Many days, I shake my head at the inanity of the music industry. On positive side, you have King Crimson revitalizing the back catalogue by releasing 40th year anniversary edition CDs (which seems like a good approach). On the negative side, Epic has just released the ‘4 Month’ anniversary edition of Ozzy’s latest disc Scream. C’mon guys, do you really think fans are going to go out and buy a second copy of Scream just to get the seven bonus tracks (…or are they just going to download it)?

Here is what you have on the bonus disc:

Studio Tracks:
"Hand of the Enemy" – exclusive to this disc
"One More Time" – originally an iTunes pre-order exclusive
"Jump the Moon” – originally on the Japanese edition of Scream

Live Tracks (from the UK Scream tour):
- “Bark at the Moon”
- “Let Me Hear You Scream”
- “No More Tears”
- “Fairies Wear Boots”

The second disc also contains the video for “Let Me Hear You Scream” along with some behind the scenes footage.

Fans of Scream will likely enjoy “Hand of the Enemy” and “One More Time” as these tracks fit perfectly with the original studio disc. I’m not sure though what Ozzy is trying to do with “Jump the Moon” as it sounds like bad barroom alt-metal. The live material is competently executed and seems to have been chosen to show that new guitarist Gus G. can play Tony Iommi, Jake E. Lee and Zakk Wylde’s licks. Gus G. hits the mark but adds no personal flair of his own.

I continue in my belief that poor product is going to put the final nail in the music industry’s coffin quicker than any illegal downloading will. Why would anyone rush to buy Ozzy’s next album when you inevitably know there will be a ‘Nice Price’ 2CD edition that follows which contains the foreign b-sides, iTunes “exclusive” tracks and more.

If you haven’t picked up Scream, the Tour Edition provides a good bang for the buck as it is priced at $10.81 (about one dollar more than the standard edition) on Amazon. If you already have Scream, there are more interesting things to spend your money on.

Links:
Ozzy Osbourne