Ozzy Osbourne

There's a wobble to his walk nowadays, but it only takes one listen to the road-trip riffs of "Crazy Train," the ominous, black metal keys of "Mr. Crowley," or a scorching, live rendition of the Black Sabbath classic "Paranoid" to remind us of the days when the religious right deemed Ozzy Osbourne scarier than Satan. Devil's disciple, metal legend . . . pantomime dame? Ozzy's Next Steps follow.

Ozzy began his career as the lead howler of heavy metal icons Black Sabbath, but he stepped away from their larger-than-life shadow beginning with his 1981 solo statement, Blizzard of Ozz. Backed by the grandstanding guitar theatrics of Randy Rhoads, songs like "Steal Away (The Night)" — here heard live, on Tribute — spurt like a torrent of molten lava. Ozzy gets satanic, psychotic, slaughtered . . . and sensitive in Deep Cuts.

It might seem strange to hear the Prince of Darkness covering the tender Beatles tune "In My Life," but the mesmerizing result captures Ozzy's trials and tribulations perfectly. As does the white-knuckle blues of "Rocky Mountain Way," the cowbell-clanging, feedback-flinging "Mississippi Queen," and an extended, incendiary rendition of "Suicide Solution."

As the once-feared front man of Black Sabbath (yes, he bit the head off of a bat, thinking it was a rubber toy) and a respected solo artist in his own right, Ozzy Osbourne could easily pass as the undisputed godfather of heavy metal. The classic and underappreciated solo songs, covers, and live cuts collected here — finely combed from Ozzy's mammoth back catalogue — leap from speaker cones with riffs as expressive and vitriolic as Ozzy's outrageous public profile.