Login / RegisterOzzy Osbourne shows Vancouver he's "still fucking crazy"
At Rogers Arena on Sunday, November 14
The most entertaining part of Sunday night’s Ozzy Osbourne concert may well have occurred before the 61-year-old metal legend actually hit the stage. In the lead-up to his appearance a clip was shown in which Osbourne’s mischievous countenance was comically transposed onto the faces of various characters from movies and TV. So we had the Ozzman showing up in an episode of Jersey Shore to swear at and upset that reality show’s main skank, Snooki, before turning up in a forest scene from Twilight to tell Bella: “Vampires are pussies. I’m the Prince of fucking Darkness!”
The clip also showed Ozzy’s self-deprecating humour by placing him in scenes from The Hangover, Iron Man 2, and the Lady Gaga video for “Telephone”. It’s just kind of a shame that the joke had to carry over to his actual performance, because Osbourne’s singing is really getting to the point where it’s not even funny anymore.
“Let the madness begin!” hollered Ozzy as his band ripped into “Bark at the Moon”, one of the best songs of his post-Black Sabbath solo career. It was clear from the get-go that his current band—lead guitarist Gus G., bassist Rob “Blasko” Nicholson, drummer Tommy Clufetos, and keyboardist-guitarist Adam Wakeman—is a force to be reckoned with, but as the night wore on it got harder and harder for them to mask the increasing weakness of Ozzy’s vocals.
For his part Ozzy would constantly exhort the audience to go crazy, as if nothing mattered but going crazier and crazier. “I’m still fucking crazy!” he bellowed. “You’re not fucking wild enough yet!” Then he’d attempt to incite the insanity by hosing down the floor crowd with foam, which actually seemed to do the trick.
But what worked best to make Ozzy’s hard-core followers go crazy like he wanted was to play a Black Sabbath tune, whether a classic Sab track like “Iron Man” or a lesser-known one like “Fairies Wear Boots”. It’s pretty obvious that his best career move at this juncture—now that Ronnie James Dio has passed on—would be to regroup with the original Sabbath members and try to recapture some of that '70s magic. He’d need to get his singing up to snuff, though.
Opening act Halford fared much better as far as vocals were concerned, as lead screamer Rob Halford—best known as the frontman for Judas Priest—can still bring the throat noise at the age of 59. His quintet focused on tunes from its new album Made of Metal, but it was the Priest material that got the biggest response. After a performance of “The Green Manalishi (With the Two-Prong Crown)”, a track off Judas Priest’s live Unleashed in the East album of '79, a guy behind me declared, “That’s a fucking good song!” I’m not sure if he knew it was originally recorded by the British blues band Fleetwood Mac 40 years ago.
The other cover that went over big during Halford’s 50-minute set was “Diamonds & Rust”, the Joan Baez tune that Judas Priest redid on its Sin After Sin album of '77. Four years earlier Nazareth had started the short-lived trend of turning female-sung folk songs into hard-rock hits with Joni Mitchell’s “This Flight Tonight”. Maybe Halford—or better yet, Ozzy—should try and kick-start a revival of the trend. I for one would love to hear the Prince of fucking Darkness forge a metal anthem out of Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now”.
You can follow Steve Newton on Twitter at twitter.com/earofnewt.
It would be nice if he'd retire with a modicum of dignity left but I guess Sharon wants to flog the last possible buck out of that dead horse.
Aside from not wanting to waste $100 for a floor ticket to watch Ozzy fart and drool his way through the classics (since when is 'Fairies Wear boots' lesser-known?) the main reason I opted out of attending was, over at the Rickshaw last night a top-notch metal show took place with some real princes of darkness. Sweden's blackmetal masters Watain put on one of the most theatrical -if downright smelly- shows the Rickshaw's seen in a while. All four bands on the bill were actually impressive, presumably far more so than doddering old Ozzy and his off-tune butchering of his former glories.
he was awful but the rest of the band was awesome
As for his voice, Ozzy has a throat infection now, picked up during his recent world travels, but instead of canceling again (the memories of the 80's flooding back again) he came out and gave it hell all the same, as he always does.
