Tony says he was back in hospital after USA tour

Our Tony just posted a statement on his official website Iommi.com. He says:

"Well we've finished the US leg of our world tour. It was a bit longer than I would have liked as I've already been in hospital having another infusion. The tour was amazing though, you always hope it's going to go well but you never know, it's great to look out and see so many people of all ages. The new songs have been going down well, we've played them enough now so we're comfortable and that helps the performance. Many thanks to everyone who came to see us, South America next, and just like Australia this is a first time for Ozzy, Geezer and me together. All the best!"

Tony described his "infusion" treatments to the Birmingham Mail earlier this year, explaining, "I have to have an antibody administered by drip every six weeks or so to keep the lymphoma in check. It sort of coats the cancer cells, stops it from going anywhere else. I have to come back home no matter where I might be in the world."

He added, "The tour dates are arranged so that I can always get back for treatment. It's the only way I can manage my illness and keep on the road. I'd love to play more shows . . . but my health has to be sorted out first." The legendary guitarist said that his treatment is a relatively new process and doctors are not sure what all the side effects might be. He also said that it "takes around 10 days to fully recover from each round of treatment, but if that's what it takes, I have to accept it."

Black Sabbath will next head to South America, beginning on October 4, to be followed by European and U.K. treks.

Read more at Blabbermouth.net  

Thank you for giving us your music, Tony! Thank you for never give in, for great performances, true moments of magic!

Thank you, Tony, just for what you are! We love you. And you know that!

Get well, take care and relax, and we can't wait to see you again on stage, Iron Man!

Iommi.com, Blabbermouth.net, 11 September 2013

Photo by Vertigo Records

Tony's interview to Phoenix Up On The Sun

Phoenix Up on the Sun caught up with Iommi during a tour break in New York to talk about developing that early sound, the making of 13, and why Ward has been replaced by former Rage Against the Machine drummer Brad Wilk.

Up on the Sun: I have to wonder about that development of that original sound. A few early songs have a bluesy and progressive sound--but how did the heavy, sludgy sound materialize? Did you stumble on it by accident?

Iommi: The sound I was after in the first place was to have something powerful. Something to create some tension. We used to work on trying to get the sound as big as we could. I think because of my accident it made me play a different way anyway. I had to work on playing chords a different way and playing as big as I could. That's really what it was, working on enhancing the sound. And when we all played together, the way Geezer would bend his notes the same as I do, and it makes the sound fuller.

That made it darker, heavier?
I wanted it to be that way. When we first started, we were playing jazzy blues stuff. Once we started getting down to really writing our own stuff, that's when the sound came about really. I wanted to create the same vibe as a horror film. It's got tension and these evilly things going on. I wanted to do that with music and I came up with these notes that were evil [laughs].

Why do you think people took to it? Did it make their hair stand up on their arms, or maybe give them that evil thrill? Or was it just so different?
It was unlike anything else around at that time. It was just different and people latched on to it. That's what we wanted. Not all people--some people hated it--but it was a matter of building up the people who liked it and making more of them. There were a lot of people when we first came out who really did slag us and hated what we did.

OK, back to the future. How is playing together--recording together--after so many years of tension and not being in the studio? The last album with the original lineup was in 1978... Ozzy was booted out in 1979...
Tensions? The tensions over the years have mainly been about business. It's not been personal at all. We always got on well on a personal level. It's been going really good.

It's just a different attitude now. When we got back together to record this album everybody had a different attitude toward what we were doing this time. We wanted to make an album together. We all really appreciated each other and respected each other. That's really the only way to go into it--a full band commitment--and everybody was ready to put everything into it.

We did try back 12 years ago, and nobody could settle on it then. It wasn't the right time, there were to many things going on. Ozzy was doing MTV, so it just didn't work then. We weren't going to do it until everybody was fully committed, and that was this time. Rubin was interested in doing the album [in 2001]. We played him some tracks but that's as far as we got with it. We pulled the plug on it. We never got into the studio. We'd just played him some tracks.

Any of these songs on 13 holdovers from the 2001 sessions?
We totally just abandoned those. It was not a good memory, so we just scrapped them.

13 went number one upon release in the U.S., your first such achievement. Why do you think it 45 years to top the charts?
[Laughs] You tell me! I don't know.

