Epic
While the Ozzman has become somewhat of a running gag over the past oh decade once was a time when the Prince of Darkness was actually provocative entertaining and a great musician to boot. Reiterating his flash-in-the-pan abilities with the advent of a solo career these revised (yet again) versions of his first and second solitary ventures celebrate the magic and mystique of a young hungry man looking to escape the shadow of the successful beast that was Black Sabbath. Like David Lee Roth but with more than a couple of stupid cover songs.
Naturally both albums benefit from remastering — which only goes so far as to highlight the initial mixing’s limitations — and varying degrees of extras. Blizzard of Ozz features an expanded booklet with photos lyrics and three throwaway extra tracks in “You Looking at Me Looking at You” an “acoustic” version of “Goodbye to Romance” and a minute-plus of guitarist Randy Rhodes fucking around in the studio. Big whoop. It does little to justify buying an album any self-respecting Ozzy fan probably has on vinyl eight-track cassette CD mini-disc and just about any other format.
Diary of a Madman fares a touch better thanks to a double-CD offering of the studio album and live set from the Blizzard of Ozz tour (which should have been paired with its respective album no?) digi-pak and colour booklet. Either way while these “re-imaginings” are only a way to boost slumping sales they do emphasize how great and sorely overlooked Ozz’s early years truly were. While somewhat dated due to goofy synthesizers the meat of classic tunes such as “Flying High Again” “Tonight” “Crazy Train” and “Suicide Solution” ensure that even with his stupidity and bad musical choices these cuts keep this metallion’s stamp eternally emblazoned on the history of heavy music.
