There are icons and there are legends and then there are gods. Icons and legend secure their status through the music and performance and maybe through activism or charity. Gods become gods after the mythology has been cast in ancient stone. Gods are not common. Ozzy Osbourne is a god. God died this week.
I quote those lyrics because Ozzy never waited til everyone was gone to show “the stranger”. Ozzy was not a persona like Alice Cooper, it was his essence. Every part of Ozzy’s existence extended beyond the music into a realm of an unknowable higher power he was tapped into. Certain planes of being and certain fields of energy most don’t care to even face in a simple mirror but he dove head first into those dark spaces and places for questioning the other self. First with Black Sabbath and then his own trailblazing solo career. A career in heavy metal that extended beyond the caged confines of the genre to influence the entire music landscape and the broader world in general.
I wrote about my experiences with Ozzy as a child here.
His passing was not a surprise it was only a matter of time with his failing health but it doesn’t lesson the sting. I was never a heavy metal fan. I am a music fan first and the musicians I love most are the authentic musicians who drive their own cars be it a vintage 57 chevy, and Chrysler Cordoba, or hearse bound for hell.
Ozzy could not be anything other than Ozzy. He was, to steal from my queer community, “Born this way”. And thank the maker for that.
With the later 60s high off hippies and free love it was a rip in music space-time when Black Sabbath howled out from the tomb in 1970 with songs like Iron Man and War Pigs cloaked in a sound that seems to have been an immaculate conception. At least with Zeppelin one can lean back a see the blues foundation. Black Sabbath came from another realm unafraid to create lyrics and sonic landscapes that sounded “dark” and like they had recorded a nightmare or soundtracked “hell”. Even if the hell being sung about was on earth.
Side note: Black Sabbath recorded their first album completely live, which was totally uncommon and still is. This gives the album its very intense very present menace.
But their soundscape was not in fact a miracle birth it came from the human condition and living life. For life is not all Archies, “Sugar Sugar” and even when you had CCR railing, “It’s Ain’t Me” on “Fortunate Son” or any of Zappa’s proselytizing, there was still sunlight peaking through the clouds. Black Sabbath by today’s standards may not seem heavy but in 1970 it was as if the Grim Reaper had personally released a smoldering cloud of sonic shivers and shrills that could end the world or at the very least consume your soul alive.
And when I say Sabbath was dark I do not mean bleak, Ozzy and CO were just willing to go places others had not at least not not in such a heavy, loud, and dare I say poetic fashion. The blues always played with the devil for example, and country music and Irish ballads are loaded with dark tragedy and sometimes are even political in their plainspoken way.
But Sabbath added poetry to that darkness in ways we had never heard before 1970 both lyrically and sonically. It was music that did not merely tell you about tragic tales or meeting the devil at the crossroads it described them in visceral ways as if peaking into a magic mirror or crystal ball. If you want to talk about music blowing minds… lots of bands blew minds over the decades but Black Sabbath is one of the few I hear get named that are STILL blowing minds.
Putting aside the stupid, “Satanic Panic” of the 70s/80s and Ozzy’s own personal antics on and off stage. The one thing that I think often goes over looked with Sabbath and Ozzy’s solo work is that while it dances with death, there is a sense of humor in there and a sense of magic. The kind of old Hollywood magic from the 30s and 40s where in every frame or song you felt, “Can you believe we get to do this for a living?”
When listening to Black Sabbath or Ozzy’s solo work no matter how “heavy” it got you can feel passion but also the sheer joy that exudes from every second. I can imagine Ozzy thinking, Here I am this wild dude who gets to record and make fantastical and fearsome music. Some dude that the music gods of yore chose to create the world of heavy metal music.
And much like Jim Henson, Walt Disney, the Grimm Brothers and others they all understood it is OK scare and be scared sometimes it helps us overcome our fears and see that not all the shadow’s in the cave are what we have been led to believe. By making music that lets music fans gleefully play in dark subject matter it eased the burden those subjects bring.
And Black Sabbath blew the doors, walls, and roof off the mausoleum of morbidity allowing others like Judas Priest and Iron Maiden, Metallica, Slayer, Anthrax and even people like Alice Cooper and others to ride those flying flaming shrapnel of rock off into the future creating sub-genres of sub-genres of metal.
In all my music research and studies I can attest that Heavy metal and punk rock are the two genres that have truly gone global. Genres that have largely stayed true to their roots no matter what country then infiltrate and shake up. Just about every country or culture I have looked at has a metal scene and metal bands. All engaging with the relatable themes of war, of hell, and yes even out and out wizardry and mythological tales.
And it all started with Sabbath and Ozzy and that great hero’s journey that included struggles with addiction and health and yes, biting the head off a bat. A adventure where along the way he created a chosen family for outcasts who like there music just a little bit louder and rougher and sometimes sillier than your average music fan. A community that, despite the media clichés and prejudices tossed about, to this day is still one of the most welcoming, fun, and chill music fandoms (even with the slam pits). Ozzy is Heavy Metals one true god watching over us from above now with that glorious mischievous grin as seen on the cover of the album, Diary Of A Madman.
So climb aboard the crazy train boys and girls and let’s blow out some speakers as we ride through catacombs and cemeteries it will be a frighteningly macabre good time. Don’t worry it will be OK, Ozzy is the conductor.
