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THE BAND
- Ozzy Osbourne - Vocals
- Tony Iommi - Guitar
- Geezer Butler - Bass
- Bill Ward - Drums
- Geoff Nicholls - Keyboards
CONCERT PHOTO GALLERY
You
can view the photo gallery for this concert here.
TOUR REVIEWS & REMARKS
From: Allroy1@aol.com
Date sent: Sun, 30 May 1999 22:00:25 EDT
Subject: Atlanta Show
To: list@black-sabbath.com
It was a beautiful early Summer/late Spring afternoon in Atlanta. Arrived @ the Lakewood Ampitheater just in time for Slayer to hit the stage. Although it has been years since I actively listened to Slayer, they brought out the old faves for this one. Opened with "Reign In Blood", and the crowd went apeshit. Also during the set, they played "South of Heaven", "Mandatory Suicide", "Dead Skin Mask", "Angel of Death", & two new songs. Good choice on Slayer's part to only do two new ones, because, for lack of a better term at the moment, they sucked. They just didn't have the same energy as the classics from 8 or 9 years ago. The Deftones absolutely, positively blew dog turds. I was never a fan to begin with, but I figured I'd give them the benefit of the doubt. A lot of bands rock much better live than they ever could or did on record. If you like ridiculous screaming to crunching, semi-atonal guitars, with the occasional tortured guy Kornish vocals, then this would've been your cup of tea. Fourteen year olds absolutely flocked to mosh to this crap on the lawn.
I'm getting old, but there's no excuse for shit of this nature backing Black Sabbath up. Guess they needed to pull the 'younger' crowd as well. Next up was Rob Zombie. Although never a raging White Zombie fan, without a doubt this set was f-----g blistering. Go-Go dancers, pyrotechnics, and a mass of horror movie imagery on the screens in the background were a perfect eye candy for Zombie's horror sludge-fest. He mentioned to the crowd that Black Sabbath were "Four of the coolest fucking guys I've ever met" with all sincerity, and appeared to genuinely be enjoying himself. The set list featured the requisite Zombie classics, "Thunder Kiss '65" (which he told the crowd to help the young kids sing along to), "More Human Than Human", and "Devil Man".
Not long after, it was time for the main event. The opening beats of the intro film (a montage of footage & songs from Sabbath's career) signaled the crowd to haul ass from the beer stands & T-shirt vendors to get back to their positions. Soon the opening sirens of "War Pigs" wailed, & Sabbath launched into a BLISTERING set. The crowd went wild with appreciation (as well they should), & you could tell that the boys were having a good time. Tony actually smiled numerous times, & Ozzy jumped around, dosing the crowd & joking around w/ Tony. Geezer was absolutely brilliant on bass, slamming out rhythms to "After Forever" "Into The Void" & "Bassically" flawlessly & with lots of energy. Bill showed incredible stamina for a man who recently had a heart attack, kicking ass like he meant it & even improvising some double bass fills during certain points. He even somehow got that tinnish drum sound for "Children of the Grave" in there for certain parts. Tony had a brief solo before the band launched into "Dirty Women" that was nothing short of killer, & the boys nailed this song home 1000 times better than on "Reunion". You could tell that Ozzy had been resting his pipes, because his voice hardly cracked at all ("Sweet Leaf" & one other song he had very brief trouble). It absolutely restored my faith in his being able to continue to sing (I had sadly resigned myself to the realization his voice was shot). It also helped that he wasn't screaming ridiculously during every song & running around methinks. From a techinical standpoint, it was clear the soundmen had figured out how to fix all my previous gripes with their sound. During "Snowblind", they turned Tony down so Ozzy could nail the "My eyes are blind..and Don't you Think You Know what I'm doing" parts of the song, as well as turning Geezer up enough to actually be heard during the songs where his parts aren't as much in the forefront. The band finished with "Children of The Grave", then came out for the obligatory encore, "Paranoid". Before launching in though, they teased us with the opening part of "Super Naut". As the song came to a close, there were explosions and amounts of confetti dumped on the covered seat crowd that would have made KISS blush. "Changes" came on as we all filed out, a pretty end to an unbelievable night. Ozzy, I'm sorry I ever doubted you.
