• Hard Rock

During BLACK SABBATH's mid 80s fragile years, bassist and band co-founder Geezer Butler (a.k.a. Terence Michael Butler) pursued the formation of his solo band, the line-up for the GEEZER BUTLER BAND. An initial set of demos would be recorded with the controversial BLACK SABBATH related singer Jeff Fenholt. Yet more sessions were then cut in St. Louis with David Donato, of WHITE TIGER and also famously a brief occupant of the BLACK SABBATH vocal position, laying down vocals. The GEEZER BUTLER BAND of 1985 included guitarist Pedro Howse, vocalist Richie Callison, a native of St. Louis, Missouri, and drummer John Mee. A later line-up had ex-BIRD OF PREY vocalist Kyle Michaels fronting the band, later of MASI. Former WISHBONE ASH and TRAPEZE vocalist Mervyn Spence had been approached but declined.

A more stable version of the band would be fronted by the PERSIAN RISK, TREDEGAR and TOKYO BLADE credited singer Carl Sentance. Although Sentance fronted the band for a two year period, no commercial recordings beyond demos were released. Employed on guitar as 1987 drew to a close would be Connecticut native JIMI BELL, actually located via selection process for auditions for OZZY OSBOURNE's band. These auditions narrowed down to two candidates, with ZAKK WYLDE pitched against Bell. Although Wylde scored the gig, Bell's compensation would be to diverted off into another branch of the BLACK SABBATH family tree, joining bassist Geezer Butler's band. Here he wrote the track 'Master Of Insanity', subsequently used, but unaccredited, on BLACK SABBATH's 1992 'Dehumanizer' album. ...