Post #405
Looking for a place to reminisce on the Ozzy's music, albums, concerts, & legacy? Join me tomorrow, August 19th, at 8:00pm central time to share your stories and hear from other fans in this online memorial/tribute.
Post #405
Looking for a place to reminisce on the Ozzy's music, albums, concerts, & legacy? Join me tomorrow, August 19th, at 8:00pm central time to share your stories and hear from other fans in this online memorial/tribute.
Post #404
On July 22nd, 2025, The Godfather of Heavy Metal, Ozzy Osbourne, passed away after a years-long struggle with Parkinson's Disease. A founding member of Black Sabbath, Ozzy's legacy in Heavy Metal Music is immense.
I have written reviews of Ozzy's music and concerts on this blog many times, and will continue to do so, perhaps until I've mentioned every note of music he ever sang! You can see all my reviews relating to Ozzy Osbourne here.
On Tuesday afternoon on the 22nd, the day the news of Ozzy's death broke, a coworker of mine tracked me down to let me know he'd created a book display in my Library's Nonfiction section titled "Rock N' Heavy Metal". Faced-out on the shelves of this glorious display were the memoirs of Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Black Sabbath, and other greats from Rock and Heavy Metal's history. Those books pertaining directly or tangentially to Ozzy were on the honorable top-shelf. My coworker had heard of my fandom and about this blog I write, and asked me to pose for a photo with him and other coworkers to promote this display.
You can find these books on display at the Schaumburg Township District Library until the end of this month. But wherever you live, go to you local library, find your Reference Librarian, and ask them where you can get a biography on Ozzy Osbourne, Black Sabbath, or Heavy Metal music. Chances are, even if they don't own their own copy, they can get one for you, free of charge! Your heavy metal IQ will thank you for it.
Before I leave you, I want to take a moment to express my sympathies to Sharon Osbourne, and all of the Osbourne's children and extended family. For all the grieving we may be doing as fans, imagine the loss felt by those who were lucky enough to be truly close to him. Let us not forget that Ozzy was also a Father, a Husband, a Grandfather, a Brother, a Son, an Uncle, and perhaps a literal Godfather as well (on that last one, I'm just guessing).
I do have more things to say about Ozzy Osbourne, and will post about them on this blog (hopefully) in the near future, including a review of his memorable final concert performance: Back to the Beginning. Follow this blog so you don't miss it when I get around to it!
Rest in peace, Ozzy. We love you. We love your music. The joy it brings us... Well, that feeling is the true reason I named this blog "HappyHeadbanger.com"!
Post # 403
Metallica released 72 Seasons in 2023, almost 7 years after their last album, Hardwired... To Self-Destruct. With the COVID-19 pandemic hitting in 2020 and slowing the world down for over a year, one might wonder if that lengthened the gap between albums. Perhaps it did, and gave the band members some unexpected downtime to focus on writing music? Or maybe it held them back from jamming together, and stalled the creative process further? We may never know. Nevertheless, it's here now and Metallica are over a year into their M72 tour in support of this album. It's high time I took an in-depth look into it.
Post # 402
Pantera released Far Beyond Driven in 1994, the same year I graduated High School. It was their 3rd major-label release, and it changed the world of heavy music forever. On a personal level, it also changed my world of music appreciation. It was the first album I owned that was considered 'extreme' metal. I had mainly been into "glam" and ''hair" metal bands, like Guns 'N' Roses, Def Leppard, and Ratt, before then. I broadened my horizons and embraced the rage, aggression, and power that pulses through every measure of Far Beyond Driven. I was far from the only one to, literally, buy into this band with this specific album: it debuted at #1 on the Billboard music charts (the heaviest album to do so at the time).
With it now being 2024, I thought it fitting to commemorate this now-classic album with a fresh blog post. I did, of course, review it on this blog previously, in Post # 63-here, but this time around I'm just going to feature several links to my favorite tracks through video and streaming links. I have re-read the post, and stand by my opinions of each album as I wrote them.
This album spawned several singles, and music videos, despite its lack of radio-friendly melody. With their first 2 albums they set a tone with their following as a purely heavy, aggressive and intense band that wasn't going to bend to fit any trends in the music industry. Already established as one of the most promising new heavy bands, Far Beyond Driven doubled-down on Pantera's aggression, and it is arguably their heaviest album to this day.
Singles from Far Beyond Driven:
-Planet Caravan (Black Sabbath cover)
My other personal favorites:
-Strength Beyond Strength (the album-opener! This song hit me like a ton of bricks! If you've never heard it before, check it out and tell me it doesn't!)
Stream Far Beyond Driven on Spotify here!
Check out Pantera's Official Music Video Playlist on Youtube!
