Continuing the discussion from People from Andy's formative ....... Part 4 (Part 3) - #102 by G8ADD.
Previous discussions:
RE: Teri Garr - I only really knew her from the Close Encounters. I suppose I should watch Young Frankenstein although I’ve never been a massive Mel Brooks fan.
I did get Close Encounters on Blu-Ray and it is a beautiful film in the format, and Dreyfuss just had something about him that endeared me. This, Jaws and Always (with the gorgeous Holly Hunter).
Mark
Jaws is good but despite it being from 1975 I only ever watched it from start to finish for the first time last year !
Well it’s been 7 months since the last post here. Today the death of Mick Ralphs was announced. I knew him as the guitarist from the rock group Bad Company. This group was made up from some former members of the group Free (Paul Rodgers and Simon Kirke) along with Boz Burrell and Mick Raplhs on guitar.
He was a talented player and wrote plenty of great songs and riffs. I remember buying their second album, Sharp Shooter, not long after it was released in 1975 and listened to it a lot during my spotty pre-university years. 50 years later it’s a classic, something that pops up on shuffle play. It’s one of those albums I’d not pick out to play but when it appears I have to give it some attentive listening.
Anyway in memory of Mick’s playing I offer the following which probably are not famous Bad Company/Mick Ralphs songs:
Deal with the preacher.
Call on me, a softer track with an excellent guitar break in the ending.
Ah, listening to these and I’m back studying for my O levels in 1978 again. I should find a picture of me from then but it probably breaks the Online Safety Act 
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When Free broke up I was gutted. I was mainly drawn to them because of the sound that Paul Kossoff produced. Unfortunately after (IMHO) a less than satisfactory period in Back Street Crawler where his talents were not extended enough (no doubt due to his lifestyle at the time), Koss passed away… the end of an era.
I listened to Bad Company for a while, but I was not that enamoured with the songs they were producing. Undoubtedly Mick’s talents were excellent, but the sound did not particularly strike a chord with me. In the end I got waylaid into Foreigner territory as local amateur Gary G4MEJ was a great fan. I guess it is what you are exposed to at a particular time.
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Paul Kossof was the star of the just-enough-notes kind of playing and dying so young was terrible. I was 15 when he died and back then I was struck by the thought no more “Walk In My Shadows” , “I’ll be Creepin” or “Trouble on Double Time”. I bought my first Free album when I was 11! Bad Company were different but the logical follow on and I liked parts of their output. Now 50 years on I like all of their output a lot more than back then. Yes, they were not Free but Paul Rodger’s voice was still worth listening to. Plus Mick’s licks I missed andy Frasier’s bass lines.
Until I went looking on t’Internet today, I had only seen pictures of Mick Ralphs playing a Les Paul. Now I’ve found pictures and videos of him playing Stratocasters and Flying Vs along with Les Pauls. What is strange is to now see musicians from my formative years dying of old age and not choking on their vomit, drugs overdoses, helicopter crashes or proving their gun wasn’t loaded by accidentally shooting themselves in the head!
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Precisely my thoughts. Scary indeed! 
I can’t decide whether this thread sounds more like Bob Harris on the Old Grey Whistle Test or John Thompson on the Fast Show’s “Jazz Club”…
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The answer to your question is “yes”.
John Michael “Ozzy” Osbourne (3 December 1948 – 22 July 2025)
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Sad. I always enjoyed the craziness of his family, as well as the band. 
Elliott, K6EL
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I wasn’t a great fan of the band but they did come up with some stonking riffs and unexpected changes! Off atage he always came across as a lovable kook, and was an amazing survivor!
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His greatest memorial - the event two weeks ago that raised almost $200 million for three charities.
RIP Ozzy
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Me either, although I’m glad to see he went out with a bang!
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And another one …
George Kooymans, of the Dutch band Golden Earring, left us today , age 77.
Luc - ON7DQ
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Ah now Mr. Osborne…
Me neither too! Oh I have some Sabbath vinyl and CDs but just a scant few. Ozzy has been part of my life for a long time however. I knew of the group from the name and suggestions there was more than just the name before I heard them, mainly because many friends of mine had old brothers listening to them. So it was Easter school holidays 1973 I was at Andrew Whitfield’s house playing Risk and Escape From Colditz whilst he played his brother’s copy of Black Sabbath Vol 4. We were still at Junior school and were listening to Big Boy’s Music 
Before I’d gone on to buy any Sabbath records myself, there were always Ozzy stories that had been found in NME or Sounds newspapers.