--Ben Norris
Set List (in no order)
"War Pigs", "NIB", "Faires Wear Boots", "After Forever", "Electric Funeral", "Into the Void", "Snowblind", "Sweet Leaf", "Dirty Women", "Iron Man" "Black Sabbath", "Children of the Grave", "Paranoid (w/ Supernaut tease)"
From: "Matt Downs" <mattallica1orion@hotmail.com>
To: siegler@black-sabbath.com
Subject: Black Sabbath: Atlanta Ozzfest Review
Date sent: Mon, 31 May 1999 15:34:03 CDT
This is a review for the Atlanta Ozzfest Sabbath show for your tour pages-
I got to the show at about 1:15, just in time to suffer through the first two bands on the main stage: Puya and System of a Down. Godsmack and Primus were OK, but still not that great. Slayer and Deftones both sucked, but Rob Zombie put on a great show. But who was there to see any of these lesser bands, anyway?! Around 9:00, the roadies started setting up for Sabbath. During this they played a short video with some clips of Ozzy interviews. It turned out to be a promo for Black Sabbath: The Last Supper which is coming out on June 14, I think. I don't know if it is a video or a CD, because I couldn't hear it very well. About 15 minutes later the lights went down, and the crowd went crazy. They showed a 2 minute video with different Sabbath live clips past to present. I think it was the same one from the Reunion Tour. Then Ozzy came out yelling for everyone to go crazy. The rest of the band appeared as the sirens began. Here is the setlist with notes about each song.-
*War Pigs - This was a great performance of the song with good crowd participation, during the whole song.
*N.I.B. - This was also excellent and began with Geezer's great bass solo.
*Fairies Wear Boots - What can I say, another amazing song.
*After Forever - Maybe a little bit of a surprise to the crowd, and done really well. Great lights, too.
*Electric Funeral - This was also awesome and very heavy, with menacing dark purple lights that added a great effect.
*Sweet Leaf - Another great song, another great performance.
*Into the Void - " " " " "
*Snowblind - " " " " " " "
*Dirty Women - Tony started this one off with a short guitar solo, while the crowd waved their lighters back and forth.
*Black Sabbath - This one was awesome. There was the thunder, bells, and large stands
with fires lit in them. Also, Ozzy on the big screen with smeared eye makeup and a crazed look in his eyes, made
this one very evil.
*Iron Man - Another great one with the crowd singing the whole thing along with Ozzy.
*Children of the Grave - Very heavy, with Embryo intro, done very well. Great fireworks after the song ended.
*Paranoid - Yeah, what else did you expect? Great atmosphere, the crowd singing every word along with Ozzy.
After this they had an amazing fireworks display under the low roof of the amphitheatre. Then they released the confetti, and played Changes over the PA. Also LOTS of water. Ozzy had his water hose and buckets throughout the show. Also, there were hoses in between the individual letters of the Ozzfest sign above the stage that poured water down. So you might want to wait to buy a tourbook until afterwards if you are in the first 20 rows. Anyway, this was an amazing concert. Ozzy's voice sounded strong, Tony is still the god of metal guitar, Geezer was amazing, and Bill can still pound out a tight rhythm. And together they were very tight, with very few mistakes. Everyone should go see them while they are still touring. It was one hell of a concert. Also, while there were fireworks going off and Bill pounding out a finale, Ozzy yelled, "We're going to come back and kick you're asses next year!" I don't know if he meant Black Sabbath or Ozzfest as "we" but who knows?
Matt Downs
Date sent: Tue, 01 Jun 1999 12:35:18 -0700
To: siegler@black-sabbath.com
From: Chris Souza <chris_souza@fabco-air.com>
Subject: Reunion Tour Report
Drove up to Atlanta from Gainesville, FL to catch the second date on the Ozzfest '99 tour. As always Black Sabbath kicked ass. Ozzfest started around 11:30 am, although do respect must be given to the opening bands, most of which I didn't even know existed. They owe great appreciation to Sabbath for the invitation to open up for the legends of metal. Around 9:15 PM Sabbath hit the stage Ozzy as dynamic as can be, Ward hidden away behind the kit seldom seen but always heard, Iommi as ominous as ever, and of course Butler, probably the most powerful bass player around. The set was the same as the reunion tour. The sun had just set and the moon was a bright orange and as full as can be. Now we need to remember that this event started at 11:00 am and they were serving alcohol, so by the time Sabbath started to preform the deed, every 55 gallon drum that was used to contain trash was now lit a blaze. Security was less than please with this turn of events, but what did they expect, this was Black fucking Sabbath. It's been several years since I have seen Ozzy or the rest of the band live. I must say what was most impressive was the fact that they played for 2 hours and 15 minutes non-stop and that they did not mask the music with stage antics. It was pure, original, unbelievably sounding HEAVY METAL. This offering of Sabbath was unrivaled to none, I guess the only ones who came close were Deep Purple in their Perfect Strangers tour.
