Readers Write In #832: RIP Ozzy Osbourne – Farewell Prince of Darkness

By Madan Mohan

Dave Hurwitz (Classics Today) has recently acquainted me with the concept of, as he calls it, an obitchuary.  Which, despite the provocative name, is actually still a fair and respectful tribute to a recently departed artist, just not one that whitewashes and deifies the departed soul for reason only that they died. Well, Hurwitz is a man after my heart!  This is a concept that appeals to me and I can’t think of a better opportunity to employ it myself than in paying tribute to a flawed rockstar, one whom I loved (sort of, will get to that) and one who also did stuff I don’t love so much.  Ozzy Osbourne, legendary frontman of heavy metal band Black Sabbath, passed away yesterday at the age of 76.

First things first, as a rock and metal lover, I would be practically stating the obvious to say I love Black Sabbath.  Unless you compulsively steered clear of classic rock (some do and nothing wrong with that) or are still hung up on the notion of a Sabbath-Deep Purple rivalry, you would count yourself among the ranks of those who love this band, the Godfather of metal and a band that unleashed a run of classic albums from the debut through to Sabotage.  Yes, if you believed the rock mags and stuck only to Paranoid, please do make amends now – better late than never!

But did I love Ozzy Osbourne’s vocals on these albums?  That’s more complicated.  Having heard other singers, including the late, great Ronnie James Dio, perform his songs, I have to say Ozzy’s voice peculiarly fit the sound of those classic albums, like hand to glove.  I want to be irritated by the nasality and sometimes grating comic effect (intentional or not) in his singing but I can’t – it works superbly.  It isn’t only Lars Ulrich who struggles to match Bill Ward’s swinging rhythms on Metallica’s cover of Sabracababra; James Hetfield doesn’t fare much better in attempting to recreate Ozzy’s vocal lines.

This was a gift that Ozzy didn’t take very long in becoming aware of…and milking to the hilt.

At first, it was innocent enough. Ozzy slipped up through the late 70s and was fired from the band in 1979.  While Black Sabbath moved on with Dio (for a while, there lies another tale), Ozzy didn’t hang around for too long.  He began an extremely successful (understatement!) solo career with 1980’s Blizzard of Oz, uniting with ace shredder Randy Rhoads.  It is so ironic that as bluesy Iommi swapped Ozzy for the virtuosic Dio, so too Ozzy had by his side a guitarist who could render solos which, let’s face it, were simply out of Iommi’s grasp in terms of technique.  If Ozzy made much more mainstream-oriented hard rock/heavy metal laced with dazzling solos, Iommi leaned on Dio to set, along with the Iron Maiden debut and Judas Priest’s clutch of late 70s masterpieces, the direction of heavy metal for the 80s.  The Black Sabbath you hear on 1979’s Heaven and Hell is a stunningly modernised and energised outfit, galvanized by the power and range of their new singer (who had already made waves with Ritchie Blackmore’s Rainbow, mind you).

After another successful outing together for Ozzy and Rhoads, 1981’s Diary of a Madman, Rhoads died tragically in a plane crash.  But Ozzy had found the formula to cement his position as a solo metal God – he would simply join hands with the next new hot guitarist.  Their solos, his Ozzy-ness.  Not my trip, personally, but it was undeniably successful. First it was Jake E Lee, then Zakk Wylde, who stayed on, barring an early 00s break, with Ozzy till the last album, 2022’s Patient Number 9. 

In the meantime, Iommi had a good thing going with Dio but the clash of two big egos came to a head post the 1982 live album Live Evil and, thereafter, a revolving door of vocalists for the rest of the 80s meant Iommi royally screwed the pooch. I do like Tony Martin and Ray Gillen could have been a like-for-like replacement for Dio had he and Iommi not allegedly gotten into fisticuffs (!) but that’s another story.  This was undeniably the nadir of Black Sabbath.

After 1995’s disastrous Forbidden, Dio was all set to rejoin Black Sabbath.  Just then, Ozzy, having vacillated previously on the matter, manoeuvred a reunion concert with Black Sabbath.  Dio said, “Me or him” and Iommi shrugged.  He had no choice in the matter. Ozzy it was!

Dio did return for a triumphant swansong, 2009’s The Devil You Know under the band name Heaven and Hell.  He died shortly after, leaving the field open for Ozzy to walk in and out of Black Sabbath as he wished.  Iommi too appeared to be reconciled to this reality by now.  The heavy drug user and one time bat eater Ozzy Osbourne had outlived his arch-rival for the spot of Black Sabbath frontman.  Prince of Darkness indeed!

But this isn’t where the story ends.  Back in 2005, Iron Maiden were on the Ozzfest line up (Ozzfest being a rock festival managed by Ozzy and his wife Sharon Osbourne).  The frontman of Iron Maiden, Bruce Dickinson, couldn’t help indulge his ego from the stage, issuing jibes at Ozzy, saying the band didn’t need a teleprompter or didn’t need a reality TV show to be relevant.  In response, Sharon planted members in the audience to throw eggs and other items at the band.  A like-for-like verbal response was, apparently, not deemed enough.  It is not clear if Bruce and the Osbournes ever made up and no Kiss-Cams were available to confirm.

Perhaps, some of the flaws attributed to Ozzy also accrue through the management of his career by the Machiavellian Sharon. In this, Ozzy shared another similarity with Dio, whose wife Wendy too was loathed by many in the rock world.  Shall we say, behind every successful metal God frontman is a ruthless wife!

Like many other enfant terribles of rock, Ozzy’s reputation had been substantially rehabilitated by, if nothing else, the passage of time.  Ozzy, like the other rock stars of the classic era, had become a hologram (well, he will become one now for sure, if you get the drift!) for the memories of those who grew up with this music and for the fantasies of those who may wished to have had that opportunity and looked to reunion shows to make up for that lack. 

In the run up to his farewell concert weeks before his death, he had wondered aloud if he and they could even make it through the show.  Did he know?  We’ll never know.  But the timing made it all the more poignant.  Everyone who turned up for the show, held on July 5, in Birmingham, will be able to say they saw The Prince of Darkness on stage for the very last time.  This time, there will be no more do-overs.  Fare thee well, Ozzman!