Iron Man
Butler's science-fiction lyric about a man of iron, with no link to the comic-book hero.
Black Sabbath, from Paranoid (1970)
- Written by
- Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler, Bill Ward, Ozzy Osbourne
- Released
- 7 October 1971
- Length
- 5:56
- Album
- Paranoid
Recorded in June 1970 with Rodger Bain producing and Tom Allom engineering. It came out as a US single on Warner Bros. on 7 October 1971 with Electric Funeral on the B-side, edited from 5:56 on the album to 3:33. Butler wrote the lyrics. He has said it has no link to the Marvel character, since he did not read American comics as a child. He took an iron bloke remark from Osbourne and went in a science-fiction direction. He has also said it was meant as an allegory for Jesus. He has described fitting each word to the syllables of Osbourne's phrasing.
It reached number 52 on the US Hot 100 in 1972, the highest of any Sabbath single there, and number 48 in the UK. The live version on Reunion won the 2000 Grammy for Best Metal Performance, and Rolling Stone placed it seventh in its 2023 list of the 100 greatest heavy metal songs. Road Warriors reworked it as We are Iron Men in the 1980s.
Live
It was the third song at Back to the Beginning in 2025.
More songs by Black Sabbath
Black Sabbath, Paranoid, War Pigs, Snowblind, N.I.B., Sweet Leaf, Children of the Grave, Planet Caravan, Sabbath Bloody Sabbath
Sources
- Iron Man (song), Wikipedia
- Geezer Butler on Black Sabbath's early days, Blabbermouth
- Geezer Butler reveals Iron Man is really about Jesus, Audacy