From: Ben Pratt <mister_crowley@hotmail.com>
To: siegler@black-sabbath.com
Subject: atlanta concert review
Date sent: Wed, 02 Jun 1999 21:34:53 AST
I went to Ozzfest '99 on May 29th in Atlanta, and here's how it went:
The concert wasn't everything I'd hoped for, since my sister and her boyfriend had to leave early. The thick smell of cannabis made her ill, and the drunks were just as loud as ever. People need to be more considerate.
The only band to really impress me, pound for pound, was Drain STH, who put on a totally babe-o-licious show. Since we got there late, I only got to hear "I Don't Mind" and "Crack the Liar's Smile." That was worth a good half the ticket price, by itself. These ladies are truely great. Their lead guitarist had problems with her amp at some point and jumped in the audience, but returned promptly after a good crowd surf. It took the roadies a while to reconnect everything, but their lead vocalist handled everything very well. Then they played a song off their new album, "Freaks of Nature," to be released on June 29th. It was probably called "Enter my Mind." Anyway, I'm going to see them again one of these days. Oh yes.
Puya was interesting, kind of Korn-ish, but dipped in a mild "salsa" beat (skews the pun). Everybody else is a kind of haze. I sang on the "third" stage, called Kara-ozzy. I did a blown-vocals version of "Holy Diver" by DIO, then finished with "Dirty Deeds" by AC/DC. To the members of Bible Belt Byproduct, who were kind enough to cheer my embarassed self, it was great chatting with y'all. I'll be sure to catch your show the next time I'm in Atlanta. Somebody e-mail me, OK?
System of a Down were loud. That's all I noticed about them, because I was off trying to figure out Flashpoint on stage 2. Their lead singer's kind of a Rollins type, blah. Godsmack did well, a tribute to their concentrated air-play. Primus' Les Claypool was cool, saying he was there to see Geezer in action. Right before some-odd song he did the first line of "goin' down to South Park," and somewhere else he did the "Smoke on the Water" riff. Slayer and Deftones suck. If any of you are fans, big deal.
Then, of course, Rob Zombie came out with a ton of pyrotechnics, go-go girls, and giant fuzzy dice. For once I didn't mind hearing that Dragula song AGAIN. They also did "Super Charger Heaven," "1965," "More Human than Human," and "Living Dead Girl."
Then Black Sabbath came out, after a little promo for their "Last Supper" video, due in the fall. I maintain my opinion that the "retirement" thing is purely promotional. Since Ozzy didn't mention it on stage or anything, it's probably total bullshit.
Here's Black Sabbath's setlist (not in order):
War Pigs - Luke's Wall
Bassically - N.I.B.
Jack the Stripper - Fairies Wear Boots
After Forever
Into the Void
cough - Sweet Leaf
Electric Funeral
Black Sabbath
Tony Iommi & Geoff Nicholls intro (sounds like "Feels Good to Me") -
Dirty Women
Snowblind
Iron Man
Embryo - Children of the Grave
a couple of bars of Supernaut - Paranoid
Ozzy did great. He squeeked a little, but no worse than Tony's amplifier at the beginnings of the songs. He jumped in on "is he alive or dead..." too early in Iron Man, but Tony just smiled, shook his head, and adjusted. There was a little too much wah on Bassically and Electric Funeral, but it just made them sound unique. The solos were faithful to the originals, yet sounded brand new. And Tony was flashing a beautiful cherry-red vintage Gibson SG, Marshalls, LaBella's, Dunlops, etc. Bill, Geezer, and Geoff were all in full form. Geoff of course is the ghost keyboard player who's probably getting lap dances backstage, but he's earned it.
Probably the neatest thing we got back with was a ton of promo CD's. There were four different ones: Some leftover Doggy Bags from '98, the Doggy Bag Second Helping (said to have been leftover from as early as West Palm the day before), a "Rock Pile" Ozzfest sampler, with two songs each from Drain STH (includes "Down," a bonus track), Insane Clown Posse, Biohazard, and Rammstein, and a "Static" sampler from Universal records featuring Vanilla Ice and Buckcherry. On top of that, we got five different cassettes from Pushmonkey, Static-X, Powerman 5000, Simon Says, and Atari Teenage Riot. No multimedia on Doggy Bag 2, but hoo cares. There were dart games, shooting games, basketball games, a rope bridge climbing game, a mechanical bull, and a big artificial rock for climbing. Just about everything came with a free CD.
