Tuesday, January 31, 2006

103. Various Artists / Bat Head Soup : A Tribute To Ozzy / 2000. 4/5.

This is an interesting mixture of artists doing an array of Ozzy Osbourne songs in differing styles. And you couldn't start the album any better than with Ripper Owens hitting unknown heights with the opening scream of “Miiiiiiiiiiiiiiister Crooooooooooowley!!!”, as only Ripper can! Yngwie Malmsteen is also a perfect foil to play Randy Rhoads' guitaring through this song.

This compilation continues the excellent number of tribute releases for metal artists in the past decade. Highlights include Lemmy singing Desire (which he co-wrote), Brad Gillis' guitaring on Over The Mountain, a sensational version of Hellraiser, in which Joe Lynn Turner does a fantastic vocal performance, and a very... well... weak performance by Vince Neil on Paranoid (and do they really have to do Paranoid? And if you did, wouldn't you try something different?).

Memories : Hearing JLT singing Hellraiser just reminded me of how good a vocalist he is. Takes you back to his days in Rainbow.

Rating : A pretty impressive effort, perhaps let down a little with the Sabbath tracks, when there were so many of his solo songs that could have been done instead. 4/5.

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