Dean has painted Tony Iommi into two of his paintings, and each one puts him in different company.
Hang this painting and someone will always point at a face and ask, “Who’s that?” Dean Turner’s Ultimate Guitarist Reunion is a hand-painted original of 45 guitar greats, 12 months from planning and hand painting to finish. Tony Iommi is one of them.
Look in the car before you look at the store, because there are faces crammed into its windows too. Dean Turner’s Highway to Hell is a hand-painted original of hard rock and metal musicians from ten bands, gathered at a roadside store on a desert highway, with Tony in the back seat of the car beside his Black Sabbath bandmate Geezer Butler. It was painted over 12 months.
Each one is available as a framed canvas print, made from the original, for the room where your music lives. This is Tony Iommi’s story.
No. 23 Who’s Who Ultimate Guitarist Reunion
the Black Sabbath riffs that started with a factory accident
On his last day at a Birmingham sheet-metal factory, at 17, he lost the tips of two fingers on his fretting hand. He changed the way he played, and Black Sabbath’s riffs came out of it.
27of 30
Highway to Hell
In this story 13 sections
Why fans still care
TONY IOMMI wrote the riffs that heavy metal grew out of, and he did it with the ends of two fingers missing. The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame says Black Sabbath “delivered heavy metal into the world”, and Iommi was the one with the guitar.
The accident happened at 17, on his last day at a sheet-metal factory in Birmingham. A press came down on his right hand, the one he fretted with, and took the tips off his middle and ring fingers. A workmate put the fingertips in a matchbox, and they followed him to the hospital. “As far as the hospital was concerned I could never play again,” he told Louder.
He was badly depressed. Then the factory manager came round to his house and told him about Django Reinhardt, the jazz guitarist who had kept playing after a fire damaged his hand. “It inspired me to get on with it,” Iommi said.
So he made himself new fingertips. “My fingers were so painful that I got a washing-up bottle, melted it down to a ball,” he said, and he shaped that into tips to fit over the two damaged fingers. He still plays with thimbles on those fingers today.
The strings were the next problem. Normal gauges hurt too much to fret and bend, so he built a lighter set out of banjo strings. Later he talked the string maker Picato into making them for him, “and then all the other companies caught on”. Black Sabbath also started tuning down on stage, which slackened the strings even more, and by Master of Reality in 1971 the band were three semitones low.
Light strings, a lower tuning and a hand that couldn’t do what other guitarists’ hands did: that’s where the Sabbath sound comes from. “It made me invent a new sound and a different style of playing,” he told Rolling Stone in 2015.
He has three Grammys for Best Metal Performance, the last in 2023, and a new solo album, From the Dark, due on 23 October 2026.
It turned out to be a good thing off a bad thing.
Early life and training
Anthony Frank Iommi was born on 19 February 1948 and grew up in Aston, in Birmingham. His mother bought him his first electric guitar, a left-handed Watkins Rapier, out of a catalogue.
He went to Birchfield Road school in Birmingham, the same school as a boy called Ozzy Osbourne, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon).
Career chapters
- 1948Born in Birmingham
- 1965Loses two fingertips in a factory accident, aged 17
- 1968Two weeks in Jethro Tull
- 1969Earth become Black Sabbath
- 1970Black Sabbath and Paranoid
- 1980Heaven and Hell, with Ronnie James Dio
- 1985The original four reunite at Live Aid
- 2000First solo album, Iommi
- 2006Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
- 201313, UK and US number 1
- 2017The End, in Birmingham
- 2025Back to the Beginning at Villa Park
- 2026MBE; From the Dark
Ozzy Zig requires gig 1968 to 1969
After Iommi and drummer Bill Ward’s band Mythology broke up, the two of them came home to Birmingham wanting to start something new. In a music shop they saw a notice that read “Ozzy Zig requires gig”.
Iommi knew exactly one Ozzy, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon). “I know an Ozzy, but it can’t be him. He can’t sing,” he told Ward. It was him. They knocked on the door, his mum answered, and with Geezer Butler, Who’s Who number 26 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) on bass the four of them became the Polka Tulk Blues Band, then Earth, and in 1969 Black Sabbath.
