What does Black Sabbath song have to do with Iron Man?

Josh Glenn says:

In this new Brainiac item I crack the lowbrow literary mystery, "What -- if anything -- does the awesome and influential Black Sabbath song 'Iron Man' have to do with the Marvel superhero? Or the Ted Hughes kiddie book, for that matter?" Having puzzled out the solution to this question, over which metalheads continue to wrangle nearly 40 years later, I offer a theory about what the 1970 antiwar song has to teach us today. Just in time for the new "Iron Man" movie!

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Mark Frauenfelder is the founder of Boing Boing and the editor-in-chief of MAKE and Cool Tools. Twitter: @frauenfelder. Come and hear Mark speak at the ALA conference in Chicago on July 1.

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tikal2k

No, _I’M_ Iron Man.
- Anonymous
  
  I Swear My Last Name Is Stark In Real Life. I Swear On My FUCKING SOUL. So… I AM IRON MAN!!!
Anonymous

yeah, two more dah dahs are required.
scottfree

Batman Begins surely has to stand as the best superhero film. No artsy-fartsy crap, just a straight forward action film with a story…even if Michael Caine was probably miscasted [Michael Caine could slaughter Bruce Wayne] and Katie holmes made a bad character worse with bad acting. For some reason Marvel puts in the action, but the stories wind up all convoluted. There tend to be so many distractions that you’re painfully aware of them.

I don’t know about the new Batman. in the screenshots Joker looks normal except with a Chelsea smile. I wonder how much of Moores origin they’ll stick with. Iron Man I cannot forgive for being such a cynical dick over the last few years.
Jake0748

Takuan @#5, You didn’t like my first comment?
Takuan

Iron Man Issue # 1. Yes. Purchased it new. Probably spilled pop all over it and used it to set fire to a a fort full of Army Men – or something equally cultural.
Takuan

http://www.leylander.org/armymen/timmee00.jpg
Jake0748

I have similar incidents in my past as well. Good times.
Antinous

Ah. Now I can calculate your age much more accurately.
Takuan

good night then. Against my better judgement,I have accepted a commission with imbeciles tomorrow. On the eve of the morrow then,and do finish my work instructing someone in the value of happo biraki.

blessings all and do not kill
Anonymous

@Hounskull

You got it all wrong. Hitler wasn’t referred to as the man of steel. That would be Stalin, whose name actually means “man of steal” in Russian.
scottfree

I definitely puzzled over this one before; in fact I think my introduction to Sabbath was about the same time as when the cartoon was on at six in the morning. I never could connect the two, and trying addled my pre-adolescent mind.

Incidentally, is anyone else annoyed at how arrogant iron man always is? i mean Capt. was always a bit camp, plus he never did wrong, but iron man? Not my cup of tea. to be fair, anyway, he may have been a skrull for twenty years, so who knows?
Evil Jim

Sabbath bassist and lyricist Geezer Butler has claimed that “Iron Man” was a dystopian “science fiction story” that he dreamed up after seeing “a lot of things in the news about pollution and nuclear war.” It had nothing to do with the superhero, that is to say.

I’m not sure why there is analysis beyond this point in the article.
stew

Because fans will forever ignore what an artist says about his or her work.

I never thought the song and the character were connected, or atleast not in any meaningful way. I always thought they were talking about the Golem, or something similar. Tony Stark never struck me as a character who would go around killing everyone.
historyman68

“I’m not sure why there is analysis beyond this point in the article.”

Sometimes creative people receive inspiration from places completely unknown to them. An obvious examples would be George Harrison and that song he unintentionally ripped off.

But, more importantly, I’ve always been told not to take an artist’s word on the meaning of his/her own art. It can be illuminating, but also potentially misleading, depending on whether or not the artist wants to hide his/her influences. If you wrote the lyrics to Iron Man, would you be more inclined say it was based directly on a comic book, or a “science fiction story” you dreamed up from current events? Which one would give you more credit/pride?
markhaas

Many years ago, I discovered there is a hidden, scientific meaning within the term “iron man.” It goes like this:

The chemical symbol for iron is Fe.

The biological name for “man” is male.

And so, scientifically speaking, and “iron man” is actually a Female.
coaxial

@#3 HOUNSKULL

Of course golems aren’t “men of steel.” They are made of dirt. Dirt and rocks. Well I guess you could make golem out of iron ore, since that’s a type of rock, but that would just be silly.
imhotep

Now someone can give Ted Hughes credit and edit his Wiki page. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_hughes

There’s reference to Pete Townsend, so Black Sabbath should be in there too.
RJ

@8 Hounskull
I like the reference you make to the Jewish golems; I was thinking something similar in comparison to the Iron Man concept. In general, Iron Man does seem more golem than mortal; an idealized concept like Beowulf the hero.

As far as Sabbath vs. the comics, I noticed a parity, but it was never a very meaningful one. Now that the previews feature Sabbath’s “Iron Man,” however, it sort of retcons the song to fit with the Iron Man concept – or makes an artful allusion from comic hero to Black Sabbath dystopia.

Either way, I enjoyed your article, Mark.
Hounskull

#20

nope, that’s a miss.

In mythical lore they can be made of clay, or other things including metal, stone, etc. Symbolically they represent the technology we create, on the most fundamental level, which could be described as inanimate objects given life by the intent of a person.

It’s deeply intuitive on the most basic level of understanding in the brain. Some of the earliest developments of higher intelligence are self recognition, empathic understanding of the intents of others, and the creation of simple tools and implements of will.

Metaphorically, personified technology = golem. Online avatars are in a sense golems.

Golems are by definition crude, and soulless. i.e. they lack the higher intelligence and emotions such as compassion. So metaphorically, metal is a good choice, and violence is a likely purpose of a golem.