Worth the 600-mile round trip? Sure. Worth $50 admission? I guess so. Next year I'm finding a good gen admission show, in protest of amphitheaters. They suck. They're built backwards. If I pay 20 bucks more, there'd better be a pit down there so I can get close to the stage. The cheap seats are the ones that should be row this/section that. Anyway, end of commentary. See y'all next time Sabbath is scrounging for money.
mister_crowley@hotmail.com
Date: Thu, 03 Jun 1999 15:59:34 -0400
From: Jonathon Moorman <jem.ebm@att.net>
Subject: Ozzfest in Atlanta
they finally made it down south and am i glad that i caught this. the song
list was predictable, but with a MAJOR EXCEPTION: can you say improv? no,
unfortunately, not a big jam session, but it wasn't the same guitar tracks
as on the album. also, check out the *complete* song list below.
WAR PIGS: no supertzar intro, a brief blurb of ozzy and geezer talking and
then a message saying that there would be a black sabbath video released on
june 15. a couple minutes later the lights went down and the siren began
playing.
N.I.B.: no BtWoS :(; a quick bass solo which was not a clone! the bass
sounded real clear though it sounded down in the mix later in the show. i
was a little surprised when i heard tony venture into a different solo
towards the end. but the sound wasn't that clear (sound board working the
kinks out?) and i wasn't positive until...
FAIRIES WEAR BOOTS: sounded wonderful! tony played around with the opening
cords and screwed up majorly at one point! it was so weird to hear him
make a mistake that i had to turn to one of the guys that i was with to
confirm it! by this time i was satisfied with the concert. they could've
stopped playing then and, i would've been annoyed but, i would have been
satisfied.
AFTER FOREVER: i forgot that they were doing this song and really started
moving when i heard it. WOW! most of the people didn't seem to know it
and i was enjoying too much to see if any interest was developed.
SWEET LEAF: geezer, geezer, geezer! this song was wonderful! they even
had a pre-recorded cough that played at the beginning. it's not necessary
guys. :)
INTO THE VOID: slowed down and doom-laden; some wonderful improv by tony
and a great workout for the whole band.
SNOWBLIND: sounded wonderful, much better live than on any of the album
versions
DIRTY WOMEN: the intro was a wonderful guitar solo by tony (maybe a minute
or so). just him and geoff playing. i was waiting for him to play the
intro section of "die young" but it didn't happen! this was another song
that the crowd didn't seem to know. however, by the end of the song, the
place was rocking. the outro guitar solo (walking the streets i wonder...)
was lengthened by a couple of minutes and tony took the time to whale. i
can't begin to tell you how wonderful it sounded. and the crowd responded
enthusiastically.
BLACK SABBATH: complete with the tiki torches and everything else that
you've read here. however, ozzy's laugh was PURE EVIL. i'm one of those
that thought gillan's version was the best, but this one might beat all!
ozzy sounded diabolical! and my buddies concurred, so i don't think that
it was just buildup.
IRON MAN: sounded great but ozzy strayed too far from his monitors and
screwed up the lyrics! oh well, just like the ol' days when he actually
had the songs memorized! i thought that this was particularly humorous
since this is one of the three songs that he's been doing all through his
solo career.
CHILDREN OF THE GRAVE: and i knew that the show was ending way to soon.
during the encore break, we were kidding each other, "hey what song do you
think they'll do next?" maybe 'neon knights' or 'children of the grave'?
kidding aside i was really hoping to hear supernaut or symptom, but, down
in my heart, i knew what was coming next. boy was i shocked to hear...
SUPERNAUT!!!!!!: i was stunned when i heard the opening chords!
unfortunately, that's all we got! as my mind was wondering how they would
bridge between it and paranoid (will they do the drum solo? will the drum
solo break into rock and roll doctor like on the born again tour?). nope,
right at the first cord change, the band broke my dream and played...
PARANOID: made the finality of the show real. there was some improv at the
end of the guitar solo (i think) but it wasn't as drawn out as at the
reunion show. the blowers opened up with so much confetti we couldn't even
see the band as the music ended and as the final bows came around.
