Ozzy or Dio?

[Blue Screen of Death]

Ozzy for work with Black Sabbath.
Dio for work done outside of them.

 

[ClownBrew]

When was this? The first time Dio was kicked out was because he and Vinny were fighting with Tony and Geezer over the mixing of a shitty live album because the engineer was a drunk who kept telling both sides the others were remixing everything behind each others' backs and the second time he left because their tour was going to end with the indignity of having to open for Ozzy after the warbling chav spent the last ten years hanging shit on them and he (rightfully) suspected they were going to reunite the original lineup and throw him out anyway.

Anyway what I'm saying is that Cozy Powell Did Nothing Wrong.

It was Forbidden iirc. He trashed Dio behind his back to Iommi and refused to work with him because reasons. Leaned on Iommi until he put Tony Martin back into the lineup after he had been gone since Tyr.

Then he proceeded to crash one of his bikes yet again and break an ankle. Just in time for the damn tour. I forget who drummed in his place but I don't think it was Vinny or Carmine that time.

Then he kicked up another bitch fit because he didn't think Tony I. was giving him enough sway over the band. Again a friendly reminder that he was the fucking drummer simply fell on deaf ears. Cue another tantrum and another injury and another abandoned tour.

I'm a drummer myself and Cozy is my all time hero behind the kit but as a person he would have had a KF thread a thousand pages long. And that's not even getting into his drunk speeding habit or his creepy love life or how many other bands and press members he shit talked in public at every given chance . Not even trying to slam him here...just telling it like it is. Even our heroes are human and all that.

 

[XYZpdq]

Ozzy Before Dio Joined Sabbath > Dio = Dio In Sabbath = Ozzy "solo" > I don't even know about any fucks after Dio but I'm sure they suck
but yeah the earliest into anything you find Ozzy is better, like that ancient Euro tv gig

 

[Cherry Popcicle.]

Honestly, the three main singers for Sabbath were all amazing for different reasons.

Ozzys blusy voice and dark lyrics(made in combination with Geezer Butler) made the original Sabbath sound. And I'll say this now: Dio could not sing the old sabbath stuff. His version of War Pigs sucks. Thats because Ozzy has such a dark, evil voice that works when writing songs about the devil, death, or wailing about bastards in Sabbath Bloody Sabbath. That said, I think Ozzy has a better solo career than he had in sabbath.

I should be clear tho, Dio is my favorite Sabbath singer. His lyrics are better than any other version. He could make songs about evil Robots on Dehumanizer sound engaging, His voice is legendary, on the level of Halford. Heaven and Hell is a metal album everyone should listen to. Not every metal fan, I mean anyone who wants to know what metal is should listen to heaven and hell. And thats just Dio in Sabbath. Dio has literally been in 3 separate legendary bands, those being Rainbow, Black Sabbath, and Dio. Dio is a legend, and while I love Ozzys unique dark voice, Dio is king.

I do want to mention Tony Martian too tho. While black sabbath have had other singers,Ray "My dick is a Bio weapon" Gillian and Ian Gillian come to mind, Tony Martian was the Third big singer. He was on as many or more albums as Dio, and had a unique style too. While I'm not a big fan of most of his stuff, and he was the lead singer on the worst black sabbath album, he was still a great singer who deserves to be up there with Dio and Ozzy.

So to give my personal list of Sabbath front men: Dio>Ozzy>Martian> Ian Gillian> Ray Gillian.

 

[Flaming Carrot]

I loved Ozzy on the early Black Sabbath albums, but after Randy Rhoades died, his solo career mostly consisted of crap. Even then, had he retired with some dignity after No More Tours, I might think a little more highly of him. But he's spent the past 25 years doing reality television and embarrassing himself with reality TV shows, terrible albums, and lousy live performances. Also, his wife is just the absolute worst.

Dio did great work with Sabbath, Rainbow, and he had a lot of good solo material too. He remained a great live performer throughout his life. Ozzy was essential for Sabbath in the early days, but Dio never did a song with Miss Piggy, so he wins.

