Three years on from his last album, Ozzy Osbourne has returned with new music, and in yet another surprising return to form he's created an excellent album, with a whole host of friendly faces involved. Jake Longhurst reviews.
The Prince Of Darkness is back with a new list of collaborators to join him making yet another album, his 13th solo release, Patient Number 9. The first thing you hear from the album is the title track, featuring Jeff Beck, and it’s exactly what you would want to hear from a guitar virtuoso and Ozzy Osbourne collaborating, with an epic track that allows them both to show their talents off. Lyrically, the title track is standard fare for Ozzy, being quite depressing, speaking about mental struggles.
However, this is by no means a feature of the whole album. Whilst there are plenty of parts where the lyrics or music feels melancholy, the feel of the whole album is quite triumphant and fun, as if Ozzy is being brought back to life by recording music. A personal favourite moment of the album is when I heard Zakk Wylde’s dirty intro riff to Parasite and realised there is still a lot more to Ozzy than we give him credit for. The song is a muscular, powerful beast and finishes with one of the best lines on the LP - ‘I like worms’ in Ozzy’s thick Brummie accent.
As we’re all aware, much of Ozzy’s best work in the past was with Black Sabbath. However, it’s quite fitting that Tony Iommi has made it onto an Ozzy record for the first time on album 13, and he leaves his mark in a fashion befitting one of the best guitarists in history, and the creator of doom metal. Both songs he plays on, No Escape From Now and Degradation Rules are suitably Sabbathian, with syrupy riffs alternating with Iommi’s searing soloing ability. For men well into their 70’s, the pair sure still know how to rock.
The next collaborator is the almighty Eric Clapton, who much like the aforementioned Tony Iommi is still keenly aware how to use a guitar to create maximum feeling. His solo on One Of These Days is a soulful jam that harks back to plenty of his best work, which makes the song a thoroughly enjoyable listen, although then again it was never in much doubt that it would be good.
[This] is possibly the best end to an Ozzy solo album we’ve heard yet.
One point I must make, not critically, but simply to press the matter, is that Ozzy uses a large amount of autotune on the album. I can already see metalheads (especially the old guard) losing their rag at the inclusion of it, but I think it has got to a point where it’s so ubiquitous in pop music that we need to accept it will permeate the rest of music much more. Frankly, Ozzy would not have been able to release an album this strong without the help of autotune anyway. Yes you can absolutely hear it, and he doesn’t have quite the same tone as in his youth, but for a man who has been in the music industry for over 50 years I think we can all begrudge him a little bit of help every now and then.
If this is goodbye to metal’s own holy emperor, then one thing is for certain - it would be a glorious send off.
Jake Longhurst
Edited by: Jake Longhurst
Cover image courtesy of Ozzy Osbourne via Facebook.
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