CHANGES: outro
OBSERVATIONS: not as much of the "I can't fucking hear you!"s thankfully.
still a bunch, though. when ozzy introduced the band -- early in the set
(before AF or ItV, i think) -- he began bowing to tony and got the audience
into the act. tony was smiling and laughing. he even gave the crowd a
bow.
and was tony animated! okay, maybe he wasn't banging his head like geezer,
but he was constantly walking around the stage: back behind ozzy, over
towards geezer and all over stage right. it was the typical tony walk, but
i've never seen him walk so much (this is my 4th sabbath show, 1st since
seventh star). maybe someone switched his decaf with espresso! ozzy
sounded great. i was happy to see one of the early concerts before his
voice got fucked! but he sounded good and (slowly) plodded around the
stage. none of the frog jumps, but lots of water! ozzy's come a long way
since he started that stuff (bark at the moon was the first tour i remember
seeing a lot of it). a bunch of buckets being filled on the side and a
fire hose that came out to his monitors.
as a warning (as opposed to giving it away) (skip to the next paragraph if
you don't want to hear this) there were several fire hoses up in the
lighting rigs. i imagine that the first 50 rows got soaked at various
parts of the show. you might want to hold off buying a tour book (only
$10) until after the show.
said tour book also included geoff nicholls (don't know where he was, i
couldn't see him from my seats) and vinnie appice (just in case!). this
was written on the credits page at the back of the book. i don't know (i
imagine it is) the same tour book as the winter tour. there's also a
picture on the page before the credits, which is missing bill ward! it's a
group shot of the other three hanging around laughing, but bill is
conspicuous by his absence. except for those couple of things, i recommend
the tour book purchase. a lot of interesting articles from the 70s.
what can you say about geezer and bill? they laid down the thunder like
nobody can. i always stared at the monitors during the times when they
displayed bill. man, can he play! and geezer, well, there's just no
comparison. i always thought that it was tony's playing that attracted me
to sabbath. however, the last couple of years, i've really appreciated the
way geezer plays. especially since the solo albums. heavy, but that
wonderful bass playing.
anyway, for those of you that might be wondering if you should catch the
opening bands. first, let me tell you that i'm 37 and really don't care
for stuff heavier than megadeth or g//z/r.
PUYA: pantera meets carlos santana! interesting blend with the 3 horns.
they varied from pantera to santana to rap to jazzy interludes. unusual but
quite listenable. they announced that they were from puerto rico and
wanted to thank their fan base out to see them from alabama! whatever!!! :)
SYSTEM OF A DOWN: a little too monotonous for my taste. we found the
second stage
GODSMACK: really good band. this was the first band that really got the
place going. rhythmic heavy stuff.
SLIPKNOT (SLIPNOOSE): i wanted to see this for geezer's son. there are
about 10 musicians (1 lead singer, 3 drums, 3 guitars, maybe more) on stage
each wearing a different mask. the lyrics were a monotony of curses and a
diatribe against something. too much angst, not enough substance. i
didn't get it and didn't enjoy it.
PRIMUS: 3 self deprecating musicians that were "here to play for y'all
*and* to see geezer butler". a wonderful set. plus, how do you insult a
band that announces, "for those of you that don't know who primus is.
there's a banner up in the grass that says 'primus sucks'. that pretty
much explains it."
SLAYER: i never cared for them in the 80s and their set didn't change my
mind. if you like them, you'll enjoy them.
DEFTONES: a good time to get up and walk around! i was not at all
impressed and almost sounded like my mother: "if you don't want your pants
to fall down, wear a belt". yup, i must be an old fart because i
*remember* when i'd spend 15 minutes trying to figure out what tour shirt
to wear to a concert. nowadays, i just want to be comfortable.
ROB ZOMBIE: WOW! my first time seeing him. very good set with lots of
pyrotechnics, dancing girls, and music to shake your bones. i was never a
big zombie fan, but i really enjoyed the set. he was full of complements
for the main act, going out of his way to say what a wonderful influence
black sabbath has made in music and what a bunch of "really great guys"
they are.
so, there's my opinions and undoubtedly you'll have others.
there were also signs everywhere about the show being filmed. since the
sabbath video is due out in two weeks, i assume that this is supposed to be
an ozzfest video. that should prove interesting.
well, i didn't mean to write this long. go see ozzfest if you get the
chance. maybe they'll be doing more of supernaut by the end of the tour!!!
-jon
jonm@beer.com
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