REVIEW: Ozzy Osbourne – Ultimate Live Ozzy (picture disc EP)

Welcome to the third WEEK OF SINGLES!  Once again, we’ll be looking at singles and EPs all week.  Up first is a really odd one.

Click here to see directories for the last two installments:  The Week of Singles, and the Week of Singles 2.

OZZY OSBOURNE – Ultimate Live Ozzy (1986 CBS picture 12″ record)

T-Rev bought this for me a year or two ago, God knows where he found it!  All I know is that one day I got a text from him saying, “Mikey, Ultimate Live Ozzy picture disc, do you need it?”  I obviously said yes,  I didn’t care what it was exactly.  I figured it was probably live cuts from The Ultimate Ozzy home video release.  I know that Ozzy picture discs go for crazy amounts of money at record shows, and this one was affordably priced.

Picture discs don’t sound the best, and this one even has a label on the front warning the consumer of this fact.  Unfortunately my plastic sleeve isn’t in the greatest shape, although the record is absolutely perfect.  I love the way the turntable spindle sticks out of Ozzy’s tongue on one side.  The other side has a picture of Ozzy and guitarist Jake E. Lee with the girl from The Ultimate Sin album cover.  Jake’s taking a bite out of her bum.

Here’s the weird thing.  Even though the label clearly states these are live versions from Kansas City in 1986 (the Ultimate Ozzy video shoot), there are no live songs.  There are three tracks per side, and both sides are identical.  They contain the studio versions of “The Ultimate Sin”, “Never Know Why”, and “Thank God for the Bomb”.  The studio versions — not live versions!  Somebody screwed up somewhere; you have to assume one side was meant to have the live tracks, and the other the studio counterparts.  Information is scarce, except that there are multiple reports of the same issue for this picture disc on the web.

Thankfully, the three missing live tracks are on the Prince of Darkness box set.   It’s always nice to get some live Ozzy stuff with Jake E. Lee, since it’s so rare to find.  Randy Castillo (R.I.P.) is on drums, and like him or not, he has a signature style that he utilized with Ozzy.  I enjoy his drumming.  The live versions are more keyboard heavy than the studio counterparts.  I enjoy Jake’s echoey guitar intro to “Thank God for the Bomb” which sounds cool live.

I’d love to know if these three live tracks were actually released on vinyl at all in 1986.  Prince of Darkness was released in 2005; that’s a long time to wait to finally get the tracks in an audio format!  I do have the Ultimate Ozzy video on VHS, but it has never been released on an official DVD.  Knowing of Ozzy’s loathing for this period, I wonder if it ever will be.  I doubt it.  It’s too bad, because some have a fondness for The Ultimate Sin and its songs.

If this picture disc had contained the live tracks it was supposed to, I’d give it 4/5 stars.  However, for a screwup this colossal:

0/5 stars.  At least it looks cool.

Final note:  When originally released, this disc came with postcards and a poster.  I have neither.

49 comments

    2. No. The only time an error is valuable, is when a band accidentally includes music they didn’t intend to, that is rare. For example, Deep Purple issues a Speed King single with the wrong version of Speed King. They used a piano take that was shelved, by mistake. Today that piano version is found on compilations, but it would be considered a rare error that would be valuable.

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  5. Dude! That’s the ULTRA-RARE “Ozzy-as-Farrah-Fawcett” picture disc!! I MUST have it to complete my set;
    “David-Coverdale-as-Tawny-Kitaen”
    “Todd-Rundgren-as-Bebe-Buell” and
    “Vince-Neil-as-Cher”
    Rawk “coff-coff” ON!

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  6. Hahaha..Jake biting that chicks ass! Mike for that alone u can’t get rid of that picture disc!
    The pic sums up the 80s!!

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    1. I don’t think this record cost Trev much, so I’m not going to cry. I do get upset if I accidentally wreck something myself, like when I scratched my brand new LP copy of Appetite for Destruction.

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  9. It was filmed and recorded in Kansas City, which is in Missouri. It was at Kemper Arena, in Kansas City Missouri. Not recorded in Kansas. People from Missouri do not like being compared to Kansas.

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      1. It’s an easy mistake to use, people in Missouri take it to personally, but they have a real rivalry with Kansas. Technically Kansas City is in both Kansas and Missouri, but the popular part with anything you want to see or anyone talks about is in Missouri. They joke about it in the movie “thousand ways to die in the west” if you’ve seen that. It’s weird and stupid, but it is what it is. It would be like having New York City be in Massachusetts, makes no sense. Too bad they got rid of Kemper, it was a kickass arena. Multuple bands filmed there.

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        1. I have seen that, I will need to watch it again. You mean that Seth MacFarlane western? I have it on Blu-ray here, I’ll have to pay more attention! Thanks for this, I love learning interesting facts like this.

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