The one hundred eighty-fifth album: #185 Black Sabbath - Paranoid
I'm covering another Black Sabbath album pretty shortly after the first, with the band, it seems, already moving more into heavy metal. There are some absolute masterpieces in here that cover that, with Paranoid feeling like an immediate classic that gets followed by a quieter, simpler Planet Caravan that feels as trippy, just not as loud. I'm not sure the lyrics always extend that well - Iron Man isn't a literary masterpiece - but the music does enough to evoke a feeling that the lyrics feel easy to overlook in those place. This is probably where heavy metal comes out better - not as a single song, where its isolation makes it stand out, but in an album where it has time to build and relax. There's a good flow to the album, with some great moments in the song that sound better in context.