 

[DeadwastePrime]

neither im more of a freddie mercury guy

 

[StevieLasVegas]

Ozzy's time with Black Sabbath rules up to and including Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, but gonna go with Dio. His four albums have had better staying power in my headspace, and The Mob Rules is my favourite Sabbath album overall.

 

[All Cops Are Based]

Both good singers in their own way (miminalist vs. maximalist, I guess), but Dio was the real deal. He sat down and banged out his own melodies, lyrics, etc. (even riffs and chord progressions once in a while) in everything he was in, from Rainbow to Sabbath to his solo stuff, so there's a real sense of continuity through it all. He never made a commercially pandering album in his life, unless you count his flirtation with confused quasi-groove metal in the 90s as commercial.

Dio's integrity is lost on a lot of muso types who just see him as being emblematic of "cheesy 80s metal excess" or whatever and can't think beyond the implications of that in terms of fashion/perceived cultural cache. We all know it's "cooler" to like Master of Reality than it is to like Heaven & Hell, but that's only because music journos/critics are efette faggot cultural tourists who can only come to terms with things that normal working class people enjoy like 2 or 3 decades after the fact, when hindsight lets them figure out how to assimilate it into their self-serving worldviews. (Remember they hated Ozzy-era Sabbath in the 70s.)

Ozzy was only ever as good as the guys he was working with. Blizzard and Diary are cool albums, but that's almost entirely on account of Randy Rhoads and Bob Daisley (one of whom Ozzy and his handler/wife tried to write out of history like a petty little pop-metal Stalin until enough fans complained about it). His solo career was a straight diagonal line down from there in terms of quality. Cool voice, good singer in the 70s, total fraud as an artist/musician.

And I think I prefer Mob Rules over any Ozzy Sabbath album by a hair, fight me

 

[ShootyPee]

nearly 3 years too late but I will simply say
If Dio never got into an argument over the mix of Live Evil and stayed with the band, he would be regarded as THE lead singer just like Brian Johnson of AC/DC is

 

[IDanceonTrannyGraves]

Dio. Ozzy's only good stuff is with Sabbath.

 

[William Murderface]

Ozzy had some talent, but the only thing that he could do that nobody else could was Sharon.

That's not true. Randy Rhoads also did Sharon.

 

[WTBOnlineFather]

nearly 3 years too late but I will simply say
If Dio never got into an argument over the mix of Live Evil and stayed with the band, he would be regarded as THE lead singer just like Brian Johnson of AC/DC is

I don't know that this is a widely accepted viewpoint. There's a massive percentage of purists among the AC/DC fanbase who prefer Bon by a long shot and they only really respect Brian for his success in keeping the band going and not so much his contribution to the music. I personally like both Bon and Brian but they clearly had different personalities and I could see why someone would like one and not the other.

Dio in Sabbath is kind of the same thing except here the rest of the band also began to change and thus the difference went far beyond just the singing and lyrics.
Dio Sabbath is a good metal band but that's just it, a metal band. They were no longer pioneers of anything really from the 80s onward. Any kind of jazzy/psychedelic edge of 70s Sabbath that was my favorite aspect of the band's sound was entirely gone when Bill Ward left and Geezer Butler gave up the lead writing duties in favor of Dio and his power metal fantasyland. It just doesn't speak to me nearly as much. To this day there are countless metal bands that sound similar to Dio with Sabbath or even his solo work but I can't think of a single band that captures the kind of lightning in a bottle that was early-mid 70s Sabbath, think Vol 4 or Sabotage.

I think Dehumanizer is Dio Sabbath's best album because it's extremely noticeable that Geezer got involved in the writing again. The grit and the social commentary are back, even if the "groove" isn't.

When talking about the 80s incarnations of Black Sabbath people also don't give enough credit to Tony Martin. Headless Cross is a really really good fucking album from start to finish. I think I even like it better than most of the Dio stuff.

