who knows but that "FORBIDDEN" album, we did that all in only ten days really so I think that kind of shows.
DL Well, I know that I interrupted your moment of solitude here and will let you return to it but did want to take the opportunity to speak with you in case this truly is the end of the road for SABBATH.
GN Like I say, who knows but I will always be around, just check behind the speaker cabinets.(laughs)
Geoff Nichols' work with BLACK SABBATH can be heard on the following discs:
HEAVEN AND HELL
MOB RULES
LIVE EVIL
BORN AGAIN
SEVENTH STAR (BLACK SABBATH Featuring Tony Iommi)
THE ETERNAL IDOL
HEADLESS CROSS
TYR
DEHUMANIZER
CROSS PURPOSES
CROSS PURPOSES LIVE (VIDEO/CD BOX SET)
FORBIDDEN
REUNION
