TONY IOMMI, IAN GILLAN To Collaborate On New Music

Legendary heavy metal guitarist Tony Iommi (BLACK SABBATH, HEAVEN & HELL) has revealed to U.K.'s Metal Hammer magazine that he will collaborate on new music with his former SABBATH bandmate, singer Ian Gillan (DEEP PURPLE). Iommi tells the magazine, "Ian was at [my place] a few weeks back, and we put a couple of tracks down, just to try and raise some money for Armenia.

"We raised some money 20 years ago and we wanted to do it again, to be able to buy stuff.

"We went over a few months ago because they gave us an Order Of Honor from the president and so Ian and I went over and Pat Cash came. They showed us what the money had bought. They showed us this old music school; it was freezing and the kids had no instruments so we bought them some new instruments — drums and guitars — and we want to build a new school for the kids.

"We're going to do a few songs and, hopefully, we can raise the money to afford to buy them a new school.

"The plans are quite open at the moment.

"We've talked about doing a couple of shows out there, but it's about working round what we are both doing — because we [HEAVEN & HELL] hope touring will start again soon."

In October 2009, Gillan and Iommi were awarded the Orders Of Honor — which were delivered to them by Prime Minister of Armenia Tigran Sargsyan — for the Armenia Grateful To Rock program (see video below). The objective of the program, was to express gratitude to those musicians who 20 years ago participated in the Rock Aid Armenia.

In 1989, within the framework of Rock Aid Armenia, the British rock stars recorded DEEP PURPLE's classic "Smoke On The Water" and also released a disc called "Rock Aid Armenia".