But I'm glad it did. A lot of people wondered if Black Sabbath was ever going to get back together, so a lot probably bought the album because they were wondering what it was going to be like since it was our first time together in 35 years. I'm really happy with the album and what we did.

Any particular stand out track? "God is Dead" certainly invokes the earliest days of the band.
We're constantly asked that and it's truly difficult. When you go track to track you really like them all. "God is Dead" is a good track. I like that. I mean, I like them all.

Where do you rank 13 among the many Black Sabbath albums?
Every album you do means something of that time period. Certainly the early stuff I like. I liked the stuff we did with Dio. If you try to rank it against with the Ozzy stuff, I think it ranks right up there.

Where's Bill? I know all of you have worked together on and off since that 1997 reunion, but is Bill even able to perform right now?
Of course--we were hoping Bill was going to do it. When we first got together, Bill was involved.

It was Bill who pulled the plug, it wasn't us. Bill decided on his own he didn't want to do this, because he didn't like things the way it was. But we still don't know exactly what that was, because Bill won't exactly talk to us about it. He got his lawyers to talk with our lawyers, and it went that way instead of talking to the band personally.

It got to be a silly situation. It would have been nice to have had Bill on the album, but it was getting too complicated. It had been after a year of this stuff, and we just had to get on with it.

How did Rage Against The Machine drummer Brad Wilk get involved?
We ended up with Brad through Rick Rubin. We tried two or three big named drummers--excellent drummers--but Rick thought they weren't quite the drummers for us. He was looking for someone very much like us--very basic, but like Bill be able to jam and come up with a few good ideas now and again.

We didn't know much about Brad apart from what he'd done with Rage, but we tried him and tried him again. He was very nervous at first, but once we spent a few days with him he got more comfortable, and we got more comfortable, and he really came into his own.

How did the recording session work? Do you bring finished material in, or work up the songs on the fly?
I came in fully armed with lots of riffs and material. I've written lots and lots of stuff. Some of the songs I'd completed at home, and I came in and played them for everybody. If they like them, then we worked them out. A lot of this was done in Rick's studio and some we did at my studio in England. Whatever it took.

I just wanted to come in fully armed with songs I could play for everybody, and then we could make additions and come up with ideas. Even if I have a finished song, I'm still going to pull it apart and work it to where we all felt it was where we wanted it be.

Given how well this is going, and the success of the record, will we see more of this Black Sabbath in the future?
We're not looking at like that. We're looking at in the moment. Unfortunately, we have to work around my treatments. I'm still having treatments for the cancer. I have to go back to England every seven or eight weeks, and I have to come off the road while my system adjusts. Then we go back on the road.

It's all been very new to me. I didn't know how it was going to work. I haven't done a tour since I was ill. Maybe a couple of shows, but I haven't done a day on, day off, day on, day off tour. I have to treat my life quite differently than I did five years ago. So we don't plan things too far down the road since I don't know how I'm going to be after this tour.

Read more on Up On The Sun.

Phoenix Up To The Sun, 8 September 2013

Black Sabbath 3D Horror Maze attraction coming to Universal Studios Hollywood

The Black Sabbath 3D horror maze attraction will open at Universal Studios in Hollywood later this month.

As you walk through the maze you will come face to face with Lucifer and his bride, blood soaked dead bodies and bubbling pools of radioactive water.

Black Sabbath songs “Luke’s Wall,” “Iron Man,” “Paranoid,” “War Pigs,” “Electric Funeral” and “Black Sabbath” will be heard throughout the maze.

The Black Sabbath 13 3D maze was created by John Murdy. “Very few bands can claim to have defined a genre of music but Black Sabbaths’ remarkable influence in the evolution of Heavy Metal will go down in history,” he said. “Tony Iommi’s dark, iconic riffs, Ozzy Osbourne’s haunting vocals and Geezer Butler’s foreboding lyrics provide the perfect soundtrack for ‘Halloween Horror Nights’ and endless inspiration for our new haunted attraction ‘Black Sabbath 13 3D’.”

“We were all really excited when Universal Studios Hollywood approached us about doing a 3D ‘Halloween Horror Nights’ maze based on our music,” said Black Sabbath’s Ozzy Osbourne. “I’ve seen the drawings of what it will look like when it’s finished and it looks amazing. I can’t wait to walk through it on opening night in September.”

