Randy was live very much like a diminutive version of Mick Ronson - you could tell the influence, but he looked great. A bit like Cherie Currie in polka dots wielding a Flying V too, he was androgynous. And he played very fluidly and melodically though not with the effective economy of Iommi or EvH; he was a bit a puppy peeing all over the rug. Not Vinnie Vincent territory yet, but getting there.
Having thus endeared myself to the Randy crowd ...
Years later I saw Ozzy in Phoenix, Az, with a juvenile, then still rake-thin and clean-shaven/'no beard growth yet' Zakk (a much more muscular player than Randy btw) and Geezer Butler lost on bass (he admitted finding Bob Daisley's bass lines tasking for his own style). Ozzy sounded a bit rough that night (and I'm not sure whether all vocal lines we heard that night were actually from him), but the crowd loved it.
And then finally with the Sabs touring 13. His voice was actually in surprisingly fine form that night and he was really adept at elegantly cutting corners to not have to sing any bits that might have endangered his vocal performance. When he's with Iommi and Butler, he's all of the sudden no longer Ozzy the lovable jester and entertainer, but the one and only Black Sabbath singer ever, a band member, not a leader. He fits in just right. Sabbath with Dio had their own qualities (seen that line-up twice), but for that brooding, ghoulish, eternal darkness sound, there is no one better.
