The comforting return of Dio bloody Dio

When Black Sabbath is truly inspired and firing on all cylinders, its music is infiltrated by a delightfully foreboding sense of apocalyptic imminence and gloom. An overwhelming atmosphere pervades, establishing feelings of awe, thrill and emotional connection through exhilaration. Even after years of overplay, when hunkering down to spin albums such as Paranoid, Sabotage, Heaven and Hell or Mob Rules, there's no denying the musk of metallic power and grace the quartet unleashes. They haven't been that awesome for years.

Despite the intended transparency of their name change, Heaven And Hell — when Iommi and bassist Geezer Butler are joined by drummer Vinny Appice and singer Ronnie James Dio — is Sabbath. And they've almost hit that old stride once again with their debut effort The Devil You Know. The first new material from the quartet since 1992's Dehumanizer, this album is a patient, methodical assault of thick riffs, steady rhythms and Dio's soaring, enchanting vocals. Like the metallic equivalent of dramatic opera, songs such as “Atom And Evil,” “Eating the Cannibals” and “Bible Black” relish in Dio's penchant for elaborate tales of fantastical mystery and otherworldly endeavours.

In essence, The Devil You Know is proto power-metal. Like its generic predecessors (which are really bands influenced by Sabbath in the first place), the album follows dynamic musical arcs. However, Heaven And Hell allow these 10 tracks to flow with a more rudimentary form of the underlying genre characteristics. In other words, the The Devil You Know overflows with guttural, instinctual influence to establish a captivating journey of descriptive narratives and creative musicianship, eschewing the hyperactivity and technical prodigiousness that define modern power metal.

Performance-wise, The Devil You Know is spot-on. Dio's enviable vocal gymnastics soar and twist, and the band sounds as tight as ever, bolstered by Iommi's solid, grinding riffs. Guitars should have been showcased more (which would mean Dio shutting up for a few seconds) and there's a great deal of grandiosity where the streamlined simplicity of a demonic four-piece would have sufficed, but that's typical of Dio-era Sabbath. The album still maturely slow-burns through its enduring grooves.

While The Devil You Know is a feast of primal Sabbath — er, Heaven And Hell — its inherent pleasure lies in the obvious. It's the comforting return of a confident, familiar beast. And while no particular song or moment shines through as an instant classic, the album rides a fine line between nostalgia and progressive stability. It's not mind-blowing, but it doesn't suck. It's just a formidable, enduring entry to the long, storied career of Black Sabbath.