“Welcome to Black Sabbath: 13-3D, where you’ll begin your descent in a demon-filled cathedral and continue on through graveyards, madhouses, corpse-filled battlefields and a nuclear apocalypse with mutated beasts,” the Universal blurb reads.

The Black Sabbath attraction will open at Universal Studios in Hollywood on September 20.

Read more on Noise 11.

Paul Cashmere for Noise 11, 8 September 2013

Black Sabbath's USA tour is over!

Black Sabbath's North American tour is over with the last date at Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum 3 September 2013.
The guys posted this statement on their official Facebook page:

"Whew! That went by fast. It seems like we just started the tour and now it’s over. Thank you to everyone who came out to see us on our North American tour. The audience response every night was unbelievable for which we thank you. We’ll be touring through South America all of October and then we’ll finish 2013 in Europe in November and December. We love you all and keep listening to Black Sabbath!"

Now, get rest and relax, Tony and guys! The South American and European fans can't wait to see you!
Long live Black Sabbath!
Long live Mighty Tony! \\m//

You can see the photo albums of the American tour on our Facebook page Tony Iommi Fan-Tastic.

6 September 2013

Black Sabbath at Gorge Amphitheater in Quincey WA

 Here's Sabbath Gorge Amphitheater gig review by Tim, our website's friend:

"IT WAS FRICKIN AWESOME!!!! Dude, they are SO tight, I mean zero flaws anywhere. They opened with War Pigs and then about 6 or 7 songs in ya hear Geezer messin around with his bass and I new NIB was on deck and it was! SO cool! they did everything you would think they would and quite a bit of the new album. They played from about 8:00 to 10:30 and they could have just started over as far as I was concerned. HOLY SHIT THAT WAS A GOOD SHOW... AND THEY ARE quite OLD!!!!

Ozzy, Tony and Geez haven't changed...at all, it like they're immortal dude! I'M SERIOUS, every song was like it came off the album and they still love doin sabbath tunes. Yeah, it was a solid 2 & 1/2 hours, i couldnt believe it! I'm tellin ya man, I've seen ALOT of shows, most everybody I wanted... this was right up there and theses guys are how old?...it was amazing and the next time YOU'RE COMING WITH ME" !!!!"

The tracklist of the gig was:

War Pigs
Into the Void
Under the Sun/Every Day Comes and Goes
Snowblind
Age of Reason
Black Sabbath
Behind the Wall of Sleep
N.I.B.
End of the Beginning
Fairies Wear Boots
Rat Salad
Iron Man
God Is Dead?
Dirty Women
Children of the Grave

Encore:
Paranoid
(Sabbath Bloody Sabbath Intro)

1 September 2013

Review of Black Sabbath's Gig in Philadelphia, Wells Fargo Center

Philly.come wrote about the Sabbath gig:

Fast-forward to the present: the original Sabbath (without drummer Bill Ward, lost to a contractual dispute) released an album, 13, mounted a tour with a sold-out stop at Wells Fargo Center on Saturday, and made old-head metal fanatics happy.

Philly Sabbath enthusiasts who heard that Osbourne was radically off-key during previous dates got a mostly good Ozzy, with his rattling deadpan's lower register in fine (though not perfect) fettle. From the beginning - air raid sirens leading into the thundering murk of "War Pigs" - to the end notes of the swelling "Paranoid," every head banged as one, with Ozzy acting as devil/uncle/cheerleader. The fact that he, legendary guitarist Tony Iommi and bassist Geezer Butler, wore beaming smiles during psycho-killer crunchers like "Iron Man" proves doom metal's less serious side is alive and thriving.

The rolling thunder was anchored by the pummeling drums of Tommy Clufetos.

Sabbath's scorched-earth sonics clacked and hummed harshly, with Iommi's slow, yowling six-string attack at its most ferocious on "Into the Void," his heaving sob of a solo during the mean, cocaine-filled monologue of "Snowblind," and "Black Sabbath."

That last track was this band's legacy moment: ominous, prickly, harshly psychedelic, and at once bell-ringingly clear and sludgier than a swamp filled with molasses and tar.

Butler's gnarly bass sound, whether deathly measured or fleet, brought a moody, melodic richness and a knuckle-dragging density to the proceedings. Butler, together with Clufetos, even managed a subtly, hip-swaying groove on "Fairies Wear Boots."

