Black Sabbath's original line-up reunite for new album and tour

Black Sabbath's original line-up is reuniting to record a new album and play a world tour, the band has announced.

Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward made the announcement at a press conference in Los Angeles on 11 November. It will be the first album featuring all four original members since 1978.

Back together

The band, formed in Aston in 1968, have come together on and off in recent years, but have not recorded a full album together for more than three decades. The new record is to be produced by Rick Rubin, and the band will headline the Download festival at Donington Park next summer as part of a world tour.

The pioneers of heavy metal

Black Sabbath are widely credited with creating heavy metal. Their first three albums, Black Sabbath and Paranoid, both released in 1970, and Master of Reality in 1971, are regarded as landmarks of rock music, and Paranoid went to number one in the UK album chart.

The band have sold more than 70 million records and were inducted into the UK Music Hall of Fame in 2005 and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2006.

A turbulent history

Osbourne was sacked from the band in 1979 and went on to enormous success as a solo artist and later as a television personality, while Iommi continued Black Sabbath with a series of other singers, including Ronnie James Dio and Ian Gillan.

The original four reunited in 1997 for live shows and a live album, Reunion, and toured on and off until 2005. Iommi and Butler then played with Dio as Heaven and Hell, releasing an album in 2009, before Dio's death last year.

Aston roots

The band's roots are firmly in Birmingham. Iommi and Ward had been playing together before they recruited Butler and Osbourne, who had placed an advertisement in a local music shop. They played early gigs in the city's clubs and pubs under names including the Polka Tulk Blues Band and Earth before settling on Black Sabbath.

Osbourne was honoured with a star on Birmingham's Walk of Stars on Broad Street in 2007.

Excitement in the city

The news will delight fans in Birmingham and around the world, many of whom never expected to hear new music from the original line-up. There is already speculation about whether the tour will include a homecoming show in the city where it all began.

For a band whose members are now in their sixties, the reunion is a remarkable chapter in a story that began in the back streets of Aston more than 40 years ago.