Celebrity deaths are quite a common occurrence and more often than not, they pass with the standard “oh, that is quite sad”, but nothing more than that due to not having any personal connection to them and them just being a person who passes in and out of your attention through life.
Things were different when the news broke about Ozzy’s death and was one that seemed to get to me in a way I have not experienced since the untimely death of Chester Bennington back in 2017.
Again, Ozzy was not someone I had ever met and in fact was an artist I had not really listened too, either his solo work or his work with Black Sabbath, but was someone I had known of via two other projects he was involved with – The Osbournes, which was a massive programme when I was growing up and also Ozzy and Jack’s World Detour.
For some reason though, his death really put me on a downer for a good few days, possibly because it was so unexpected after his successful solo show a mere few weeks previously.
After his death, the beauty of Spotify allowed me to have a deep dive into the works of both Ozzy and Black Sabbath and better late than never, I now have a great appreciation for just how good of an artist he was and just why he had so many accolades associated with him.
I was not able to get down to Birmingham on the day of the funeral, but after seeing the outpouring of grief and support shown on the day, I felt compelled to head down to visit some of the areas that had been so heavily featured since his passing.
So, fast forward a few weeks, whilst heading down south on my Summer Holiday, I stopped off to see the bridge, which although has been cleared of the flowers from the immediate days after Ozzy’s passing, still seems to get restocked on a regular basis and was similarly decorated with an array of touching tributes.
After the bridge, I walked down to see the Murals which were created by Mr Murals and was pleased to see they were all still in perfect condition and the signatures had been protected by Birmingham Council.
Finally I headed on over to the Town hall to have a wander through the external photo exhibit before finally heading into the museum to see the Working class Hero exhibition which was originally designed to be open through the “Summer of sabbath”, but has now been extended into the new year.
All the places I stopped at really had an atmosphere to them and there was always someone there just contemplating what they were seeing who would stop and talk about Ozzy and their connection to him, be it just through his music, or from meeting him.
The final stop before continuing on my journey was to go and see Ozzy’s childhood home and the graffiti which he added to the bricks outside his front door.
I am glad I made the pilgrimage down there and now, through these photos have a lasting memory which I can look back on in the years to come to remember this summer, which in a way you could say was the second year the music died.