Kyle: You are making comments based on a YouTube video and didn't even go to the show yourself? I've heard many unqualified opinions before but that one just steals the show. 'He sucks now, but I didn't go...' Way to go, Kyle! Did you just finish reading "Being Dumb, for Dummies?"
As far as Ozzy / Dio comparisons go, we may as well be comparing Windows / MAC or the ever tiring Zakk vs Gus G.
There is no point in it at all, and how irrelevant too! Dio was unbelievable with Heaven & Hell and Sabbath (same thing different day of course) as was Ozzy, however Ozzy is the front man, DIO was the vocalist and the two can never compare. I LOVED Dio's solo albums and, with all due respect if we are to measure solo careers, I think it's pretty obvious who saw greater success in the solo arena.
Ozzy's not a legendary vocalist? So what, he's undeniably a great front man and his show sold a lot more tickets than the last Heaven & Hell show, by a long shot. Again I say this with all due respect and no shot at Dio, RIP!
Regardless, they each shone in their own very unique ways.
The venue, OH EM GEE!
If we could only get the bigger acts to squeeze into the Coliseum for two nights, so we don't have to deal with seats on the floor at a metal show and these wannabe security guards who normally work at Fields, deliver Real Estate Weekly or pizzas. These 'public safety professionals' who were clearly bullied in school or beaten by their parents for being useless, these nobody's on power trips from Vancouver's worst and most inexperienced security service, Prime Time Security.
These shows would be a thousand times better somewhere with better acoustics and staff!
I was in the middle of the floor, then at the front of the floor then at the back of the floor, great sound desk and engineers but acoustically the venue still absolutely sucked the sweaty ballsack.
While ranting on venue, I've never liked the garage, or is it the 'phone booth' now? Rogers Arena is a horrific venue that should just be pulled down and turned into a giant pigeon park where shopping cart dwellers can stretch their legs instead of cramping in on East Hastings.
Crap acoustics, crap venue, crap parking, crap staff, crap......yeah. They completely screwed up the Canucks game experience and they trounce on music.
But hey, if they can fit more people in and charge more, who cares about the visitor's experience?
Vancouver's got some great venues for acoustics and especially rock sound staging, to think that Rogers Arena is used so often simply because you can cram more people into it, while sacrificing sound quality, just illustrates how North America has forgotten about properly staging shows and is more focused on the money grab instead.
Can't stop the ringing of my funeral bell.
ever hear of Payback time
BTW in 2002 Ozzy no-showed Seattles ozzfest with a sore throat and when I saw him in 2004 he blamed his shit performance on the same
I was row 2 front and center and went the vip M&G route.
I have been to several Ozzy shows, including Ozfest the other year, but out in Calgary.Ozzy will always be one of the Metal greats.
Yes, he is in his 60s, yes his voice did break apart (on only a couple of songs, but substantially so), and yes he does not move the greatest anymore but you know what - I had a blast, and loved it.
The show was great, revisiting my teen years of Ozzy and being part of what my be his last Vancouver hurrah - I am very glad I went. I could only hope to have that mush energy and talent when I am in my 60s.
I can't imagine someone not enjoying the show, and given he has been rocking longer than I have been alive, I am apt to give him a bit of leeway.
PS: Janiti - that sucks large, total BS - I would be so pissed - but blame the venue, not the band (I'd definitely go chat with Rogers Arena about that)
I had a great time. Totally glad I went. He just gave 'er. If you were expecting the 25 or 30 year old Ozzy, give your head a shake.
I hope he comes back again.
GM Place/Rogers Arena has for years had a reputation for the most overzealous security guards in Vancouver. Janiti's story is just one of countless examples of the disproportionate bullshit they pull on a regular basis.
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