Though pensive questions of revolution and religion filled Butler's lyrics, wordy clunkers like "Dirty Women" and "End of the Beginning" slowed Sabbath's righteous roll.

Since the band's 1969 start, guitarist Tony Iommi's arsenal of thick, monster riffs and archly sinister solos, along with bassist Geezer Butler's nimble-fingered low-end rumble (to say nothing of his meanly fantastical lyrics), was genre-defining. Add Ozzy's cold-steel whine to the mix and Black Sabbath became a greatest heavy rock band on the planet!

Sabbath Philly Gig setlist:
War Pigs
Into the Void
Under the Sun/Every Day Comes and Goes
Snowblind
Age of Reason
Black Sabbath
Behind the Wall of Sleep
N.I.B.
End of the Beginning
Fairies Wear Boots
Rat Salad
Iron Man
God Is Dead?
Dirty Women
Children of the Grave

Encore:
Paranoid
(Sabbath Bloody Sabbath instrumental intro)

We would like to thank a great Sabbath fan Jim Powers for really fantastic shooting of the show! The best Youtube videos of high quality ever!

Philly.com, 1 September 2013

Ian Gillan recalls fantastic times he spent with Black Sabbath!

In a recent interview to Myglobalmind Ian Gillan remembers happy time he spent with Tony Iommi and Geezer Butler during Black Sabbath's Born Again era, and explains some things about Who Cares charity project he made with Tony.

Myglobalmind: How do you attempt to explain the high global chart positions of latest album”Who Cares”It has achieved astonishing success all around the globe. Was there anything different song wise or production wise that could possibly account for that?

Ian “I can never ever explain anything that happens in the commercial world. I have no grasp of it or understanding of it, and I have never ever worked in that area. If we have commercial success there is only one explanation that we are in tune with something or other but we don’t know what. We certainly don’t plan it that way, I think people probably take an interest or make an effort. I don’t know.”

Myglobalmind: I read that you agreed to join Black Sabbath after a heavy night out with Tony Iommi. Looking back how do you view the period that you spent with Black Sabbath?

Ian”That was the longest party that I ever went to. That lasted about a year the recording and the tour. I was at a loose end, I had no band and they had no singer. It worked out pretty conveniently for all of us really. Yeah we went out and got smashed one night, Tony, Geezer Butler and I. We ended up under the table and had to be swept out. My manager called me the next day and said if you are going to make career decisions maybe you should give me a call first. I said that I don’t know what you are talking about but apparently I had agreed to join Black Sabbath the night before. It was one of those things and I had a fantastic time. I have great memories of it and I am still in touch with Tony. We do a few bits and pieces together. I’m just following his progress on tour in America at the moment.”

Read the whole interview on Myglobalmind

Myglobalmind, 31 August 2013

Tony Iommi on riff-writing process: "I Have To Feel It In Myself"

 SF Weekly recently spoke to legendary guitarist Tony Iommi about the making of the band's new album, "13" — the first in 35 years to feature Tony, singer Ozzy Osbourne and bassist Geezer Butler. Asked what it was like working with legendary producer Rick Rubin, who is notorious for being very "in and out" of the studio while records are being made, Iommi said:

"At first I was a bit apprehensive, because I didn't know how he was going to work. We all were. But at the end of the day, yeah, I think it worked out really good. It's good to have somebody in control as such, because to control this band, it's hard when you're one of the members. I really did stipulate that when we got together that we need a producer. It's alright saying, 'Oh yeah, we can do it ourselves,' which we probably could. But you get into this stage where you lose track again, and you start, 'Well, I'll put an overdub on that, and I'll put a harmony on that,' and it gets out of control. By having somebody like Rick, he kept us to the basic thing. I actually did put a couple of harmonies on when he wasn't there. But then he took 'em off."

He added: "Rick wanted me to play the solos live, which I haven't done for years. I've normally put the backing track down, then go in and put solos down. And I'm going, 'Well, I don't really know what I'm going to play yet.' And he'd go, 'Well, just try something.' He encouraged me to try different things, and that's what happened on 'Age Of Reason' and 'Damaged Soul'."