My personally curated Dimebag Darrell Playlist on Spotify (this one includes other bands he played in- including Damageplan & Anthrax!)
Happy Headbanging!
Post #401
While it is a great thing that Black Sabbath finally reissued the Tony Martin albums in the Anno Domini box set, it also may leave new listeners with a few questions. I found several answers to my own questions in this fantastic interview. Enjoy!
Post #400
I became a fan of Black Sabbath for the first time in the early 1990's, largely due to the fact that I was a fan of Dio, and I heard that Ronnie James Dio had reunited with Black Sabbath for the Dehumanizer album in 1992. I added that album to my collection, and proceeded to track down most of Black Sabbath's back-catalog over the next several years. Most of the albums I tracked down featured Ozzy or Dio as vocalists, but there were a couple more-recent ones featuring some guy named Tony Martin as the lead singer.
The Sabbath/Dio reunion did not last beyond the Dehumanizer album, and the next album they released, Cross Purposes, again featured Tony Martin on vocals. As a new fan, I was a little frustrated with the inconsistency of their lineup in this era, but at the end of the day I didn't think much of it. They had one more album with Martin, Forbidden, released in 1995. Little did anyone know this would be the final studio album from Sabbath for years and years to come...
Fast-forward to the post-iTunes, and streaming era of music, and all these digital platforms have a huge gap in Black Sabbath's discography: all the albums released under the I.R.S Records label! Coincidentally, these albums included 4 of the 5 albums that Black Sabbath recorded with Martin as vocalist. The first album he sang on, The Eternal Idol, was the band's last release under the Warner Bros. label.
For years, the only way to hear these 'missing' albums was if you owned them in physical format from their initial release. The I.R.S. label folded in 1996. I had collected some, but not all, of these Tony Martin Sabbath albums as CDs, but for years I was missing others. In recent years I've become a 'streaming music' listener, and frequently craft my own playlists to listen to on my daily commute. The absence of these Black Sabbath albums left gaps in my Black Sabbath playlists, and the songs from these albums faded into obscurity...
Thankfully, Tony Iommi, Black Sabbath's founding guitarist, and only member who was in the band throughout it's entire career, has been diligently working for years, if not decades, to try to get these missing albums reissued. Now, in 2024, this has finally happened!
Post #398
On August 18th, a Friday afternoon, I headed north to Wisconsin's Capitol to finally catch a festival of Power Metal I'd been looking forward to for years: Mad With Power VI. This time, 2 bands I've been following were both scheduled to perform. I had seen them both for the 1st time back in 2011, at Dame-Nation III: Shield of Wings and A Sound of Thunder. Unfortunately, just days before the show, A Sound of Thunder had to cancel due to injury. Still, I was hyped for this music fest, and wasn't going to miss it!
Post #397
The Scorpions are best known for their international hits released during the 1980's as part of the 'Hair-Metal' era of mainstream heavy metal. In fact, during this era many fans of their music, myself included, were unaware that they had several albums that pre-dated their Mercury Records 'debut' album Lovedrive. It was only about a decade later, in the mid 90's, when the internet provided a means of discovery for these early works by the Scorpions. Prior to that, you'd have to know a specialty retailer that sold 'imported' albums of international bands.
So, this post is intended for those more casual fans that may now be eager to discover this early era of the Scorpions. We'll go back to a time when they were not an established 'Hair Band', but rather a mid-'70's rock band exhibiting a different pallet of sounds and styles than they're known for today. Sometimes more bluesy, other times more psychedelic, and occasionally flirting with a progressive-rock vibe, the Scorpions were definitely more experimental in their formative years. Check out some of these tracks for the more vintage sound of Scorpions!
-In Search of the Peace of Mind
-Action
-Catch Your Train
-Virgin Killer
-In Your Park
Post # 396
Back in 2013, I heard Cauldron perform this track at Orion Music + More 2013. By the time I found this Bandcamp link the limited edition vinyl was sold out. However you can still stream their cover at the link below!
Post #395
It's been a while since I reviewed Shield of Wings on this blog. Their first recording, the EP Solarium, was released in 2011. I reviewed a concert they played in August of that year, and have been following them since then.
