(Credits: Far Out / Sony Music Entertainment)
Sat 23 August 2025 19:00, UK
Any band’s hope is to create something that is entirely their own. It’s impossible for anyone to not draw from their influences when they’re putting together their first riffs, but even after years in the spotlight with Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne had a keen ear for when bands had something that no one else could touch.
Then again, Osbourne’s first approach to music was a lot different than the ‘Prince of Darkness’ persona. It was clear that he was never going to follow in the footsteps of The Beatles or anything, but after slogging it out in blues bands, hearing Tony Iommi take cues from horror films and make frightening music is the half the reason why Sabbath has gone down in history as the fathers of all things metal.
But that’s not how Osbourne saw his music. Sure, tunes like ‘Children of the Grave’ and ‘Symptom of the Universe’ are responsible for spawning different subgenres of heavy metal, but Osbourne always saw himself as a hard rock artist most of the time. After all, that’s the music that most of his friends played back in the day, and looking at the company he kept throughout his personal life, he was as likely to be friends with Robert Plant as he was to hang out with the members of Metallica.
If anyone even thinks about playing rock and roll, though, they’re going to be involuntarily taking pages out of AC/DC’s playbook. The whole idea of badass rhythm guitar playing could be broken down into Malcolm Young’s right hand, and even if some of their riffs end up sounding like dad-rock to modern ears, there’s a reason why most artists don’t dare to take on any of their classics to cover live.
Osbourne already had his signature sound by the time that records like Highway to Hell were storming up the charts, but he felt that there was hardly any other group that could compete with what AC/DC were doing, saying, “Angus [Young] is like a machine that never stops. He keeps going and going. He still got the fucking energy, man. They are a really great bunch of guys. They are my friends, are real people. There is no other band in the world like them. There is no bollocks, there is no fucking around. Whether you like them or you don’t and I’m proud to say I love them.”
And even with some of their suggestive lyrics, there’s something about the groove that always keeps people coming back. The riffs might be fairly straightforward, but the real challenge behind any great musician is being able to play their riffs and then recreating that in the context of a group.
Because while anyone can figure out the first few chord stabs of ‘Back in Black’ and recreate it in their bedroom, what made all of their songs groove is how they lock in with the drummer. Everything might sound normal in the context of your practice space, but if a song doesn’t have that swing, it won’t work, and given how much Osbourne learned about groove working in Sabbath, he knew a thing or two about the kind of rhythm that gets a crowd on their feet every night.
But that common link between AC/DC and Osbourne is the kind of thing that goes beyond normal rock and roll history. That goes all the way back to the days when the finest bluesmen were making their way across the US, and while Angus was a few generations removed from those guys, he and his brother created the foundation for bluesy rock and roll that will never be outdone.
Related Topics