Iommi also spoke about the riff-writing process for "13", saying about his endless backlog of material: "I have got a closet full of riffs, but I very rarely go back to them, to be honest. I always think, 'Well, I'll put this away, and I'll put that down,' and when it comes time to do something, I always seem to come up with something new. For this album, I did write purposely, so I could have an armory of songs or ideas to play to the other guys. I didn't want to walk into a room and everybody look at each other and go, 'What we gonna do now?'" He continued: "I have to feel it in myself; it comes from within. You do a riff and you think, 'Oh yeah, I really like this.' I'll go back to [it] and listen to it again and go, 'Yeah, I like this.'

I mean, I've done thousands and thousands of them. I can walk into the studio and play for a couple of days and just come up with no end of riffs. I might not ever use them."

Read more at Blabbermouth.net

Blabbermouth.net, 27 August 2013

Tony Iommi: My health comes before Black Sabbath

The shining star of this tour is, unquestionably, guitarist Tony Iommi. On "13", he performs like it’s the last album he’ll ever make—which is quite possible, given the grim reaper of lymphoma beckoning over his shoulder. Willamette Week spoke to the man who invented metal guitar about replacing Ward, his health and, of course, the sweet leaf.

On working with Rick Rubin:

“Rick wanted us to go back to the basic idea of recording, like we did the first album. It was hard, at first, to get into, because it’s been over 40-odd years since we recorded that way of just walking in, playing and walking out. But it sort of worked. And it was what it really needed. Because it’s so easy to start saying, ‘Well, I’ll put another guitar on here and we’ll put a harmony on there and Ozzy [Osbourne] can do a vocal harmony.’ See, Rick didn’t want any of that. He wanted it just to be very basic. And I actually did go in and put a harmony on one part, and Rick took ’em off!”

On replacing Bill Ward:

“Rick suggested Ginger Baker, which we put a stop on. We didn’t think Ginger Baker would have been…we didn’t want to go in the studio and have, um, problems. And we did try some big-name drummers, some very big-name drummers. And they were great. But Rick particularly suggested Brad Wilk. And it was great because Brad had no idea what we were gonna be doing. We wouldn’t let him hear the tracks with drums. We just wanted to see what he was gonna put to it. And Brad was a really nice guy. He did work hard, you know, because he was thrown in the deep end so much, and he was very nervous. And then he got used to us. He got used to our jokes, the way we prank around.”

On health:

“Ronnie [James Dio, who fronted Black Sabbath on its 2009 tour and died in 2010] was getting stomach pains, and he was telling me before we were going onstage some nights, ‘Oh, my stomach’s really playing up,’ and he’d ask me if I’ve got any Tums or anything. And I said, ‘You should get it checked, you know, Ronnie.’ Of course, he did, but it was too late. And that’s the problem. It’s easy to overlook these things. I mean, I’m probably more over the top than I ever have been now. I check everything every day. You just don’t know. A lump pops up and you’ve gotta get it sorted.”

On doing another Black Sabbath record:

“It all depends on my health, really. But I don’t think it would be hard to do another album, because we work so well together once we start cracking. And I’ve got plenty of ideas and stuff. But we’ll have to see what happens at the end of the year, after tour. I mean, for me, this is a whole new venture, because it’s the first time I’ve been out on tour since I’ve been ill for the last two years. And I have to treat things very differently to how I did five years ago. I’ve always put the band first, but now, of course, I have to put my health first.”

On the last time he smoked a joint with his bandmates:

“A long time ago. We haven’t all done that together since ’77 or something like that.”

Read more on Wilamette Week

Wilamette Week, 27 August 2013

Tony Iommi reflects on Black Sabbath future and his life

"We are very pleased," says Tony, the author of some of the mightiest guitar riffs in rock history. "It's just quite a shock to have our first No. 1 record (in the U.S.) after being around for 45 years.

Perhaps the most amazing thing isn't that "13" managed to top the charts, but rather that it exists at all.

For years, if not decades, the odds of this version of the band -- featuring founding members Iommi, vocalist Ozzy Osbourne and bassist Geezer Butler -- recording another studio album seemed, at best, highly improbable.

There were simply too many obstacles. There was Iommi's battle with cancer, Osbourne's substance abuse problems and original drummer Bill Ward's departure from the fold. Plus, it had been more than three decades since these players had achieved any real degree of success together in the studio.

Thus, most fans probably assumed that 1978's "Never Say Die!" would stand as the last Sabbath album with Osbourne on the microphone.

