Black Sabbath: Paranoid

1. “War Pigs / Luke’s Wall”

This song resembles the mistreatment of being shipped off to war just for a politician's game. The evil politicians known as “war pigs” hide away as innocent people fight the war they had nothing to do with. This song outlines how evil and destructive politicians can be without carrying out the dirty work themselves. 2:26 it says, “They started the war/ Why should they go out to fight? They leave all to the poor.” Even in a life-and-death matter, the government chooses to use innocent people to kill for their country. The last few lyrics of the song talk about how the “war pigs” will be left with no power on Judgement Day. It describes how the “war pigs” will be crawling begging for mercy for the sins they committed. This could be drawn to a parallel as the “war pigs” are put into the place of the innocent man in war. This song was made to go against the corruptness of being sent off into war.

2. “Paranoid”

This song is a little more confusing to decipher. My take on the song is a man slowly diving into depression and wanting to find anything to help. For example, “All day long I think of things/ But nothing seems to satisfy,” “Can you help me/ Occupy my brain?”, “I can't see the things that make true happiness,” and lastly, “Happiness, I cannot feel/ and love, to me, is so unreal.” All these would be perfect examples of a man suffering from depression trying to find himself. The man is characterized by frowning all the time and not being able to express happiness. His life seems to be ruined or ended early due to the last lyric being, “I tell you to enjoy life, I wish I could, but it's too late.” The last lyric is emphasized by the guitar and drums being played suddenly. I believe this to be the man killing himself due to not being able to handle his depression.

3. “Planet Caravan”

There are not too many lyrics here that can be summarized from the song. But in a behind-the-scenes Bill Ward (Drummer and Head Writer) said it's about floating through time and space with a loved one, being free from any unnecessary chains in life. This song is a peaceful love song about sharing the universe together in a spaceship, gracefully floating around.

4. “Iron Man”

This song first details the thoughts of the terrified people around an odd man, “Has he lost his mind/ Can he see or is he blind?/ Can he walk at all/ Or if he moves, will he fall?” These show the thoughts of the people passing by the random man. They don't have any care for him whatsoever. The song describes the odd man's journey and what made him into the way he is today. The man travels into the future to save mankind from something unpredictable, but in the process, he gets caught in a magnetic field and turns to iron. When he returns to his own time, he is stared at, discriminated against, and feared. This fuels his anger for mankind and he plans his vengeance. The Iron Man terrorizes the people that he once wanted to save, killing and torturing them. I believe this song can be interpreted as a scenario where you are too kind or too caring and people use you or treat you like nothing, leaving you in the dust for their own personal gain.

5. “Electric Funeral”

“Electric Funeral” is about a nuclear holocaust and how it would cause widespread destruction and the end of life as we know it. A nuclear holocaust would result in radioactive fallout, electromagnetic pulses, and firestorms. Some of these are described in the song by describing the effects of them, for example, “Turns houses into sites/ Turns people into clay/ Radiation minds decay.” These show that houses are being destroyed, people are basically melting, and people's minds are decaying due to radiation. This song does an amazing job at explaining a lot of the effects of a possible nuclear holocaust. The song ends with how the people's lives are brought down into hell, trapped in burning cells.

6. “Hand Of Doom”

From what I gathered “Hand of Doom” is about the effects of drug addiction. The song illustrates how the person in question doesn't have a lot of time left; this could be due to an overdose he is succumbing to. The song goes on to talk about the napalm in Vietnam and how nauseating it is to think about. The lyric is followed by, “You push the needle in.” This is an obvious example of heroin, the next few lyrics cement this idea further, “From life you escape/ Reality's that way/ Colors in your mind/ Satisfy your time” Throughout the song the man slowly gets sicker and sicker as he dives deeper into his addiction, relying on it more. I believe this song is about the effects of Vietnam (or war in general) scarring a veteran's psyche to the point where he falls into drugs to help him feel “good” or just completely forget the times of war altogether.

7. “Rat Salad”

“Rat Salad” is unfortunately just an instrumental track so there's not much meaning to get out of it. What it does show is how amazing of a drummer Bill Ward is. Throughout the song, it shows the amazing music the of them can make, but the spotlight is given to Bill Ward with a 1-minute and 22-second drum solo which was outstanding at the time.

8. “Jack the Stripper / Fairies Wear Boots”

I couldn't really even tell you what this song means. The closest thing I have is how the band got beaten up by skinheads (not Nazis but punks) and they decided to write a song about it. The second part of the song is about how lead singer Ozzy Osbourne was tripping on a hallucinative drug while walking in the park and saw, “Fairy with boots are dancin' with a dwarf, alright, now.” The last verse of the song ends with a doctor telling him to stop doing drugs because “'Cause smokin' and trippin' is all that you do.”