This morning’s news of Ozzy Osbourne’s passing hit me harder than I expected. It got me thinking about legacy, how ordinary beginnings can spark extraordinary change, and how we rarely recognise that power while we’re living it.
Heavy Metal began in Birmingham
Tell a teenager deep into death‑core that heavy metal was born in Birmingham, England, and you’ll probably get a blank stare.
Yet that industrial city forged Black Sabbath, and Black Sabbath forged a genre.
Without their huge riffs in the early 1970s, would we have Metallica, Pantera, or the countless sub‑genres on today’s playlists? Back then “heavy metal” didn’t exist. Ozzy, Tony, Geezer and Bill were four factory workers making noise after their work shifts, with no plans for global domination.
Revisiting Sabbath as a guitar player
I’ll admit I wasn’t the world’s biggest Sabbath fan growing up. Yes, “Paranoid” turns up in every beginner’s guitar book, but by the time I started playing, newer metal acts were must more enticing. Revisiting early Sabbath performances, especially their Back to the Beginning reunion, was eye‑opening. Seeing all those rock legends there to honour Ozzy reminded me how deep his roots run through modern music.
Small actions, long legacy
News like today’s drags up personal memories.
I think of one of our first guitar shows: the British Boutique Guitar Festival. Mike, better known as the “China Guitar Sceptic” on YouTube, invited us. He championed luthiers, connected players, and pushed the community forward. Without Mike, many of us would never have met.
Mike, Ozzy, Black Sabbath: different scales of influence, but same lesson. None of them could have predicted the impact they’d leave, yet every conversation, every impromptu jam, every act of support set off ripples that travelled far beyond what they might have intended.
Lessons to carry forward
We’re not Black Sabbath and we’re not from Birmingham, but their story presses the same question on all of us:
What could happen if we just keep playing, keep building, keep going?
Maybe we won’t invent a genre, but every interaction, every backstage chat, every customer we help, every late‑night jam matters.
So, feel inspired to go out there and pursue your dreams, because if some factory workers from Birmingham could create a whole genre of music that would span decades, who knows what you could achieve.