A few years ago, I was driving down Washington Avenue in Minneapolis on a rainy morning when Black Sabbath's Iron Man came on the radio. Suddenly, I wasn't a 40-something-year-old man watching rain hit my windshield. I was a 14-year-old at Boy Scout camp, inside a hot green canvas tent with Andy Newman's black Walkman in my hand. I was hitting the play button and hearing the hiss of the cassette tape, followed by that strange, wavering voice:

I am Iron Man!

It was like nothing I had ever heard before. It was scary. It was exciting. It was ominous.

It was also... welcoming. Right away, it spoke to me. Made sense. It felt like it was something made just for me. I had seen the metal kids at school. They intimidated me with their long hair and Metallica shirts. I never thought I could be one of them. But here I was, listening to Black Sabbath. And liking it. Loving it.

​Driving down the road that rainy day, all of this came back to me in a flood, but it was more than a memory. I was in my car, and it was raining. But I was also in that tent, and it was sunny. I was young. I was middle-aged. In both times, in both places, I was listing to Iron Man. Hearing it for the first time. Hearing it for the hundredth time. Traveling in time and space.

Black Sabbath opened doors for me. When I was younger, I thought I didn't like music. It turned out that I didn't like what was played on the radio - the only way to hear music back then, kids. It wasn't until junior high that I started discovering bands that I liked, and not until high school that I really started exploring heavy music. Black Sabbath was first. Then Nirvana, as was written in the bylaws of high school in the 90s. Then Rollins Band. White Zombie. The Misfits. Neurosis. The floodgates sprang open. Also I was briefly very into a band called Floodgate, but that's a different post.

I was fortunate to see Black Sabbath and Ozzy several times in my life. First at Ozzfest in the Metrodome in 1997 and for the final time on their farewell tour in 2016. There's one experience in particular that I've been thinking about today. It was the second time I saw Ozzy solo, when he closed out the combined Ozzfest/Warped Tour in Somerset, Wisconsin in 1998.

Ozzy played a true greatest hits set of both his solo material and Black Sabbath. At the end of the final songs, giant confetti cannons went off, showering the crowd with bright, slowly rotating rectangles of paper that fluttered down from the sky. It was so unexpected that all of my attention was focused above me, watching these little slips of paper fall from the sky while Changes pumped from the speakers. It wasn't live, just the album version.

Still, it was magic. 

I remember feeling so delighted, so moved. It was a long and fun day of metal bands, and it ended with a moment that felt beautiful. It still feels beautiful to me now. 

When I looked back to the stage, the band was gone. Ozzy was gone. But the beauty still remained.

​Rest in peace, Ozzy. Thank you for the memories. ​