Lastly I have to compare the thing most people actually think of when they compare Dio to Ozzy: the vocals. Dio is obviously a much more technically proficient singer and his voice is a pleasure to listen to. Meanwhile Ozzy is a bluesman with nostrils full of coke, who had a fairly impressive range for a brief span of about 2-3 years (listen to Sabotage holy shit) and then his voice went to shit rapidly. He's objectively worse but he's a natural at singing the kind of music I subjectively enjoy the most.

 

[ShootyPee]

I'm a Bon Scott purist simply because I feel that material is just better. Back in Black is fantastic and then it just gets lesser from there

Heaven and Hell and Mob Rules aren't just some metal albums from a metal band that's for sure. Dio initially wasn't sure if he'd jive with the Sabbath sound so a lot of the tracks were made to be familiar with what he was used to (Lady Evil could've easily been a Rainbow track) and then you get to Sign of The Southern Cross and he's made a 100% glorious transition

Dehumanizer was a clusterfuck of a production and Tony lost millions on it. Despite that I also agree it's a great album. Too Late being my favorite track but some days it competes with Master of Insanity (originally a Geezer Butler solo track)

I received my copies of Anno Domini yesterday and have been reinvigorating my interest in the Martin era. I actually prefer Forbidden (the remix) instrumentally over Cross Purposes after listening for a minute. That remix is like the worlds greatest face lift.

Geezer Butler is the best writer for Black Sabbath and deserves Ozzys share of the Sabbath name. Plastic Planet proves just how much of that Black Sabbath sound and soul is him.

imo if you got Iommi and Butler it's Black Sabbath period everyone else is expendable

 

[William Murderface]

But every band that changes a frontman changes the dynamic of the sound and the band. Van Halen and Van Hagar being a classic example. You can point to any number of other bands that have done the same thing. AC/DC, Judas Priest, Iron Maiden, Rainbow, Deep Purple, Pink Floyd, the list goes on. Sometimes you can replace the instrument playing members and sometimes you can't. Van Halen being a great example. They fired Michael Anthony and put in Wolfgang van Halen into the slot and while he is a competent bassist he can't sing like Mike could and the band missed his backing vocals on the last album. Buckethead might be a great guitarist, but Slash he ain't. The flip side of that coin is Steven Adler is fired and replaced by Matt Sorum and the band just kept on keeping on.

Obviously the frontman is the biggest change in a band's sound and image. He's the guy out front, it's his vocals everyone hears, it's his energy that drive a band and a performance on stage and it's what people notice. And I don't think anyone can foresee how other lineup changes will change the band beyond the frontman and maybe his dynamic with the lead guitarist. Aerosmith comes to mind when Joe Perry left and was replaced by Rick Dufay. It's not to say Dufay wasn't good on Rock And A Hard Place, but that album just missed something and that was Joe Perry. Mick Taylor being replaced by Ronnie Wood in the Rolling Stones worked. Lindsey Buckingham being replaced by Rick Vito in Fleetwood Mac didn't.

 

[whogoesthere]

Ozzy couldn't sing Dio songs but Dio could do the opposite. His range also allowed the rest of the band especially Iommi to come out of their shell more.

I cannot stand Dio doing the Ozzy stuff, it doesn't suit the style at all. War Pigs is a classic example.

 

[Ibanez RG 350EX]

Dio. Ozzy's only good stuff is with Sabbath.

The man may not have been all that talented himself, but he was top-tier at recruiting talent in his solo career.

 

[ShootyPee]

Thank you for the music, Ozzy.

 

[ArgonianVoter]

sad

 

[Jonah Hill poster]

Right now both, because I’m certain they are meeting in the universe comparing their vocal octave ranges.

 

[cleanerfromvenus]

Ozzy had better songs behind him, Dio was technically a better singer and probably a nicer guy at times. I have to give it to Ozzy for launching a bunch of careers and putting bread on the table for everyone who made it in metal.