Godspeed to a lighthearted Prince of Darkness

Unreal, less than three weeks after “Back to the Beginning,” the end of the road for a once in a generation frontman.

Farewell Ozzy Osbourne.

Ozzy was not a musical genius, save his voice, which was awesome and inimitable. He resides firmly in this old and flawed Top 10 heavy metal vocalists list which I should probably update. 

He was the face of heavy metal, and its soul. If not its brightest talent its center, the sun around which the rest of the metal universe revolved. His charisma was off the charts. The world turned out to see him and Black Sabbath off in Birmingham, which you don’t do for assholes.

I think some of Ozzy’s solo material is overlooked. Certainly not “Crazy Train,” “Bark at the Moon,” “Mr. Crowley” or “Mama I’m Coming Home,” but how about “Fire in the Sky,” “Mr. Tinkertrain” or “The Ultimate Sin”? 

As I noted in my Black Sabbath post our metal heroes are dying off, and the list is getting longer. Lemmy, Dio, EVH, Paul Di'Anno, and now Ozzy. That’s how it goes, none of us are getting out alive.

It makes me sad of course, but also reflective, and expansive. Paradoxically death opens my heart. See enough of it, and you realize life is too short for grudges and pettiness and trying to “own” each other. How about more celebration of the good, of reading and taking a few notes from the “Diary of a Madman” who wrang every fucking bead of sweat out of this life?

Maybe if we can all stop hating each other for five minutes and realize that we’re walking a finite and short path on a spinning ball of rock in the darkness of an unfathomably massive void we’d all be … a little happier? Or at least more appreciative of the miracle of our own lives. Ozzy had his dark moments and transgressions and addictions, but the outpourings of support confirm a few common traits: He laughed a lot, he cared about his friends, and he was hopeful.

Maybe it’s not too late

To learn how to love, and forget how to hate