There was a detour first. In late 1968 Iommi spent about two weeks in Jethro Tull, long enough to appear with them in the Rolling Stones’ Rock and Roll Circus film. It “didn’t feel like a proper band to me,” he said, and he went home.
Black Sabbath and Paranoid 1970
The first album, Black Sabbath, came out on Friday 13 February 1970, after two days in the studio.
Paranoid followed that September. Its title track came last: producer Rodger Bain told them they needed one more short song, and Iommi came up with the riff on the spot. “It’s basic. It’s not technical by any means,” he said in 2024. The album went to number 1 in the UK.
The Ozzy years 1970 to 1978
Black Sabbath made eight studio albums with Ozzy, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon), from Black Sabbath in 1970 to Never Say Die! in 1978. Master of Reality reached number 8 in the US in 1971, and from Vol. 4 on, the band had a hand in producing its own records.
The way they wrote didn’t change much. Iommi brought the riffs, Ozzy, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) found a vocal melody over them, and Geezer wrote most of the words. When the riffs dried up in 1973, the band hired Clearwell Castle in Wales and set their gear up in the dungeons. The first thing Iommi came up with down there was the riff to Sabbath Bloody Sabbath.
In 1978 a young band from Pasadena opened for them for eight months: Van Halen. “Eddie was playing things I’d never seen before,” Iommi said of Eddie Van Halen, Who’s Who number 34, and the two stayed friends.
Dio, Gillan and the singers who followed 1979 to 1997
Ozzy, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) left Black Sabbath in 1979. Iommi met his next singer at a party at the house of the band’s manager, Don Arden: Ronnie James Dio, who had been singing with Rainbow. Back at Iommi’s house he played Dio an unfinished riff called Children of the Sea, and Dio went into a corner and wrote the words for it on the spot.
With Dio, Black Sabbath made Heaven and Hell (April 1980) and Mob Rules (1981), and the live album Live Evil. Then the singers kept changing. Ian Gillan, Who’s Who number 12 in · The Ultimate Reunion (story coming soon) of Deep Purple sang on Born Again in 1983. Glenn Hughes sang on Seventh Star in 1986, a record Iommi had started as a solo album.
Tony Martin came in for The Eternal Idol in 1987 and stayed for five albums, including Headless Cross, with Cozy Powell on drums. Dio came back for Dehumanizer in 1992. Through all of it, Iommi was the one member who never left.
Reunions and Heaven & Hell 1985 to 2010
The original four played together again at Live Aid on 13 July 1985, and properly reunited in 1997. The live album Reunion came out in October 1998, and its version of Iron Man won the Grammy for Best Metal Performance in 2000.
In November 2005 Brian May, Who’s Who number 20 inducted Black Sabbath into the UK Music Hall of Fame. A few months later, in March 2006, Lars Ulrich, Who’s Who number 13 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) and James Hetfield, Who’s Who number 33 inducted them into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in New York, and Metallica played Hole in the Sky and Iron Man in their honour.
Iommi and Geezer also went back to the Dio line-up. Calling themselves Heaven & Hell, they toured from 2007 and released The Devil You Know in April 2009. Dio died of stomach cancer on 16 May 2010.
Solo records 2000 to 2005
Iommi’s first solo album, Iommi, came out in October 2000, with a different singer on almost every song. The guest list ran from Dave Grohl, Billy Corgan, Henry Rollins and Serj Tankian to Billy Idol, Skin and Phil Anselmo. Ozzy, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) sang Who’s Fooling Who, with Bill Ward on drums, and Brian May, Who’s Who number 20 played guitar on Goodbye Lament.
He followed it with two records with Glenn Hughes: The 1996 DEP Sessions, recorded years earlier, and Fused in 2005.
13 and The End 2012 to 2017
In January 2012, as Sabbath were getting back together, Iommi announced he had lymphoma. They made 13 anyway, with Rick Rubin producing, Brad Wilk of Rage Against the Machine on drums and without Bill Ward. In June 2013 it went to number 1 in the UK and the US. The Official Charts Company counted 42 years and 8 months since Paranoid, a record gap between UK number 1 albums. Its single God Is Dead? won Sabbath another Grammy in 2014.
The farewell tour was called The End, and it finished at the Genting Arena in Birmingham on 4 February 2017. That wasn’t quite the end. On 8 August 2022 Iommi and Ozzy, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) played Paranoid at the closing ceremony of the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham.
Back to the Beginning 5 July 2025
On 5 July 2025 the original four played one last show at Villa Park in Birmingham, Back to the Beginning, for Cure Parkinson’s, Birmingham Children’s Hospital and Acorn Children’s Hospice. Tom Morello, Who’s Who number 22 was musical director. More than 40,000 people were at the ground and about 5.8 million watched online.
It ran all day. Mastodon, Rival Sons, Anthrax, Halestorm, Lamb of God, Alice in Chains, Gojira, Pantera, Tool and Slayer all played, and between them came supergroups built for the night. Steven Tyler, Who’s Who number 23 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) sang Train Kept A-Rollin’ with Ronnie Wood, Who’s Who number 19 on guitar, then Walk This Way and Whole Lotta Love with Morello, Who’s Who number 22, Nuno Bettencourt and Andrew Watt. Billy Corgan, K.K. Downing, Jake E Lee, Lzzy Hale, David Draiman, Chad Smith, Travis Barker and Danny Carey all took a turn too.
Guns N’ Roses, fronted by Axl Rose, Who’s Who number 2 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) with Slash, Who’s Who number 43 and Duff McKagan, Who’s Who number 3 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon), played four Sabbath songs, It’s Alright, Never Say Die, Junior’s Eyes and Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, before Welcome to the Jungle and Paradise City.
Metallica were the last band on before Ozzy’s, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) own set. James Hetfield, Who’s Who number 33, Kirk Hammett, Who’s Who number 10 and Lars Ulrich, Who’s Who number 13 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) opened with Sabbath’s Hole in the Sky and later played Johnny Blade, from Never Say Die!, live for the first time. “Without Sabbath, there would be no Metallica,” Hetfield, Who’s Who number 33 told the crowd.
Then Ozzy, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) played his own set from a throne with a bat on top, backed by Zakk Wylde, Who’s Who number 27, Mike Inez, Adam Wakeman and Tommy Clufetos, finishing with Crazy Train. Last came Black Sabbath, Iommi, Ozzy, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon), Geezer, Who’s Who number 26 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) and Bill Ward, with War Pigs, N.I.B., Iron Man and Paranoid. It was Ozzy’s, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) final performance.
MBE and From the Dark 2026
In 2026 he was made an MBE, and he received it at Windsor Castle on 30 September. “This is very special to me because it’s from our own country,” he told Guitar Player.
His solo album From the Dark, with Jørn Lande singing, is due on 23 October. The only guest on it is his friend Brian May, Who’s Who number 20, who plays the guitar solo on Death Wake. “We’re not trying to prove anything,” Iommi said.
Craft, sound and style
Thimbles and fingertips
Iommi frets with the tips of his middle and ring fingers covered. He started with the home-made ones from the washing-up liquid bottle and still wears thimbles on those two fingers.
Light strings, low tuning
From the early days his stage strings were “eights”, which he gives as .008, .011, .016, down to .032. Black Sabbath was cut in standard tuning, but the band soon tuned down on stage, he says “both for Ozzy and for me with my fingers”. Master of Reality went down three semitones, so songs from that album need a guitar with heavier strings. Children of the Grave and Into the Void are both on that album, so that’s the tuning you hear on them.
The Monkey SG and the John Birch guitars
He was a Stratocaster player at first, with a left-handed Gibson SG as a spare. On the first album session he started Wicked World on the Strat, the pickup failed, and with only two days in the studio he picked up the SG and kept it for several albums. That SG stayed with him for several albums.
Birmingham luthier John Birch then built him guitars around his hand, including a 24-fret neck. Guitar companies had told him, “We can’t do it.” Birch said he’d have a go.
Gibson describes the Monkey as a heavily modified 1964 SG Special, played on every album and tour of the 1970s by the original line-up, with pickups hand-made in the UK by an apprentice of John Birch. In January 2020 Gibson’s Custom Shop announced a replica: 50 guitars, 25 right-handed and 25 left-handed, signed and numbered, down to the zero fret and the stop-tailpiece bushings.
