Tony Iommi Profile

Date Of Birth - 19th February 1948
Place Of Birth - Aston, Birmingham, England
Starsign - Aquarius
Height - 6'2"
Weight - 13.5 stone
Colour Of Hair - BLACK
Colour Of Eyes - Green
Place Of Residence - Warwickshire, England
Cars Owned - Mercedes
Pets - Two Rottweiler Dogs
Hobbies - Cars, Watching Films, Walking
Likes - Having Peace Of Mind
Dislikes - Smoking And Arguing
Favourite Food - Japanese, Indian And Curry
Favorite Drinks - Guinnes, Lager, Vodka and Orange
Favorite Countries - USA & Hawaii for visiting & UK for residing
Favorite Cities - Los Angeles
Favorite TV Programmers - Get Smart & Rockford Files
Favorite Films - The Exorcist and most good horror films
Favorite Actor - Roger Moore and Clint Eastwood
Favorite Actress - No one in particular
Favorite Cars - Ferrari and Lamborghini
Favorite Form Of Travelling - Driving myself otherwise flying
Favorite Sports - Boxing and Wrestling
Favorite Books - Lob San Rampa and Nostradamus
Favorite Animal - Elephant
Favorite DJ's - Alan Freeman and Tommy Vance
Happiest Moments - When I'm getting the communication and feedback from fans at concerts, it's difficult to describe exactly.
Worst Moments - The problems with my ex-management and the divorce from my last wife.
Pet Hates - Getting up too early and having to travel.
If you weren't a Guitarist
what would you have been - Boxer or Wrestler
Early Influences - The Shadows & later on Django Reinhardt
Favorite Bands - Most good 70's bands like Zeppelin, Purple and The Moody Blues etc.
Favorite 80's Bands - No particular Favorites although there are some good ones around

Favorite Guitarists - Brian May, Eddie Van Halen & Joe Pass
Favorite Drummers - Cozy Powell & John Bonham
Favorite Male Singes - Frank Sinatra & Dean Martin
Favorite Female Singers - Anne Wilson of Heart & Barbara Streisand
Favorite Rock Singers - Tony Martin, Ronnie James Dio, Ian Gillan & David Coverdale
Favorite Instrument other
than Guitar - Piano
3 All Time Favorite
SABBATH Songs - HEAVEN AND HELL, BLACK SABBATH and SABBATH BLOODY SABBATH
Favorite Acoustic
SABBATH Song - Laguna Sunrise
Favorite News SABBATH Songs - Devil & Daughter and HEADLESS CROSS
3 All Time Favorite
SABBATH Albums - BLACK SABBATH, SABBATH BLOODY SABBATH and HEAVEN AND HELL
Favorite Own Guitar Solos - Heart Like A Wheel and at the time Lonely Is The Word
Favorite Riffs - Too many to name
Favorite SABBATH Album
Covers - SABBATH BLOODY SABBATH then HEAVEN AND HELL
Worst SABBATH Album Covers - SABOTAGE and BORN AGAIN
Favorite Country to
Perform In - Most Countries

Most Memorable Years for
SABBATH so far - 1973 and 1980
Why - '73 because of the general vibes at the time
and it saw us at a good peak
'80 because it was a new beginning. However,
this excludes the present situation which
is very exciting.
Remaining Goals To Archive - For the band to be back where it should be which is in the top bracket.
Tony Iommi in "BLACK SABBATH Appreciation Society Newsletter Volume 2, 1989".

Tony Iommi's Guitar

In 1996 Iommi : Now I've got an Eggle guitar. It's a different sort of design. I've been in the factory working to get the shape and feel right. It will be called the Iommi Legend. I wanted them to do an SG originally. We came up with more of a contoured and bigger body so it's similar to a Paul Reed Smith, I suppose. I've got my own JD pickups, which are going to be put on the production model as well.

The pickups specially wound for Tony by John Birch were finally duplicated successfully by Gibson
after being approached by Tony at the 1996 International Music Fair (Musik Messe) in Frankfurt.
They are Gibson pick-ups with the "Patent Applied For" decal and were originally available at
Authorized Gibson Dealers for $145.95 USD (I don't know how much they cost now).
The price of the pickups in 1999 range from $189.99 U.S. List to $94.99 U.S. special Sale price, with $145.95 being the average price as stated.
The pickups are fully wax-potted against feedback, have a four-conductor lead for all wiring variations,
have a closed chrome cover, were backed by
Gibson's Limited Lifetime Warranty and 60 day "Guaranteed Gibson Quality" exchange program.
FEB 1999 Gibson to come out with Tony Iommi model SG
See http://www.iommi.com for more info.


TONY IOMMI'S GUITAR COLUMN

Tony Iommi has a regular column in Guitar World, starting with the latest issue, August 1997 (with Foo Fighters on the cover). In the first installment, he explained about his fingers, and then the proper way to play the intro riff to "Paranoid," emphasizing that it is played at the 12th fret, not the 7th.

A BIT OF FINGER
When Tony Iommi used to work in a factory of some kind, his job was to pass
hunks of metal to someone who used a machine to punch holes in the metal
or cut it up or something like that... One day when the other guy didn't
turn up, Tony tried to use the machine and cut the ends off his fingers -
he took the bits to hospital where they said they couldn't do anything for
him. The possibility that he would not ever play guitar again was very real.
Tony may have tried switching to playing right handed, but it wasn't working out.
Then a friend of his gave him a Django Rheinhardt album. This was a gypsy guitarist
who only had two fingers. This inspired Tony to go home and repair his fingers with molten
plastic from an old washing-up liquid bottle, in true Blue Peter spirit.
He had to do so because playing without the ends of his fingers was too
painful.

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