Osbourne Family Album, The

Everything we’ve seen so far has just been pebbles, faint rumblings, mere hints of the marketing landslide that’s about to bury us. A few Osbourne Family posters here and a couple of T-shirts there capitalizing on the surprise success of MTV’s latest reality show are nothing compared to the onslaught of action figures, clothes, lunch boxes, yo-yo’s, CDs, DVDs, and everything else America’s “first family of evil” has planned for us.

The first item being offered up to tide us over until season two starts is the official soundtrack for the television show, titled The Osbourne Family Album. The album contains several of the family’s favorite songs, as well as some Ozzy Osbourne classics. The songs are linked together by sound samples taken directly from the television show.

The disc opens with Pat Boone’s rendition of “Crazy Train,” which originally appeared on his CD of heavy metal cover tunes and is also the theme for the television show. Other tracks on the album include The

Kinks’ “You really Got Me”, System of a Down’s “Snowblind”, John Lennon’s “Imagine”, The Cars’ “Drive”, Starsailor’s “Good Souls”, Dillusion’s “Mirror Image”, Eric Clapton’s “Wonderful Tonight”, and Chevelle’s “Family System”. The promo material touts “unreleased material from Starsailor and Dillusion”, but to tell you the truth I wouldn’t know the difference between released and unreleased material from those two bands.

Included are some short explanations as to why the songs were picked, for those who are curious. Nothing too in-depth is given; John Lennon’s “Imagine” says “Ozzy and Sharon fell in love to this song while they were dating.” Nothing Earth shattering to be found here. The Cars’ “Drive” was “a personal favorite of Aimee Osbourne when she was younger”, and Dillision’s “Mirror Image” is “an act that Jack [Osbourne] is currently working to develop.” Sounds a bit self-serving to me, but hey. Not my soundtrack.

The other musical tracks on the disc come from the Osbournes themselves. Ozzy tracks include “Dreamer”, “Mama I’m Coming Home”, “Paranoid”, and “Crazy Train”. The final Osbourne track is daughter Kelly’s rendition of Madonna’s “Papa Don’t Preach” with Incubus backing the pink-haired one. The vocals don’t sound as bad or as distorted as they do on the radio bootleg of the song that made the internet rounds last month — either that was a slightly different mix, or somewhere during the “CD to radio to mp3 to Internet to My Computer” process, something got lost.

Between each track lies a short sample from the television show. The samples include Ozzy’s discussion about Pat Boone, Ozzy’s lectures to his kids, Kelly’s speech about the valet guy farting in her car, Ozzy throwing the piece of wood through the neighbor’s window, Ozzy ranting about the dogs pissing on his carpet, Ozzy’s rant about “bubbles” and being the “Prince of fuckin’ Darkness”, and the Osbournes’ conversation about Ozzy’s viagra experiments, among others. Two versions of the album are being sold, one for all ages and one for adults; the all ages version has the samples bleeped just like the television show. The adult version does not.

The Prince of fuckin’ Darkness (along with the Princess of fuckin’ Marketing) have put together a cute little package that tries to capture the excitement and surprise of the hit television show. The problem is, there’s nothing new here. Even casual fans of the show have heard most of the sound clips included within. I would guess that most people who enjoy The Kinks, System of a Down, John Lennon or Ozzy Osbourne already own these songs on CD. I guess if you’re dying to have Kelly Osbourne’s version of “Papa Don’t Preach” or some bands that Jack Osbourne is developing on CD, this album is for you.

My guess is that with the huge Osbourne marketing landslide we’re about to experience combined with the relatively few number of Kelly Osbourne fans in the world, this CD should be readily available in either a bargin bin or used CD store near you within three months. If you must own this album, I’d wait 90 days.

01. Crazy Train – (Pat Boone/Theme from TV Show)
02. Dreamer – Ozzy Osbourne
03. Papa Don’t Preach – Kelly Osbourne
04. Paranoid – Black Sabbath
05. You Really Got Me – The Kinks
06. Snowblind – System Of A Down
07. Imagine – John Lennon
08. Drive – The Cars
09. Good Souls (Remix) – Starsailor
10. Mirror Image – Dillusion
11. Wonderful Tonight – Eric Clapton
12. Mama I’m Coming Home – Ozzy Osbourne
13. Crazy Train – Ozzy Osbourne
14. Family System – Chevelle (Bonus Track)

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