Making friends with strangers inside my mind

Continuing my trip forward in time through the album charts

16/09/22 : Patient Number 9 - Ozzy Osbourne

It feels like no time since we last met Ozzy - although I was actually thinking of the Sabbath album from '83 which he's not on.  But a month before that, we'd met his last solo album from '20 and that surprised me with (and I quote) "a surprising amount of nuance" which meant that "it really could have been a far worse experience".  High praise indeed!  But before we get round to Ozzy's next adventure, we have another compilation album to consider - and reject.

Straight in at #1 this week is Robbie Williams with album celebrating the 25th anniversary of his solo career.  Part of me thought I should listen to this because it features "reimagined" versions but then I thought "nah, the man's an idiot".  Apparently it's his 14th solo #1 album which has him overtaking Elvis - the man has done some decent tracks over the years, but it's amazing he's managed to draw out his career for so long.  So I'm much happier this week finding out what Ozzy is up to (whilst desperately hoping that Robbie's not still churning stuff out at the age of 73) - will he continue to surprise me?

And well, yeah he does.  I'd struggle to say this album displays an awful lot of nuance but what it does do is rock - and it does it very well.  I liked the title track enough to say it actually stood out for me, but throughout the album it shows a surprisingly high quality bar (although it does also get rather silly in places as well - but that's Ozzy for you).  Inviting his mates to play wasn't the worst idea in the world - and when your mates include Jeff Beck, Mike McCready (Pearl Jam), Eric Clapton,Tommy Iommi, Josh Homme, Robert Trujillo, Duff McKagan, Chad Smith and Taylor Hawkins, why wouldn't you invite them?  And let's not forget Zakk Wylde who is his usual guitarist and Andrew Watt who's back to produce this, having done such a good job on An Ordinary Man.  All in all, this was surprisingly enjoyable - and featured some very fine guitar work.

We're at #2 in the charts this week - I'm hoping the lad manages to hang around slightly longer than the 3 weeks that An Ordinary Man managed (but I doubt he will).  The rest of the top are Robbie, Harry, The Manic Street Preachers (a re-entry of a a re-released 2001 album, for no obvious reason) and The Amazons (another new entry from a band who I don't know, but now feel I should).  There are no other new entries in the top ten.

Wikipedia doesn't have a lot on the album other than the critics saying nice things about it.  It's done well commercially as well, having got to #2 in Australia, Germany, Italy and Sweden - bad luck on missing out on a #1 somewhere, Ozzy.  "Customers also listened to" Five Finger Death Punch, Little Eva and The Retaliators - I suspect I probably wouldn't like too many of them.  But, there would have been no danger of me listening to Ozzy's album under other circumstances and I'd have to say I really quite enjoyed it - his status as national treasure is safe for a bit longer.

09/09/22 - I didn't mind this at all
23/09/22 - A bumper bundle!