ah-zee, ah-zee, ah-zee

so, yesterday was my first “real” ozzy concert…

…although it was actually the fourth time i’d seen him. i saw him at ozzfest back in 1997 (black sabbath, ozzy, pantera, type o negative) and again in 2k2 (ozzy, system of a down, rob zombie) and then one last time (as far as ozzfests were concerned) in 2k3 (ozzy, koЯn, marilyn manson, disturbed). but this was the first ozzy show that was JUST ozzy.

okay, so maybe not JUST ozzy. there was an opener – but i’m getting ahead of myself a bit.

it was also a radio reunion day for me. i started the day at chuck stanley’s CBQ restaurant (we did college radio together) then when i got to the show (extra early, due to fear of will call issues, but we’ll get to that) i hung out with another college buddy, randy (now of 99.5. KISS) and lloyd (randy’s boss, and my first boss out of college). after all the reminiscing and shit talking (it’s what we do) i wandered off to the will call window.

the reason i thought there might be problems is ticketmaster is notoriously UN-flexible when it comes to their policies – and the will-call policy is to have purchasing credit card AND i.d.. while i know i had made allowances back in the day when i ran box offices for people that had their cards lost, stolen, or what-not i did NOT work for “the master”…but i had my drivers license, my confirmation email, and (for backup, but it never left the car) my bank statement that showed the charge (and the line item didn’t just say “ticketmaster”, but rather “ticketmaster – ozzy osbourne – san antonio, 1/24/2011”) but the email and i.d. were enough AND i was only a few rows behind my KISS buds so we got to hang out between sets, before, etc…just not after, but that was my doing. again, getting ahead of myself…

slash opened (with some guy formerly of creed, i think randy said, on vocals). they did slash solo stuff, but the highlight (for me) was hearing the velvet revolver and g&r stuff. say what you want, but when slash hits those opening notes of “sweet child o’ mine” in a packed arena in one of the most metal cities on the planet (san antonio has THE best rock show crowds, period) it’s a magical thing.

then, it was ozzy time.

one of my guilty little pleasures of an ozzy show (and i can remember these at all the ozzfests, even back in ’97) is this little video montage they do with ozzy inserted into pop culture shit he wasn’t a part of. back in ’97 it was old beatles clips and pulp fiction and shit…now it was jersey shore and twilight. just funny as shit the way they work that stuff together – all with the common “ozzy thread”. then came a greatest hits set, with tons of sabbath covers, and pretty much every hit he had. he was articulate (believe it or not) and bouncy between every song, and you could just tell this very well could be his last tour…and if it is, he went out on a hell of a note.

although i missed the last one…

…i can tell i’m getting older because i’ve become that guy that will sacrifice the last song or two of a live concert in favor of getting out of the parking lot in ninety seconds versus ninety minutes…and yesterday i had the bonus reasons of my gas gauge being on the red line when i got there, which made me wanna say “fuck it” and get out of there as quickly as i could. it worked, and i think if i missed any songs it was just one…but then when i got in the car the gas line had mysteriously jumped to an eighth of a tank…fuck it, no turning back now, so i went to a station i had seen on the outskirts of town that, for some reason, had prices on their sign that made them thirty cents cheaper per gallon than anywhere else i’d seen (which brings to mind the question “how the FUCK did they sneak gas back up to three bucks a fucking gallon for NO fucking reason and nobody seemed to care or report on it?”) but it turned out that the top line on their sign was that “E-85” shit, which my car (thankfully) won’t do, so there we are.

back to town, back to sleep, back to life…but now i still have TWO full days off. what to do, what to do…