Osbourne was a busy man in the 2000s. His activities included leading the namesake hard rock tour Ozzfest, playing the perpetually befuddled and bleeped-out father on the MTV's reality show "The Osbournes," putting out a number of popular solo records and, in general, establishing with his family one of the most powerful brands in the business.

In the midst of all that, he reunited with the other three founding Sabbath members. They gathered with super-producer Rick Rubin to try and cut a new studio album in 2001. It didn't work.

"It just wasn't right," the 65-year-old Iommi says during a recent phone interview. "Nobody was on the right page. So, we abandoned the whole idea. But I always thought -- or, at least, really hoped -- we would do another album."

Osbourne did tour with Sabbath in the 2000s, but mostly concentrated on the business of being famous. That translated to a lot of spare time for Iommi, Butler and Ward, who instead collaborated with Ronnie James Dio, the vocalist who led Black Sabbath for a few years after Osbourne split for a solo career (or was fired for his runaway substance abuse problem, depending on which version you believe) in 1979.

The reunion was dubbed Heaven and Hell, a title taken from the Dio-led Sabbath's landmark 1980 album.

"I didn't want to live on the Black Sabbath name with that lineup, because it stood for itself," Iommi says of the reunion with Dio. "And, of course, we went out as Heaven and Hell because we weren't playing any of the Ozzy stuff. All the stuff we were doing was with Ronnie."

These days, most people only think of Sabbath in terms of the Ozzy lineup. That's understandable, since Ozzy was the one originally at the microphone for such early and lasting favorites as "Paranoid," "War Pigs," "Black Sabbath" and "Iron Man" -- the last of which was reborn as an anthem for Marvel Comics' popular "Iron Man" movies. Yet the Dio offerings stand tall among Sabbath's mighty songbook.

"Ronnie was a superb singer -- one of the best," Iommi said of the vocalist, who died in 2010 from stomach cancer. "It's a sad ending. But Ronnie did give it his all, right to the end."

After Heaven and Hell ended, Osbourne re-entered the picture and soon plans were under way to record a new album. Yet new obstacles appeared. Most significantly, drummer Ward opted out, reportedly due to a money issue. Eventually, the three-legged Sabbath hobbled into the studio anyway, again under producer Rick Rubin's watch, with Brad Wilk of Rage Against the Machine as the session drummer. Filling in for Ward on the road is Tommy Clufetos, who also plays in Osbourne's solo band.

"It would've been nice to have had Bill involved," Iommi says. "But we waited long enough for Bill, and what can we do? We can't make him do it. It was his decision. It was sad."

The result, however, was anything but sad. Black Sabbath's 19th studio album would climb to No. 1 during its first week on the charts.

Iommi is happy to add that this isn't just another Black Sabbath album -- it's another good one. He feels that "13" stacks up quite nicely among all the long-cherished classics, which would include such metal masterpieces as 1971's "Master of Reality" and 1973's "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath."

"We haven't done this album just to do one, because we didn't need to do one," he says. "We wanted to do one for ourselves. I think it holds up. We love all the stuff we've done (on the album).

"That's the only way we could do it. Everybody had to be 100 percent into it and really want to do this album. Everybody had to be on the same page."

Of course, Sabbath fans are probably even more excited about a new tour than a new album. And they were justifiably worried that the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame act might not tour in 2013 -- at least not in North America -- after learning that Iommi had been diagnosed with lymphoma in January. Yet the guitarist has found the courage and strength to take to the road.

"To be honest, I was wondering whether I could do (the tour) as well," Iommi says. "I have to treat life very differently now. This, for me, has been a big challenge. So far, it's been OK. The medical thing is still going on. It'll be ongoing, really, for life. It's not going to go away. I just have to try to treat it.

"So I go back to England every seven to eight weeks for a treatment. Then it takes 10 days, two weeks, to start feeling normal again. Then we go back out on the road."

Iommi says that every single day battling cancer is a challenge.

"My whole life has changed," he says. "My attitude has changed toward everything. Life becomes a lot more precious. I appreciate when we've got the opportunity to get together and be onstage and play and do what I like to do.

"I think my illness, in one way, has helped everybody, because it's brought the reality of you really don't know how long this is going to last. It was easy to take things for granted before. I think everyone now appreciates what we've got and what we get to do."

Read more on San Jose Mercury News

San Hose Mercury News, 22 August 2013