I was pleasantly surprised to hear their announcement of a new, full-length album, Unfinished. I was instantly curious to hear how they sound on this new material. Guitarist and main songwriter, James Gregor, and fellow founding member Patrick Eulitz (drums), have recruited a new lineup, featuring Aliyah Daye on keyboards and backing vocals, Alex Luke on bass guitar, and Lara Mordian on lead vocals. My first exposure to any of the new music was their music video for the first single, "Wetland". After that experience, I was eager to hear more. Their overall sound and style of symphonic metal sounds complete, fresh, and epic! Beyond that, the recording reverberates with top-notch production. Every instrument can be heard crisp and clear.To reference a couple established bands in the symphonic metal genre, I'd compare Lara's vocal style to Epica's Simone Simons. Lara uses a smooth blending of head-voice and chest-voice throughout most songs. Aliyah adds backing vocals in styles ranging from melodic harmonies to death growls. While this may seem stylistically similar to Epica as well, Shield of Wings doesn't implement the harsher vocal style as prominently. Theirs is a primarily melodic, operatic style of vocals with a small peppering of death growls, and only in a fraction of their songs.
Musically their formula sounds close to mid-era Nightwish, as they use heavy guitars, and synthesized symphonic and folk elements to navigate the mood of each piece. Patrick Eulitz could practically be channeling Nightwish's Jukka Nevalainen, he's so precise with the rapid, double-bass drums, and keeping a tight and powerful rhythm through the heavy moments of the music. Nearly every track incorporates multiple elements, with segments that shift from dark heavy tones, to light operatic phrases and back again. Tempos ramp up to furious paces, only to calm again and build the contrast further. Yet every transition flows so seamlessly, they sound like they've been in this field for years, if not decades.
On the track "Cedar", they introduce elements of folk and Celtic music, with a wide array of instruments to match. Heavy guitars and symphonic elements join in, and make this song an immersing musical experience. It's one of my favorite track on the album.
The closing track, "The Scarred Clay Reshaping" is the crowning jewel. The longest track at seven and a half minutes, and lyrics that bring the album full circle, even referencing their early EP in the chorus: "Unfinished solarium, one more cut of the seeker's tongue." Themes of life, struggle, despair and rebirth abound throughout the album, but culminate in the closing lyric: "Ode to the scarred clay reshaping, ode to the ever-flowing river!"
Prepare to be transfixed... Here is the video for "Wetland":
Post #394
In 2021, Tetrarch released Unstable, their follow-up to 2017's Freak, and on this release the band show much consistency and growth as they tighten their grip on their trademark sound. They also continue to impress with their music videos, of which they now have for 4 different tracks from Unstable.
Unstable opens with "I'm Not Right", a blisteringly heavy number that picks up right where Freak left off without missing a beat! This is also one of the 4 official music videos I mentioned. I will link to a couple of those at the end of this post.Lastly I'll mention the closing number, "Trust Me", which is a bit of a departure from the rest of the tracks, in that is slows the tempo way down, and projects dark and ominous moods. This gothic alt-metal brilliance in its own right, and the drummer drives the rhythm mainly with loud cymbal crashes throughout, almost like Black Sabbath's "War Pigs", but slower and heavier.
Recommended tracks from Unstable:
-I'm Not Right
-You Never Listen
-Sick of You
-Stitch Me Up
-Pushed Down (this one has a chorus that just begs to become an anthem: "We are the psychos, the untouchables!")
Now for those promised music videos, but first, you should be sure you check out Tetrarch's Youtube channel and subscribe so you don't miss out on their next awesome video!
Here are their videos for "I'm Not Right" and "Stitch Me Up"
Post #393
Tetrarch spent their time from 2013 to 2017 relocating (they moved from Georgia to L.A.) and also reinventing themselves. Their early EPs might have fallen comfortably inside the 'metalcore' subgenre, but by the time they dropped Freak it was clear they'd discovered a new calling and were headed in a new direction...
The album opens with the title track, "Freak"- an aggressive hardcore song that puts some of their new formula on display. Diamond Rowe's guitar leads emulate an eerie vibe that seems to channel Korn's Brian 'Head' Welch. Vocalist Josh Fore pours forth emotion with ever line. His voice could be compared to Chester Bennington when singing melodically, or Corey Taylor when screaming. If this sounds like a promising formula of sounds for a metal-head, that's because it is! Plus you have to love the bridge lyric: "In the darkness the strange becomes ordinary..."The next track, "Spit", takes them a step closer to Korn-esque alt-metal, as Fore employs new inflections in his vocal delivery, bringing comparisons to Jonathan Davis to mind. However, as the 3rd track, "Pull the Trigger" unfurls, we are once again blown away with an assault of aggressive metal.
The rest of the album continues in this fashion, swaying back and forth between hardcore, brutal metal riffs, and eerie, haunting melodies. Drums and bass that bludgeon the senses relentlessly, guitars that can shred in one moment and entice the mind the next, and a masterful blend of melodic and hardcore vocals, this band gives us a great metal album with Freak. If you crave this blending of angst and aggression, then please do yourself the favor of checking out this band!
Their Music video for the title track: