Ozzfest fans crazy for new blood, dinosaurs
MANSFIELD -- Ozzy Osbourne captured the heavy-metal tone yesterday when he cried at the outset of Black Sabbath's set: ''Can you believe this is the tenth anniversary of Ozzfest? Are you ready to go crazy? Let's go crazy!"
To be honest, the sold-out gathering of 20,000 fans had already been going crazy -- many of them since the ungodly rock 'n' roll hour of just after 9 a.m. when this epic, 20-band Ozzfest began with Wicked Wisdom, a group led by Jada Pinkett Smith. Her husband, actor Will Smith, watched her from the side of the sun-swept B stage where most of yesterday's groups churned through short sets of speed metal with murderous intensity.
Band after band gave it their best shot during mostly four-song sprints at this open-air second stage in the Tweeter Center's asphalt parking lot. Standout acts included Sweden's Soilwork, Arch Enemy (with some of the fanciest guitar fretwork of the day), the brutally aggressive Black Dahlia Murder, the relentless A Dozen Furies, the monstrously talented Mastodon (with outstanding soloists), the pile-driving Bay State band Killswitch Engage, and the metal horror merchant Rob Zombie, whose sledgehammer set included some White Zombie songs.
Next to Ozzy, Zombie made the second-most cogent Ozzfest observation of the long 14-hour day. ''It ain't changed a bit in 10 years," he said. ''It's a [expletive] dinosaur. That's why we like it."
Ozzfest has become a symbol of heavy metal's unity. Many people arrive early to catch the new blood of the festival, then stay late to see the dinosaurs -- and they love them both. The band that stole the show yesterday was Iron Maiden, a British relic which filled the slot of last year's Judas Priest. Like Priest, Maiden singer Bruce Dickinson said his group would just play old songs at Ozzfest, then tour behind a new record next year.
Dickinson was a remarkably well-preserved showman who defied his age by racing across the stage and climbing stairs to ramps at either side, from which he exhorted the crowd into a horn-saluting frenzy with such songs as ''Wraithchild" and ''Run to the Hills," aided by a triple-guitar attack and inflatable beast with neon blue eyes, and changing rear curtains that made their set feel like a Broadway play.
The main stage had heated up at twilight with the ferocity of In Flames, followed by the manic madness of Zakk Wylde's Black Label Society, and a flawlessly tight set by Massachusetts band Shadows Fall, with singer Brian Fair flapping his massive, knee-length dreadlocks.
Mudvayne then followed with a riveting musically challenging set in which one song sounded like a heavy-metal Gregorian chant. And Black Sabbath finished the night strongly, as they always do, with a revitalized Ozzy cooking through ''War Pigs," ''Dirty Women," and other favorites. Sabbath's set featured spectacular lighting and marked the debut of the Tweeter Center's new LED screens on the lawn which provided much improved visual clarity and brightness for the fans going crazy in their own way up there.
