The person who was instrumental in many of these tribute albums getting off the ground and being recorded is Bob Kulick. There are a number of tribute albums that came out during this period, of many different artists, and they all have Kulick as the instigator and organiser and producer behind them. He even plays on many of them. Prior to this album, Kulick had produced “Humanary Stew: A Tribute to Alice Cooper” and “Little Guitars: A Tribute to Van Halen”. So, he knew his way around the concept and knew what it needed in order to work. In regards to this particular album, this is a powerhouse tribute, with all of the artists involved well known for their own work during the 1980’s and 1990’s.
The most difficult part of organising a tribute on this scale for an artist such as Ozzy Osbourne is that, not only do you have to find lead vocalists who can do justice to Ozzy own unique singing style, but band members who can compete with the originals, and especially when it comes to the guitarist. For the songs chosen for this album, the original guitarists rank as some of the finest of all time in the heavy metal genre – Tony Iommi, Randy Rhoads, Jake E. Lee and Zakk Wylde. You don’t want to come in and do a half-arsed job, but neither do you want to just do a note-for-note repeat of what those guitarists played, you want to put your own signature on the song – just not so much that you destroy what is so good about the original. So, as you can see, not an easy task. But one that was taken on by Kulick and his fellow production members, and they ended up gathering a who’s who of the genre to produce this album, one that saw the light of day with the arrival of the new century in the year 2000.
The album has 11 tracks, with the majority coming from Ozzy’s career after leaving Black Sabbath. Indeed, it seems a little out of place that two of those 11 songs on the album are actually Black Sabbath songs, though I’m sure that the producers of the album would argue that they are two songs that Ozzy has continued to perform live through his whole career post-1978. And they are great songs. Everyone knows “Paranoid” and “Children of the Grave”, but surely there were so many other great songs that Ozzy has done since his split with Black Sabbath that it wasn’t necessary to revisit them?! “Children of the Grave” features band project mates Jeff Martin on vocals and Paul Gilbert on guitar, along with Scott Travis on drums, and Martin’s vocals are smooth and almost commercial in their performance of the song, while Guilbert and Travis emphasise their parts to create an enjoyable cover of this song. When it comes to “Paranoid”... I mean, what can you actually do to enhance the track? Stu Hamm and Gregg Bissonnette provide a solid rhythm for George Lynch to come in and blow his load all over the song to ensure everyone knows it is him playing guitar on it. Hey! It sounds great, so its no big deal, and Vince Neil’s vocals are not in any danger of having to break into any vocal acrobatics, so it all comes together nicely. But I’d love to have heard a couple of different songs covered.
“Suicide Solution” is covered by a band called The Flys who apparently had some traction around the time this album was conceived, and whose two brothers are a part of what is known as the First Family of Surfing... okay then... this is basically a remix of the original song, and in the long run is what I consider to be an irrelevant addition to the album. In some ways you can add the version of “Goodbye to Romance” here as well. Performed by the then-couple of Lisa Loeb and Dweezil Zappa, this acoustic ballad based cover of the... same styled ballad track... is that you would imagine it would be. Performed nicely, sung nicely... just... a nice track. Which to me misses the point of the album entirely. Yes, it proves that the song can be morphed into an acoustic guitar driven song that any market would enjoy. But amongst these other tracks and performances it seems out of place. Which, to be fair, is the same with the original song on its originally released album. But we’ll get to that down the track a little...
As to the remainder of the album, well it is fun to listen to. It opens up with “Mr Crowley”, and what an opening it is, with the perfectly played opening musical intro, and then the ominous pause, at which point Tim “Ripper” Owens comes in and SCREAMS that opening title to the song, which blows you backwards as it crashes out of the speakers. Enormous! Amazing! And then to top it off, Yngwie Malmsteen does an amazing job of reproducing the original riffing and especially solo sections of the song while still making it be a part of his own sound. It’s a great version of the original song, though Ripper does try to overperform a little when with a voice like his it isn’t necessary. This is followed by a wonderful version of “Over the Mountain”. Mark Slaughter’s vocals are spot on, retaining the energy and emotion of Ozzy’s vocals in a sterling performance, completely enhanced by Brad Gillis on guitar. Following Randy Rhoads’ tragic passing, Gillis completed the tour on the back of the “Diary of a Madman” album, so he would have played this a lot back at that time. His guitaring here is as awesome as always, backed by Eric Singer's precision drumming.
Then we have a terrific rendition of “Desire”, which is sung by one of the co-writers of the track, Lemmy Kilmister. Lemmy said before his death that he made more runs off the four songs he wrote for Ozzy’s “No More Tears” album than a dozen Motorhead albums. And Motorhead and Lemmy have done other cover versions of songs on other albums, but in the main it has been the band that has played on them, and so they manage to turn them into Motorhead songs, which is fantastic. Here however, Lemmy only sings, and the song itself is handled by other musicians. Competent musicians don’t get me wrong, with Richie Kotzen on guitar providing a very stylistic and personal rendition of lead guitar over the rhythm, which also sounds great. But Lemmy’s distinctive vocal style doesn’t quite match what is offered musically. It’s still a great version of the song, but one that could have been better either with Motorhead providing a Motorized version of the track or perhaps getting someone else to sing it. Whoever go the job of reprising “Crazy Train” was always on a hiding to nothing, but covered by the pounding drums from Jason Bonham, Dee Snider’s vocal is unique in itself, and does get better every time you listen to it. And Doug Aldrich, who was renown even at this time for being a guitarist who would always stay faithful to all guitarists original visions of the songs he plays on, puts in another great performance here to complete a great cover of this great song.
“Hellraiser” once again shows why it is one of Ozzy best ever songs, as this version melds the kings of AOR in Rainbow’s Joe Lynn Turner and Toto’s Steve Lukather and Mr Big’s Pat Torpey to provide another marvellous version of this song. Turner’s vocals are in top form here and Lukather’s guitaring is sublime. In the same way is the version here of “Shot in the Dark”, with Jeff Scott Soto’s vocals driving a smooth sound through the song, with Bruce Kulick providing a subdued performance on the guitar that understates Jake E. Lee’s original but still makes for an enjoyable interpretation. The album concludes with “I Don’t Know”, a surprisingly good version of this classic, with Jack Blades on vocals, Jeff Pilson on bass and Reb Beach riffing away on guitar. Another great combination to finish off an enjoyable release.
The plethora of tribute albums that had begun to be released in and around these years where not ones that I sought out at the time. In general, they would just... appear before me, often in searches on music downloading sites on the internet where they would pop up when searching for a particular artist. Many of them I have since purchased on CD. This album you can actually find on Bandcamp, on CD and vinyl!
So it was a little over 20 years ago that I first discovered it, and played it quite a bit. The most memorable time was on a boys trip off to visit some pubs in the Southern Highlands when I placed the CD in the stereo of the car... and the reaction from everyone in the car with that initial scream from Ripper Owens on the opening track of “Mr Crowley” Everyone jumped and said ‘holy crap! What the hell?!!’ That was a fun moment.
I do have a saying or a motto if you will when it comes to tribute albums or cover albums. And that is that these kinds of albums are fun for a while, but eventually you will want to go back to the original songs on the original albums and listen to the actual artist perform them. And that is true here once again. This is very much worth a listen, to hear how the songs are interpreted by all of those playing and singing. It is great. But you can’t beat the original versions and the original artists who created them and played on them. Ozzy is unique. So too his collection of guitarists and bass guitarists and drummers. All have their part to play. But as a true tribute to all of them, this is a worthy release.
I have spent the last couple of days reliving it once again for this podcast. I can’t say I’ve ever sat down and considered a list of my favourite tribute slash cover albums. This would rank highly if I did, I suspect. Maybe I should be doing that at the moment as well, just to pass the time...
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