By 1974 he’d worked the guitars over himself. He told Guitar Player that year he’d fitted low-feedback pickups, put polyurethane on the neck, filed the frets, and tried metal tuning pegs and several custom bridges, and that keeping it in tune was still a fight. The same interview has a three-pickup Gibson Les Paul, a newer SG, a Gibson J-50, a Guild acoustic and a Junior that Leslie West gave him. He also said he couldn’t play right-handed instruments any more.
The treble booster
When Black Sabbath started out he played through Marshall 50-watt amps. By the first album he’d switched to Laney, a Birmingham firm that started up around the same time as the band, and he drove it with a Rangemaster treble booster. A guitarist he met in Carlisle, from the band that became Spooky Tooth, took the Rangemaster home overnight and changed its parts. “He’d given it sustain and everything,” Iommi said.
He ran the booster into the bass input of his amp, and he told Guitar Player in 2025 that the combination made his sound. It was noisy, too. At the Spectrum in Philadelphia the ice-rink machinery set it buzzing, and some gigs were cancelled because he couldn’t get his sound without it. An amp rebuilder threw it away around 1979 (one account says 1982), and it has never been recreated. Laney’s TI-Boost pedal is the modern stand-in.
The Laney rig
By 1974 the stage rig was four 100-watt Laney heads into six Laney 4x12 cabinets, he told Guitar Player. Laney later made his signature amps. The GH100TI came first, in the early to mid-1990s, and the TI100 followed in 2012: 100 watts from four 6L6 valves, two channels with a footswitchable pre-boost, and a three-band EQ. He called it “everything I’ve ever wanted in an amp”.
Who picked it up
The 2006 Rock Hall induction is a fair measure: Metallica did it, and Hetfield, Who’s Who number 33 called Sabbath “mammoth riffs with menacing lyrics”. Zakk Wylde, Who’s Who number 27 and Slash, Who’s Who number 43 were both on the Villa Park bill playing Sabbath’s songs back to him.
What other players say
“Obviously if there was no Black Sabbath, there would be no Metallica.”
“Never have I known a more timeless and influential band.”
“He is really my dearest friend in the business ... And, of course, he is the father of heavy metal.”
“Tony Iommi is the riff lord, in my mind”
“the one that has inspired me the most out of any guitar player”
“Ground Zero for riff writing is Jimmy Page, Who’s Who number 32 and Tony Iommi.”
“two or three hundred of the greatest electric guitar riffs of all time”
“he’s the Bach, Beethoven, and Mozart of riffs.”
“Bill, Geezer, Ozzy and Tony, if it weren’t for you, we wouldn’t be here.”
Stories people still tell
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Friday 13th.
Black Sabbath’s first album came out on Friday 13 February 1970.
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The Tull fortnight.
His two weeks with Jethro Tull in late 1968 got him into the Rolling Stones’ Rock and Roll Circus, and then he went back to his own band.
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Bonham at the wedding.
Iommi knew John Bonham, Who’s Who number 6 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) from the Midlands club circuit, where their bands played the same gigs. “Bonham was best man at my first wedding,” he told Guitar World.
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Giving back.
He supports cancer charities. “It’s nice to give back because I know what it’s like for those patients,” he said in 2026.
Legacy
The Recording Academy says Sabbath “arguably invented the heavy metal signposts”.
Ozzy Osbourne, Who’s Who number 29 in · Highway to Hell (story coming soon) died on 22 July 2025, 17 days after Villa Park. “There won’t ever be another like him,” Iommi said.
In the painting
Tony Iommi | Black Sabbath
Ultimate Guitarist Reunion
Number 23 of 45 on the Who’s Who
Number 23 of 45 on the Who’s Who list for Ultimate Guitarist Reunion by Dean Turner Art, published as Tony Iommi | Black Sabbath.
Collectors lean in, argue over faces and pull the names list. If you’re looking for Black Sabbath, start with Iommi, the one with the moustache.
