Ozzy Osbourne - Blizzard of Ozz
September 20 1980
By Anthony Desantis
Ozzy Osbourne
Blizzard of Ozz
Genre: Shuffling drunkenly away from classically trained but angry bees.
Allen’s Rating: 5 out of 5 (there are reasons)
Anthony’s Rating: 4.5 out of 5
Classical music and angry bees.
Classical Music: I get the sense that many metal musicians in the early days of the form had a chip on their shoulders with respect to being taken seriously. Perhaps their answer to that was to constantly flout their classical music training and try to add classical flourishes to every intro, outro, and bridge of what are otherwise head-banging blues rockers. It made for an interesting foment. Flatulent opuses that were deliciously skewered in “Spinal Tap” using the “Ston’enge” motif. I still cry laughing when the 2’ Stonehenge narrowly misses being stepped on by the dwarves who dance around it at the Druids’ behest. Randy Rhoads was guilty of this.
Angry bees: I tend to prefer the rumble of bass to the whine of treble. I like music that you feel in your gut, not your nasal cavity. Randy Rhoads’ guitar sounds to me like an angry swarm of treble bees. I don’t know why but I still dig it.
I was a geek in about 7th grade who was on his third school in about 5 years across 3 states (circa 1981) when I first heard Diary of a Madman, Ozzy’s second album. I actually thought it was his first. I remember taking my most prized possession, an early boombox that had dual tape decks - one in the front with the swing down door and one on the side that popped in like a car player - to the playground. I sucked up my courage and brought it over to the cool kids, Steven Schoenhaus and Mark Engelman, telling them that I’d heard this new music. I imagined that knowing some cool new music would help my standing. “My older brother turned me on to this. Have you heard it?” (Please like me.) “Oh. Yeah. That’s Ozzy.” Bell rings. Everyone goes inside. I am deflated. I did later turn that around by playing “Speak of the Devil” and knowingly singing all the words to my little cousin on a boat ride off Long Beach Island. That made me feel cool. I knew stuff.
All this to say that Ozzy, despite my initial playground failure at Raritan Valley Elementary, was my first recollection of digging music and having some small dusting of coolness that came from knowing some music that not EVERYONE knew about. They didn’t ever play it on WPLJ in the mornings on my tortuous bus ride or anywhere else that I knew of back then.
So, you can imagine me in my 7th/8th grade bedroom which was painted dark purple with an orchid deep pile shag rug that my parents got for me from some classified ad listening to Ozzy over and over on my dual cassette-decked boom box.
“I Don’t Know” - There are conflicting takes on who wrote what songs and to what degree Ozzy was or was not sober during much of the recording process. You can clearly see the results of that lifestyle as Mr. Osbourne mumbled his way through his reality show many years later. Supposedly the bulk of the music was written by Randy Rhoads who came to the band after leaving Quiet Riot. He writes a hard driving buzz saw guitar rocker that Ozzy whines over - talking about how y’all should stop asking him shit. He doesn’t know anything about anything. At 2:25 Insert Rush 2112 style bridge where one could imagine Ozzy cavorting with dark fairies while lamenting his lack of inclusion in the general knowing. Then back to rocking out to the end with bass and guitar runs and flourishes. Those flourishes eventually reminded me of David Lee Roth’s screeches and howls. Too many of them, too often.
Still: For a post Sabbath kick off he got going on the right foot. 5 meat pies out of 5. Classic. We’re off and rocking into…
“Crazy Train” - Randy Rhoads again helps Ozzy distance himself from Black Sabbath. This to me is Ozzy’s anthem. He’s nuts. He’s drunk. He’s high. He’s eating flying rodents and he’s singing about it. This one gets your index and pinky fingers up and pounding. Love it.
5 sides of bacon out of 5
“Goodye to Romance” - But then…..Ozzy and company (Rhoads again) insert obligatory downer metal ballad. This one could have come from a Dan Fogelberg or Gilbert O’Sullivan album. Meh. But remember, I was in a purple room back then and having pre-teen angst. I knew I wasn’t cool and I didn’t know much so, “gee, this must be good, right?” Supposedly this song was Ozzy’s musical breakup letter to Black Sabbath. I doubt any of them cried.
3 overstuffed sausages out of 5
“Dee” - For sooth, ’tis a fine night for a flagon of mead which I shall have with a trencher of mutton stew. Shove this crap.
0 foie gras
“Suicide Solution” - Oh, Ozzy. Your occult nonsense persona got you in trouble didn’t it. A pre-teen like me who maybe didn’t have the same defense mechanism of dark wit that I did left a note that this song may have influenced his decision to cash in his chips early. It’s ridiculous what musicians will say about their own lyrics when confronted with a lawsuit. “It was about vaginas, I swear.” It’s a song, man. Let it go. And it’s fun.
4 ham sandwiches out of 5
“Mr. Crowley” - Why? I suppose this is the musical continuation of the Dark magic, occult Ozzy that flowed through Black Sabbath in songs like “The Wizard”, “Iron Man”, etc. The opening 1 minute long synth section sounds like the Muppet Show waiting for Vincent Price to stop in and say a little something. Later there’s an acclaimed guitar solo that sounds…like a guitar solo. I think I lost interest in the solo era a while ago. Thanks, Nigel Tufnel. There are actually two masturbatory solos, the second being the outdo. The total solo time, then is One minute and thirty-five seconds of a five minute song. The song itself, according to Ozzy was just his taking a vague interest in a topic - Aleister Crowley - that everyone was talking about at the time. No darkness theme, says he. All bats are safe.
4 welsh rare bits out of 5
“No Bone Movies” - Supposedly Ozzy and the boys went to a dirty movie and the bass player wasn’t into it. So he wrote this anthem against porn. Ok.
3 blood sausages out of 5
“Revelation Mother Earth” - Who knew? Ozzy was against climate change and intercultural hate and strife all the way back in 1980. Maybe? Maybe Joe Biden can use this as his entrance music. Is there a Metal Lobby? Untapped constituency? They lost me with the lumbering piano solo. More Neo-classical metal nonsense. I don’t see his name in the credits but it could have been Liberace uncredited. I do dig the final driving death chord section even with the whiny solo. Maybe Slash was listening to this when constructing that November Rain solo section at the end of that song. Maybe not.
2 greasy newspapers full of chips out of 5
“Steal Away The Night” - Good old rock n roll. Great way to end it. Even when he’s singing about chics and partying and such, he still puts his own twist on it. “Broken chains and broken rules. Let it be rebellion rules the night.” Poison is not going to write that.
5 monte cristos out of 5
In conclusion: I loved the weirdo outsider of Oz then and I can totally jam out to him now. I stayed on the Crazy Train all the way to Bark At The Moon. He sang about shit that I didn’t know what he was talking about and that sounded mysterious and cool. He laid it all over some pretty straight forward blues rock and those infernal testosterone solo nonsenses. If I’m a drunken dude who just left an extremely successful band in Black Sabbath that had carved a solid niche for itself, then I’m pretty happy that I’m somehow able to pull together a really solid bunch of musicians who can partially carry me to post Sabbath success. Rock on, Weirdo.
Overall: 4.5 Haggis of 5
After all the above treats you get the fat, tattooed Ozzy in spandex from the Speak of the Devil live show. Pasty, English, and bloated.
https://open.spotify.com/album/6aGfK3YpRxZ1rJfaNRckLH?si=5poAiEvZSBWRj_usWV7j1w