Anyway, the first 3 albums came into my possession by the time I was 17. I noticed a distinct drop in the both the quality of the music and recording by the fourth. The tunes were not so good IMHO and the recordings were just poor. The drop in quality being proportional to the amount of cocaine and alcohol they consumed. I think the first 3 are probably much more blues inspired metal. Now you either like it or you don’t. But I did. Bill Ward’s drumming featuring excellent jazz inspired patterns and fills with occasional burst of him beating the living daylights out of them; Geezer Butler playing busy “lead bass” lines; Tony Iommi’s wailing vibrato and stupendous riffs. And Ozzys vocals. The vocals fit their tunes and lyrics but probably sound rubbish on other songs. A lot of their sound was due to Iommi severing the tips of two of his fretting fingers and having to wear plastic prosthetics and him and Butler tuned their instruments down 3 semi-tones. However, the later albums ended up with really 1 or maybe 2 tracks I liked so I never invested. It was getting bad by the time Technical Ecstasy was released but there was stand out song, Dirty Women which is much more reminiscent of the early stuff.
Ozzy became a bigger and bigger drug and alcohol addict and was sacked by 1979. They recruited Ronnie James Dio, released Heaven and Hell, a masterpiece. 45 years later still sounds fresh to me but probably is really dated and doesn’t sound like Sabbath. Ah, memories of A level revision, I listen to it and the maths behind Simple Harmonic Motion and wonderous stuff like Euler’s formula come back. I used to be able to prove cis theta = exp i.theta from first principles, not any more!
Ozzy released his Blizzard of Ozz album with the excellent track Mr. Crowley (really Randy Rhoads guitar work) but the rest was “meh!” And then I stopped being a child, a teenager, a student and got a job and mortgage and spending money on records became a thing of the past. The worst part was not being in the presence of like minded people and so being exposed to new music all the time. It wasn’t really till Naspter that that the “try before you buy” idea was possible again. Shame too many people tried but didn’t buy.
Of course Ozzy continued being an addict and generally an ar*e. As he sobered up over the last 20-25 years and became a reality star then he could be entertaining and funny once more. I bought Sabbath’s album 13 when they reformed for the last time (it wasn’t the last time) and I would not believe you if you said I bought it 12 years ago, seems like the other day.
I wasn’t surprised to hear he had died, he’d looked terrible for a long time since a quad-bike accident and a broken neck. Now if you had told me, 20-30 years back , just how much coverage Ozzy’s death would get in the press I would have thought you were mad. But no there are still stories about him and his death being published today, 3 days later. That’s quite some staying power. Maybe it’s because, like me, people are quite stunned his final concert raised £140million for 3 charities. That kind of fund raising is going to buy you a lot of forgiveness and provoke many rose-tinted memories in people.
So Ozzy has been part of me, but not as a huge fan, for oh so long, some 52 years. I’m not particularly grief stricken over a musician I never met dying, saddened it’s the end of an era but it just reinforces that my formative youth continues to retreat further and further into the past. Still, I can look forward to the construction work 
Chez FMF is getting closer to completion and the fact that my grandaughter is now 7 weeks old. 
RIP Ozzy and thanks for the memories.
Back in 1973 when Radar Love was a big hit, the fact Golden Earring were Dutch made them seem so exotic to a 12 year old kid.
Oh go on then… an unusual but oh so trippy song with a very different Ozzy vocal.
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I quite agree. For me, though, as a huge fan of Pink Floyd and Peter Gabriel era Genesis, those albums lacked a certain richness, a complexity that I had come to require. Floyd, of course, were thoroughly infused with the blues too, but (for me) used them in a more creative way, plus an exploration of timbre that made BS sound almost plain. Worth a casual listen but not study.
Very few bands last more than a decade at their creative peak.
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Another artist with an instantly recognisable voice now gone from this world - Rick Davies of Supertramp. In the early to mid 70s I had an Austin Mini van which had a long / medium wave radio in it. Their song Dreamer always seemed to be on the radio and it immediately brings back memories of freezing cold journeys from Lancaster where we lived at the time to see family in Nottinghamshire. Their song Bloody Well Right was a much better song in many ways, but as usual YMMV.
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For me starting as a Marconi apprentice and listening to Supertramp (In Springfield House for any other ex-apprentices) put me back in Chelmsford in the 80’s. I still really like their “Paris” live album which I prefer to the studio versions of almost all the tracks. I’m feeling rather old now…. 73. Paul
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I came to hear more than Dreamer/Bloody Well Right in 1979 when my sister returned from university for the summer and had someone’s copy of Supertramp’s Crime of The Century mixed in with her records. She put it on and thought “oh no not Dreamer” and the first track was School and I was mesmerised. 46 years ago and I remember sitting listening intently, it’s not rock it’s not pop. I was transfixed. When the track finished I put it on again.
Now I don’t like all their tracks, but the ones I do like a like a lot. The other thing is their vinyl albums were stunningly well recorded. engineered, produced and stamped. Supertramp records were standard HiFi test records back when me and my university mates were spending all our money of HiFi and records.
Like Paul, I’m feeling very old thinking how long ago this was. Amazing thing the human brain, I’m listening to the track Crime Of The Century and I’m recalling listening to the album at home (my mum liked it compared to the heavier stuff I played) and back in my university flat. The young lady who became Mrs. FMF also liked Supertramp rather a lot.
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