Dean painted him in the back row right beside Tom Morello, Who’s Who number 22. Morello, Who’s Who number 22 was musical director of Black Sabbath’s final show, Back to the Beginning, at Villa Park on 5 July 2025. “It’s incredible, what he’s done,” Iommi said before the show.
More names on the same list cross his story: James Hetfield, Who’s Who number 33, who helped induct Black Sabbath into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, Brian May, Who’s Who number 20, his guest on From the Dark, Eddie Van Halen, Who’s Who number 34, whose band opened for Sabbath in 1978, and Zakk Wylde, Who’s Who number 27, Slash, Who’s Who number 43, Kirk Hammett, Who’s Who number 10 and Ronnie Wood, Who’s Who number 19, who all played at Villa Park.
Highway to Hell
Number 27 of 30 on the Who’s Who
Number 27 of 30 on the Who’s Who list for Highway to Hell, published as Tony Iommi | Black Sabbath.
Dean painted him side by side with Geezer Butler, Who’s Who number 26 (story coming soon) in the back seat of the car. The two of them started Black Sabbath together and played its last show together, at Villa Park on 5 July 2025.
See Tony Iommi among all 45 guitarists in Ultimate Guitarist Reunion.
Who’s Who in the Ultimate Guitarist Reunion
Numbered as on the painting’s key. Pick a name to read their story.
- Story live
- Coming soon
- You’re reading
Find the numbers on the painting
- 1Albert King
- 2B.B. King
- 3Eric Clapton | Cream/Yardbirds
- 4Stevie Ray Vaughan | Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble
- 5Billy Gibbons | ZZ TOP
- 6Jimi Hendrix | The Jimi Hendrix Experience/Solo
- 7The Edge | U2
- 8Pete Townshend | The Who
- 9David Gilmour | Pink Floyd
- 10Kirk Hammett | Metallica
- 11Peter Frampton | Solo/Humble Pie/The Herd
- 12George Thorogood | George Thorogood & the Destroyers
- 13Mark Knopfler | Dire Straits
- 14Ritchie Blackmore | Deep Purple/Rainbow
- 15Jeff Beck | Solo/Yardbirds
- 16Gary Moore
- 17Joe Perry | Aerosmith
- 18Prince
- 19Ronnie Wood | Rolling Stones
- 20Brian May | Queen
- 21Rory Gallagher | Solo/Taste
- 22Tom Morello | Rage Against the machine /Audioslave
- 23Tony Iommi | Black SabbathYou’re reading
- 24Carlos Santana
- 25Joe Walsh | Eagles
- 26Jack White | Solo/White Stripes
- 27Zakk Wylde | Ozzy Osbourne/Black Label Society
- 28Randy Rhoads | Ozzy Osbourne
- 29Joe Satriani
- 30Steve Vai
- 31Keith Richards | Rolling Stones
- 32Jimmy Page | Led Zeppelin/Yardbirds
- 33James Hetfield | Metallica
- 34Eddie Van Halen | Van Halen
- 35Angus Young | AC/DC
- 36Chuck Berry
- 37Kurt Cobain | Nirvana
- 38Les Paul
- 39Lenny Kravitz
- 40Bo Diddley
- 41Johnny Winter
- 42Malcolm Young | AC/DC
- 43Slash | Guns N Roses
- 44George Harrison | Beatles/Traveling Wilburys/Solo
- 45Robert Johnson
Tony Iommi is also on the Who’s Who in 1 more painting
Highway to Hell29 names · Tony Iommi is number 27 of 30
Find the numbers on the painting
- 1Brian Johnson | AC/DC (story coming soon)
- 2Axl Rose | Guns N' Roses (story coming soon)
- 3Duff McKagan | Guns N' Roses (story coming soon)
- 4Slash | Guns N' Roses
- 5Jimmy Page | Led Zeppelin
- 6John Bonham | Led Zeppelin (story coming soon)
- 7Robert Plant | Led Zeppelin (story coming soon)
- 8Eddie Van Halen | Van Halen
- 9Dusty Hill | ZZ Top (story coming soon)
- 10Billy Gibbons | ZZ Top
- 11Frank Beard | ZZ Top (story coming soon)
- 12Kirk Hammett | Metallica
- 13Lars Ulrich | Metallica (story coming soon)
- 14James Hetfield | Metallica
- 15Phil Rudd | AC/DC (story coming soon)
- 17Vince Neil | Mötley Crüe (story coming soon)
