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On Promo?

 

 Yes

Performed?

 

 No

Date:

 

[scheduled for] Monday, April 3

Listen to an except of the announcement
[Recorded by Pedro Collazo]  

 
Additional info:

Excerpts from the book:

click to here to buy this book


Black Sabbath had flown over from Miami for the Mar Y Sol festival. The crew arrived at the site as usual, before the band did.

However, as it drew closer to the time for the band to leave for the gig, it became clear that they would never make it, at least on land.

The road leading to the festival ground was grid locked.

Spock Wall [producer] used a payphone to call Patrick Meehan [producer], who was with the band at the Redondo Beach Hotel, to warn him of the traffic problems. Meehan told him to expect the band as and when they could get there.

Their only chance would have been to hire a helicopter, but none was available. Meehan then decided that the band should admit defeat. They
had nothing to lose as they had been paid in advance, unlike many of the other acts on the bill.

The band had one immediate problem. They only had a day room at the hotel, somewhere to freshen up before they set off for the festival.


Meehan decided that they should go to the bar and stay there until an earlier flight could be arranged to get them off the island. But he couldn't inform the crew, who were still at the site waiting for the band, and he had no way to contact anyone there.

Luke [road manager] decided to take a shower before abandoning the suite, and Ozzy decided to throw him a Cherry Bomb [1/4 dynamite] while he was in there. The hotel suite looked like a scene from Apocalypse Now.

Luckily, the band didn't have to stay around the hotel long enough to explain the bomb site they'd created. All that was left of them was a vapor trail by the time their trashed room had been discovered.

Spock and the road crew, meanwhile, were still in the dark. Finally they decided to drive back to the hotel to find out what was going on. But there was no sign of Black Sabbath, Luke or Meehan.

The crew, unlike the band, had beds booked for the night, and so they decided to check in while they thought about what to do next. The duty manager politely offered to show them their rooms. Stopping the lift on the 2nd floor, he directed them to the suite that the band had left in explosive disarray, explaining that they were welcome to stay there 'if you don't mind the mess'.

Opening the door, they immediately realized what had happened. Knowing that the manager's icy civility would soon give way to a fury they'd rather not get involved in, they did the only sensible thing and made for the airport, where they jumped on the first flight back to Miami.

 


FAKE POSTER!!

You'll see lots of these over the internet & eBay

  • Such flyer NEVER existed back in 1972. Black Sabbath didn't even played (for those who think this was a souvenir of that gig), and the picture of the band is from circa 1976, not 1972.
  • If you compare several copies of these "re-prints" you'll notice how the color changes. Now, that's "original"
  • As stated in my interview with Alex Cooley, there was no headliner or main band in this festival as this fake poster suggests.