Rating: NN
In a cost-effective and low-effort spin on the year-end best-of cash-in concept, Under Cover gathers Ozzy Osbourne’s previously released renditions of other people’s tunes and adds four new ones to pad out the disc. While some songs lend themselves to Ozzification, namely Arthur Brown’s Fire and King Crimson’s 21st Century Schizoid Man, his take on the Moody Blues’ Go Now (he never would’ve tried it if he’d heard the Bessie Banks original) and John Lennon’s Working Class Hero and Woman prove woefully ill-advised. Sympathy For The Devil might seem right, satanically speaking at least, but neither Ozzy nor his backing band is capable of doing it justice, even with help from sacred steel hotshot Robert Randolph. Boy, is he ever gonna be pissed when he finds out which Rolling Stones tune he was playing on.