- 18Tommy Lee | Mötley Crüe (story coming soon)
- 19Nikki Sixx | Mötley Crüe (story coming soon)
- 20Mark Evans | AC/DC (story coming soon)
- 21Cliff Williams | AC/DC (story coming soon)
- 22Joe Perry | Aerosmith
- 23Steven Tyler | Aerosmith (story coming soon)
- 24Bon Scott | AC/DC (story coming soon)
- 25Lemmy Kilmister | Motörhead (story coming soon)
- 26Geezer Butler | Black Sabbath (story coming soon)
- 27Tony Iommi | Black SabbathYou’re reading
- 28Malcolm Young | AC/DC
- 29Ozzy Osbourne | Black Sabbath (story coming soon)
- 30Angus Young | AC/DC
Sources
- Tony Iommi official site, Biography. iommi.com
- Rock & Roll Hall of Fame, Black Sabbath. rockhall.com
- Blabbermouth, Tony Iommi announces listening events for From The Dark (8 Oct 2026). blabbermouth.net
- Music Week, King’s Birthday Honours (12 Jun 2026). musicweek.com
- Guitar Player, Tony Iommi MBE (30 Sep 2026). guitarplayer.com
- Grammy.com, Best Metal Performance. grammy.com
- Grammy.com, 2019 Special Merit Awards (19 Dec 2018). grammy.com
- Official Charts Company, Black Sabbath guitarist diagnosed with cancer (9 Jan 2012). officialcharts.com
- Blabbermouth, Original Black Sabbath to play final show (5 Feb 2025). blabbermouth.net
- Louder, Iommi and Butler pay tribute to Ozzy Osbourne (22 Jul 2025). loudersound.com
- Official Charts Company, Black Sabbath make chart history (16 Jun 2013). officialcharts.com
- Louder, When Tony Iommi joined Jethro Tull. loudersound.com
- Loudwire, Tony Iommi turns 64 (19 Feb 2012). loudwire.com
- Consequence, Black Sabbath earn first No. 1 album with 13 (Jun 2013). consequence.net
- Blabbermouth, Tom Morello honoured to be musical director (2025). blabbermouth.net
- Louder, The final Black Sabbath interview, by Dave Everley (2 Jul 2025). loudersound.com
- Consequence, Tony Iommi awarded MBE at Windsor Castle (Sep 2026). consequence.net
- Louder, Tony Iommi receives MBE at Windsor Castle (Sep 2026). loudersound.com
- Tony Iommi (official), From the Dark album announced. iommi.com
- Louder, Iommi recalls fateful finger loss, by Martin Kielty (20 Feb 2015). loudersound.com
- Rolling Stone, Tony Iommi explains metal’s birth in animated interview (19 Feb 2015). rollingstone.com
- Guitar World, Tony Iommi on fingertips, Jethro Tull and his Monkey SG, by Neville Marten (1 Apr 2020). guitarworld.com
- Louder, Tony Iommi and Brian May on Paranoid (3 Jan 2024). loudersound.com
- Ultimate Classic Rock, How Ozzy Osbourne joined Tony Iommi’s band (21 Feb 2020). ultimateclassicrock.com
- Louder, The Black Sabbath story: the early years. loudersound.com
- Tony Iommi official site, Biography chapter 2. iommi.com
- Tony Iommi official site, Biography chapter 3. iommi.com
- Louder, What happened when Ronnie James Dio joined Black Sabbath (17 Jul 2018). loudersound.com
- Tony Iommi official site, Iommi (2000). iommi.com
- Tony Iommi official site, Fused (2005). iommi.com
- Blabbermouth, Full text of Metallica’s Black Sabbath induction speech (15 Mar 2006). blabbermouth.net
- BBC News, Black Sabbath bow out in Birmingham with final concert (5 Feb 2017). bbc.com
- Rolling Stone, Ozzy and Iommi reunite at the Commonwealth Games (Aug 2022). rollingstone.com
- Louder, Back to the Beginning setlist, by Fraser Lewry (5 Jul 2025). loudersound.com
- Blabbermouth, Guns N’ Roses covers four Black Sabbath songs at Back to the Beginning (6 Jul 2025). blabbermouth.net
- Louder, Metallica pay tribute to Black Sabbath at final show (Jul 2025). loudersound.com
