Ozzy, the road to – Randy Rhoads
Ozzy And Randy Rhoads- A Guitar Wizard
By: joseph genco
Randall William Rhoads, better-known as Randy Rhoads was born on December sixth 1956, is a well known heavy metal artist who was affiliated with Ozzy Osbourne and Quiet Riot. As a pupil of classical music, Rhoads aggregated both classical and heavy metal music and played in his own expressive style, which produced a large fan following for the fresh style of playing. Prior to going on tour with Ozzy Osbourne, he would look for classical guitar lessons from his tutors.
Randy Rhoads organized a small cover band and named it after his mother’s middle name – Violet fox when he was 14 years old and with his brother kelle who took control of the drums. They performed numerous shows at the Grand Salon, Musonia, which was his school of music. Rhoads instructed his best friend Kelly Garni how to play bass after his Violet Fox band was disbanded. They conceived a small group and began playing at the backyard parties.
Together they went onto form the band the Quiet Riot. Rhoads was sixteen years old when Quiet Riot was shaped.
His career with Ozzy Osbourne commenced quite unexpectedly. Post Black Sabbath, Ozzy Osbourne was hunting for a new guitar player and the same was brought up while he was being interviewed by Raw Power magazine. Before long Randy Rhoads name was intimated to Ozzy Osbourne during the interview. The following day he asked his friend and bassist Dana Strum to reach and contact Rhoads for an audition. Soon Dana Sturm contacted Rhoads and called on for an audition. Rhoads walked in for his audition with his Les Paul guitar and the practice amp and was warming up for the audition as Ozzy Osbourne walked in. Ozzy knew immediately that this was his man without even hearing his audition. Rhoads later on recalled the moment and said,”I was just tuning up and he said you’ve got the gig”.
The band was named as The Blizzard of Ozz. They headed into the studio for the first time to record their first album which they named it as Blizzard of Ozz.
The level of playing completely changed for Rhoads due to the artistic freedom and encouragement he got from Osbourne and Bob Daisley.
Randy Rhoads went on to record another record album to critical acclaim called “Diary of a Madman”. His guitar wizardry had just started to be acknowledged worldwide as his life was tragically cut short in March of 1982. Rhoads, despite his fear of flying, was coaxed onto a small plane owned and operated by their tour bus driver. After 2 attempts at flying close to the tour bus where Ozzy was sleeping at the time were successful, a 3rd approach was made. The plane clipped the bus with its left wing and spiraled out of control, killing Rhoads instantly. In fact, the bodies were beyond recognition; however, they were lastly identified with the help of dental records.
Randy Rhoads is believed by most to be tremendously important as a neo-classical heavy metal guitar wizard. Numerous guitar players have referenced Rhoads as a major influence including; Zakk Wylde, Yngwie Malmsteen and Michael Angelo Batio to name a few.
