It is 2012, and I am pretty sure everyone on the planet has heard Crazy Train. Back in 1987, every teenage wanna be guitar player in my hometown was cramping their fretting hand trying to work out the main riff. Most of them playing on some second hand piece of garbage bought from World of Music.Randy Rhoads was huge in my click back then. It was due to Ozzy releasing the Tribute LP. We all had it (or a dubbed copy of it). It spent at least a solid 6 months in my tape deck. I was 12 going on 13 that year.
Fast forward 12 or so years to the late 90's. My wife and I were walking through the Millcreek Mall, and we saw a young girl, probably 14, wearing a Randy Rhoads Tribute t-shirt. She was enthusiastically explaining his awesomeness to her friend on a bench outside of The Cookie Factory.
That stuck with me for a few reasons, but I remember thinking that this kid was out of place in 1999. Regardless it was good to see a child from the next generation geeking out to Randy.After I started researching this blog, I told my wife about that specific memory, and I was accused of being weird..... Ahem........I say nay.........not weird at all. I would make a mental note of a Randy Rhoads shirt today if I saw one, that's what rock nerds do.
By the time I hit high school, Randy's playing was fully integrated into my thought process. I judged guitar players by whether or not they could do the solo to Crazy Train without messing up (I still can't even start the solo - but I was playing drums back then). When it came time for our cover band, INFERNO to play a benefit at the Corry High School, there was no question about Crazy Train being in the set list!
What is my point in all this rambling? I dig Randy Rhoads. I have come to love his rhythm playing and writing as much as his soloing these days. His feel for music riffage and arrangement was outstanding.
So, we are on the cusp of the 30th Anniversary of Randy Rhoads death, and I am wondering, how do I pay tribute? So I started digging.... What I wanted to find was more than just the run of the mill "Sharon approved" statements from the Osbourne handlers. So I looked elsewhere. Old interviews, youtube clips, Books, articles, etc. for information from the people associated with Randy. Finding material for this blog would prove tedious and time consuming.I decided to start by rooting through old OZZY interviews to get some info straight out of the 80's (before years of spin doctoring changed history).
The opening story is a result of the excavation, and I take full responsibility for it because I wrote it.
The second half contains quotes I wanted to geek out to. I tried to stay away from protected content, and I took the liberty to paraphrase when needed. I cannot verify the accuracy of the written words, but some of the quotes are from video interviews, so the artists did say them. The problem with Ozzy history is that Ozzy himself constantly re-writes his own stories by changing them with each interview, and there are several versions of every story depending on the interviewee. Ozzy tells a lot of white lies, but so does everybody else. I digress.... I hope you enjoy!
