Former Black Sabbath Keyboardist Geoff Nicholls Passes Away

Former Black Sabbath keyboardist Geoff Nicholls died yesterday morning (January 28th) after a battle with lung cancer. He was 68.

Nicholls first joined Black Sabbath as a second guitarist in the late ’70s, and briefly played bass for the band when Geezer Butler took a leave of absence in 1980. When Butler returned Nicholls was moved over to the keys, and he lent his talents to all of their albums from Heaven and Hell (1980) to Forbidden (1995).

Nicholls’ status in the band was often murky; he was only allowed official “member” status for brief stints, and was relegated to side or back stage during live shows. From Wikipedia:

… he was not an official member until 1986. He remained an official member until 1991, then regained member status from 1993 to 1996. He was an unofficial member once again since the reunion with Ozzy Osbourne in 1997. Although his main role with Sabbath has been on the keyboard, Nicholls also played some rhythm guitar on the reunion tours, e.g., during Iommi’s solo in “Snowblind” and a few tracks during the Headless Cross (1989) and Forbidden (1995) tours.

In addition to not always being credited as a full member of the band, Nicholls has rarely appeared on stage proper during Sabbath shows; instead he usually played from a side-stage or backstage position. One exception to this was the tour in support of the album Seventh Star (1986), wherein he played on stage as an equal member of the band. Another is a concert in May 1988, wherein Nicholls played bass for a charity function.

Nicholls played with former Black Sabbath vocalist Tony Martin in the latter’s band Tony Martin’s Headless Cross until his death, and joined his pre-Sabbath band Quartz when they reunited in 2011.

Geezer Butler and Tony Iommi both posted tributes on social media, which you can see below.

Best wishes to Nicholls’ family and friends from everyone here at MS.

[via Loudwire]