siLLy puPPy Despite claiming that “No More Tears” would be his last album and even followed it up with an aptly named “No More Tours” jaunt around the world, OZZY OSBOURNE didn’t take to retirement too keenly and lo and behold found himself in the studios again to record his seventh studio album OZZMOSIS which came out four years after his last majorly successful comeback album. This is a rather unique album in all of his canon in not only lineup but also for its dipping into the current alternative rock and metal scene. While most of the band members from the past jumped ship after the previous album and tour, Zakk Wylde returned for guitar duties.

Also on board for OZZMOSIS is Geezer Butler who had just left Black Sabbath for the umpteenth time and on drums Deen Castronovo joined the team after serving in Wild Dogs and Bad English. His mellow AOR ballad band history shines through on this one. Also new to the mix was Rick Wakeman on keyboards. Yes, that Rick Wakeman of the progressive rock superstar band Yes and his first appearance with OZZY on an album since the 1973 Black Sabbath album “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath” when Yes and Sabbath were recording in adjacent studios. Unfortunately despite one of the most accomplished prog rock keyboard wizards on board, there isn’t much in keyboard virtuosity.

OZZMOSIS was another hit for OZZY as it reached number 4 on the Billboard album charts and went on to be certified triple platinum. This was one of those huge productions unlike any of his earlier albums with a whole army of engineering assistants and production and mastering crews. As well as OZZY and Zakk Wylde contributing in the songwriting department, so too did Geezer Butler and quite a few others including Steve Vai, Dream Theater’s John Purdell and Motorhead’s Lemmy Kilmister. Originally Steve Vai was on board to join the team on guitar duties but had a clash of personalities with OZZY allowing Wylde to jump back in the guitarist’s role once again.

Stylistically OZZMOSIS is a lot mellower than any other previous OZZY album. Starting with “No More Tears” he had shed the lunatic madman image and cleaned up his act. That album emerged at the tail end of the glam metal scene and a lot had changed in the next couple of years. Once Nirvana released their mega-hit “Nevermind,” the entire music scene shifted towards alternative rock and grunge and suddenly anything 80s wasn’t cool and bands like Soundgarden, Alice In Chains and Stone Temple Pilots were suddenly kings of the music scene. While many an 80s metal band attempted to adapt to the sudden changes, very few did it in a convincing way, however OZZY pulled off quite a convincing mix of the melodic heavy metal of the 80s with a spruced up take on alternative rock.

The album starts off with extraordinary strong single “Perry Mason,” which while sounding like classic OZZY is a bit of a head scratcher for subject matter for only a decade prior, OZZY was akin to the devil for the far right and no longer was he biting off bats but singing about TV based law shows. The album is rather mellow as a majority of the tracks are pop rock ballads with an alternative edge. “I Just Want You,” “Ghost Behind My Eyes” and “See You On The Other Side” are all catchy and subdued rockers that are much slower pop oriented than anything of the past. The only real metal cruncher on the entire album is “Thunder Underground” that unleashes the full Zakk Wylde guitar fury. “I Just Want You” even has a rather Nirvana type of rhythmic drive and i could easily imagine Kurt Cobain at the helm incomprehensibly screaming his heart out.

This has always been my least favorite OZZY album because of the lack of iconic metal compositions but as i’ve listened to this again after so many years for the sake of reviewing, i haven’t given this album a fair shake. True that it’s not OZZY’s most metal and it’s not his most innovative and it is certainly not the one with the most pyrotechnic guitar soloing flair, however it is chock full of catchy melodies and is probably the most Sabbath sounding of all his solo efforts for the obvious reason of Geezer contributing bass. It’s also one of the best produced albums of the 90s as the instrumentation blends together like a symphony without being overproduced. True this will never top my personal charts but not as bad as i remembered. The only complaint i have is that it doesn’t seem like OZZY evolved very much and he simply settled into a comfort zone that suited the time. While that was nothing out of the ordinary for the day, it certainly shows all these years later..

Kingcrimsonprog Ozzy Osbourne’s seventh full length studio album Ozzmosis was released in 1995. This was the third album to feature Zack Wylde on guitar, following up the terrific No Rest For The Wicked and No More Tears albums and as well as that, it was his first to feature former Black Sabbath artist Geezer Butler on Bass.

With their previous two albums; Osbourne and his band set about modernizing their sound, but Ozzmosis took things one step further with some of the heaviest music and production on any Ozzy release ever.

Musically, Ozzmosis is a solid and relatively consistent album. Standout tracks include the massive singles ‘Perry Mason,’ and ‘Thunder Underground,’ as well as ‘My Jekyll Doesn’t Hide,’ which are some of Ozzy’s heaviest ever compositions.

The album is more than just heavier metal numbers however, as the previous album No More Tears, there are a few big ballads mixed in to keep things varied as well.

While the album still feels like a solid band affair, the band actually received additional songwriting help from the legendary Lemmy and Steve Vai, as well as producer John Purdell and former song doctor Jim Vallance.

If you have an interest in Ozzy then you should probably check out this album; its solid, surprisingly heavy for Ozzy and has Geezer Butler on bass, all that definitely makes it worth investigating. Overall, Ozzmosis rates among the better Ozzy albums and is probably the best album he made after his brief retirement from music in the 90s.

SouthSideoftheSky "Sick and tired of being sick and tired"

Following in the footsteps of No More Tears came here Ozzy’s second album from the 90’s and he decided to take his sound further away from the 80’s by making it more contemporary in that dreaded age of Alternative Rock. Though I think that this deliberate attempt to sound contemporary was a clear mistake, the result is actually not that bad despite of this. I would even say that Ozzmosis is almost up to par with The Ultimate Sin and No Rest For The Wicked in terms of quality and I give it the same rating as those two 80’s albums. The material itself and the production is much closer in style to No More Tears than any earlier Ozzy album.

Once again the personnel are radically changed, with only guitarist Zakk Wylde left on board. On bass we here have none other than Geezer Butler who had just left Black Sabbath (again) after an argument with Toni Iommi. Keyboard virtuoso Rick Wakeman of Yes fame is brought in to play on this album, but Wakeman’s presence in the sound is very weak to the degree that you wonder what the point was in bringing him in if he would not be properly utilized. As personal friend of Ozzy’s, this was neither the first time not the last time that he and Wakeman would work together. Wakeman played on Black Sabbath’s Sabbath Bloody Sabbath back in the 70’s and Ozzy would sing on a track on Wakeman’s 1999 album Return To The Centre Of The Earth.

It is hard to pick out any favourite tracks from this album as it is very even. Albums like The Ultimate Sin and No Rest For The Wicked and even No More Tears were rather uneven and had a few excellent songs and a few no so good songs. Ozzmosis has no excellent songs whatsoever, but also no really bad songs. It is an enjoyable listen for sure, but it is very far away from Ozzy’s best works. Still, it is very impressive and unusual that after 25 years in the music business, Ozzy had yet to release a bad album.