- Blabbermouth, Metallica cover Hole in the Sky and Johnny Blade at Back to the Beginning (Jul 2025). blabbermouth.net
- Loudwire, What five songs Ozzy Osbourne played in his final concert (5 Jul 2025). loudwire.com
- Loudwire, Back to the Beginning total money raised (13 Nov 2025). loudwire.com
- Guitar Player, Jackson Maxwell, Brian May on Tony Iommi (reporting Guitar World 2020 interview), 9 Jul 2020. guitarplayer.com
- Louder, Why Brian May is the only guest musician on Tony Iommi’s solo album (31 Jul 2026). loudersound.com
- Louder, Tony Iommi on collaborating with Brian May (27 Aug 2026). loudersound.com
- BBC News, The Birmingham street where Black Sabbath’s sound began (Feb 2017): in 1965, his last day at a sheet-metal factory on Summer Lane, Aston, he lost the tips of two fingers. bbc.com
- Business Live (Birmingham Post), Birmingham: birthplace of heavy metal: 1965, sheet-metal factory, tips of his right-hand middle and ring fingers. business-live.co.uk
- Blabbermouth, Text of Brian May’s UK Hall of Fame speech posted online (13 Dec 2005): Brian May introduced Black Sabbath at the UK Music Hall of Fame “last month”. blabbermouth.net
- Guitar World, Phil Weller, Slash played a Gibson SG at Ozzy Osbourne’s farewell show (14 Jan 2026): Slash on the SG he used at Back to the Beginning. guitarworld.com
- MusicRadar, Slash and Seymour Duncan 3.0 humbuckers (Jan 2026): “The SG that I had at the Ozzy gig”, for Guns N’ Roses’ set at Back to the Beginning. musicradar.com
- Guitar.com, Justin Beckner, “The gear used by Tony Iommi on Black Sabbath’s debut album”, 19 Mar 2024 (TI-Boost; Laney’s view of the booster mod). guitar.com
- Guitar Player, Elizabeth Swann with Barry Cleveland, “Tony Iommi on the modified treble booster his tech threw out”, 30 Jun 2025 (bass input, Spectrum buzz, cancelled gigs, thrown out around 1979). guitarplayer.com
- Blabbermouth, “Tony Iommi ’Monkey’ 1964 SG Special replica guitar from Gibson available worldwide”, 16 Jan 2020 (Monkey description, 50 replicas). blabbermouth.net
- Guitar Player, Steve Rosen, Tony Iommi 1974 interview, published 16 Apr 2020 (1974 mods, other guitars, Laney rig, left-handed). guitarplayer.com
- Blabbermouth, “New Tony Iommi signature amp launched; details available”, 23 Mar 2012 (GH100TI, TI100). blabbermouth.net
- Blabbermouth, James Hetfield on Tony Iommi (SiriusXM, Riff Life), 21 Sept 2026. blabbermouth.net
- Guitar Player, Andrew Daly, Tom Morello on the Black Sabbath farewell reunion show, updated 2 Mar 2025. guitarplayer.com
- Guitar.com, Crystal Koe, Zakk Wylde on “Lord” Tony Iommi (reporting Revolver), 24 Feb 2023. guitar.com
Names appear exactly as published on the Who’s Who lists for Ultimate Guitarist Reunion and Highway to Hell.
See the names list for other Ultimate Series artworks
Every painting has its own numbered Who’s Who. Pick a scene and see who’s in it.
Ultimate Aussie Pub Rock ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Aussie Reunion - Part 2See who’s in it - Highway to HellSee who’s in it
The Ultimate ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Eagles ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Queen ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Beatles ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Classic Country ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Hip Hop ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Gangster ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Boxing ReunionSee who’s in it 
Ultimate Fighter ReunionSee who’s in it