It’s really not surprising someone writes a song about an iron man going to war, even if nobody had ever thought of it before. It’s no more surprising than video games with rudimentary personas are mostly violence based. At the most rudimentary level, that’s what humanity is: crude, dumb, and violent.

:|
Hounskull

#22 right.

I wonder if Tony Stark / Iron Man of the movie will also have a dark side or if he’ll just be a one dimensional action figure wank fest.
Beanolini

…or, it could be a reference to Stalin, the soi-disant ‘steel man’.

Some friends of mine occasionally play ‘Iron Man’ on the hurdy-gurdy. It works extremely well.
RJ

@24
I don’t know if I’d call it a “wank-fest,” but it probably will be in keeping with the usual superhero motif; regular guy with a dark side and all becomes some kind of salvation or other.

But that’s what most people expect from a movie based on an archaic superhero comic; lots of action, and a storyline the audience can keep up with without having to think too hard about it.

Besides, how are you going to work greater depth into a movie about a comic hero who wears a suit of armor and has freakin’ JETS sticking out of his feet and shoots rockets from his arms? Not a lot of room for subtlety and grace, there.

It’s fluff, intellectually. But that’s fine, because that’s all it’s supposed to be. I look forward to seeing it, just because I loved the Iron Man concept as a kid.

Now, if they made a movie about an honest-to-god Golem, that would be very interesting…
Hounskull

#26

Spider Man was fairly complex… for a comic book movie. The Dark Knight based on Frank Miller looks like it might be OK, for a comic book movie. 300 was absolutely moronic.

But the nature of Iron Man being a robotic suit with copious firepower, and the glib previews, don’t give me much hope. Besides, Tony Stark has always been this character basically designed to glamourize wealth, warfare, and weaponry. Which is fine and all, but basically an action packed wank-fest.

The only thing that could make it interesting is if Downey delivers a really neurotic performance out of the armor suit.
Noodle

I have a theory of my own about this. Birmingham, UK the hometown of Black Sabbath, has a large iconic metal statue in it’s city centre entitled, funnily enough, Iron Man. Whether the idea was unconsciously from it or they want to avoid association for legal or whatever reasons, I couldn’t say. Either they thought of it and the statue is a homage or the statue (or whatever it was based on) was copied.
ill lich

Wait– WHY are we analyzing Sabbath lyrics? These are the guys who wrote such deep lyrics as “I want to reach out and touch the sky/ I want to touch the sun/ But I don’t need to fly/ I’m gonna climb up every mountain of the moon/ And find the dish that ran away with the spoon” (from “Supernaut”) or my own personal favorite : “So I went to the doctor/ See what he could give me/ He said “Son, son, you’ve gone too far./ ‘Cause smokin’ and trippin’ is all that you do. . . .Yeaahhhhhhh!!” (from “Fairies Wear Boots”)

I suspect it’s an amalgam of ideas and influences that gave birth to “Iron Man.” It’s arguable WHO in the band wrote the lyrics– Geezer claims at least some inspiration for “Iron Man”, but I’ve also heard Ozzy claim he wrote all (or nearly all) the lyrics for Sabbath songs, so it’s possible they both had something to do with “Iron Man.” Considering all the drugs they were doing back then I’m sure images of the comic-hero intertwined with images of Birmingham steel-mills, and ecological destruction and invented images from their own minds to give birth to “Iron Man”, plus a lot of the lyrics were probably just them trying to come up with stuff that rhymed: “we need something that rhymes with ‘dread’. . . how about ‘boots of lead’?”

Yes yes yes, a wonderful mental exercise for stoners and music-nerds everywhere.
Avram

Keep in mind that the music is usually one of the last things added to a movie. Often it hasn’t been done yet at the time a trailer is released. That’s why you sometimes see trailers with generic placeholder music, or classical or pop tunes, or music from an earlier movie from the same studio. (If I remember right, the early trailers for James and the Giant Peach used music from The Nightmare Before Christmas.) It’s possible that Sabbath’s “Iron Man” won’t actually be used in the Iron Man movie.

I’ve got pretty high hopes for the movie. Favreau’s not only a long-time comics fan, but he’s also interested in character and dialog. Swingers looks like it was pretty good practice for writing Tony Stark.
planettom

The important question is, is Black Sabbath’s IRON MAN fight’n and smite’n with repulsor rays?
Jake0748

dah dah, dah dah dah, dahdahdahdahdahdahdahdah
Crawford Tillinghast

My roommate and her ex and I watched the trailer last fall when it debuted (I forget during which show).

After it was over, I looked over at them and said “You know, even if the movie sucks, at least we got to see that.”
Jake0748

well, I did it wrong, there should be at least two more dah dahs at the end.
Antinous

The wrong number of ‘dahs’ and you get the refrain from Each Man Kills The Thing He Loves.
Takuan

wish I had hung onto Number 1 now.
Jake0748

Antinous – thanks LOL
Beryllium

Answer:

Both are made of PURE FUCKING AWESOMENESS.
Hounskull

Man of Iron, or man of steel, or other such expressions go back centuries and were especially prevalent after the industrial revolution in manufacturing and “steel towns” which were also where “metal” is most popular.

The idea of man as a cold machine is often linked with warfare as well. Hitler was often referred to as a “man of steel” and the Nazi youth camps intended to raise a generation of “men of steel.”

Many US comics dealt with anti-fascist themes before, during, and after WWII. Many of the artists had fled European fascism and US comic characters typically defended freedom against tyranny and fascism.

As a side note, a folkloric Jewish “super hero” of revenge is the golem, an inanimate create brought to life via alchemy for a single purpose. But that’s not to say Iron Man of the Man of Steel or other characters are necessarily Jewish.

The idea of a human-like construct with supernatural abilities goes back millennium and exists in many cultures.