Tony Iommi Recalls Using John Lennon’s House To Record ‘Mob Rules’

We all know the famous white country house featured in John Lennon’s music video for ‘Imagine.’ As it turns out, Black Sabbath recorded their tenth studio album’s title track, ‘Mob Rules,’ in the studio of John Lennon’s house. In a recent interview with Kerrang, Tony Iommi expressed his feelings about recording in the Tittenhurst Lodge.

‘Mob Rules’ was the second Black Sabbath album to feature Ronnie James Dio and Vinnie Appice, who had replaced Bill Ward during the Heaven and Hell tour. Although these were significant changes, the band achieved chemistry with this new lineup and got their hands on the album. However, what excited them most was recording the title track ‘The Mob Rules’ in John Lennon’s famous Tittenhurst Lodge.

“The first one we did for that album was ‘The Mob Rules,’” Iommi recalled. “We went to John Lennon’s house – he’d got a studio there. We set the gear up, jammed, and I’d come up with this riff, and then Ronnie started singing. The idea was that it was for the soundtrack of a movie, a Heavy Metal film, the cartoon. That worked well, but when we came to record the album, Martin Birch didn’t want to use that version. He wanted to do it, so it’s all in context with each other. Well, that was his excuse.”

When asked what John Lennon’s house was like, Tony Iommi revealed his observations, saying, “You know the video for ‘Imagine,’ where he’s sat at the white piano and all that? It was all the same. Nothing had been touched. It was all the same. It was nice. It was quite funny because you’d open a cupboard, and they’d be full of gold discs.”

So, it was an interesting and thrilling experience for Iommi and Sabbath to record their ‘Mob Rules’ in the studio in Lennon’s house. Although the recording of the track ‘The Mob Rules’ didn’t appear on the album, spending time in the Tittenhurst Lodge, which was left untouched after the Beatle’s passing, apparently was an unforgettable memory for the band.