Technical Ecstasy

Technical Ecstasy was the seventh studio album, produced by Iommi and released in October 1976 by Warner Bros. in the United States and Canada and by Vertigo elsewhere. After the legal fight that surrounded Sabotage the band chose Criteria Studios in Miami. Iommi said nobody else would take responsibility for production, so it was left to him. Butler said the Eagles were making Hotel California in an adjacent studio and that the band had to scrape cocaine off the mixing board before they could record. The Eagles had to stop on several occasions because Sabbath were too loud.

The songs are more varied than on earlier records, with synthesisers and keyboards from Gerald Woodroffe. It's Alright is written and sung by Ward, the first Sabbath song not sung by Osbourne, and it was released as a single. Guns N' Roses later covered it live. Butler described the record as a response to punk and later called it the beginning of the end. Osbourne wrote that he had a Blizzard of Ozz T-shirt made and thought about leaving.

Hipgnosis designed the cover, which Storm Thorgerson described as two robots in love on an escalator. The album reached number 13 in Britain and number 52 in the United States, and reviews were mixed. AC/DC supported the band on the 1977 European tour, and Osbourne briefly left afterwards, with Dave Walker standing in.