Ozzy Osbourne, Korn - Sazka Arena, Prague, Czech Republic - Tuesday 26th June 2007

Wow, have I been to some strange gigs lately! Courtesy of my colleagues in the Czech Republic, I went to a large ice hockey arena in Prague, to see Ozzy Osbourne play, also "ably" supported by Korn. Of course, when you think of Eastern Europe, one of the things that springs to mind is an unhealthy liking for heavy metal, with all the dodgy hair and fashion sense that this entails. This gig utterly lived up to the stereotype - the Russians have an awful lot to answer for.

Korn were the support band, and did all the cheesy heavy metal excess in spades, enough to wind the crowd up for Ozzy. The lead singer appeared to be wearing a kilt, and there were several band members on stage whose exact purpose was unclear. One member in particular seemed to be there solely to provide a few growling backing vocals, and to swing his long hair around in a circle, like some kind of signal to all the metallers in the audience.

During Korn's set, I started to feel slightly self-conscious wearing my nice red Strokes t-shirt - it was nowhere near black enough, and I was looking very out of place amongst all the heavy metal hand salutes (you know the really cliched "666" ones). In general, Korn made an awful noise (I sound really old by saying that, but it is true), to an audience of people that seemed to be lapping it all up. Why they need 2 drummers at all times, rising to 3 for certain songs, is a complete mystery.

When the singer growled "get your muthafuckin hands in the air", everybody went mad - I suspect partly because the word "fuck" had just been used. The only (small) saving grace was that they played a bit of the Metallica song One, which was the only tuneful moment of their set. I can safely say that Korn were the most awful band I have ever seen play live, especially in front of an audience of over 10,000 people. 10,000 people meant that one in every thousand citizens of the Czech Republic was watching that show - truly shocking.

If Korn were just plain bad (trust me, they were), then Ozzy Osbourne himself was like a pantomime, his show was so laughable. For many of the songs, he was so incredibly out of tune, and sounded either drunk or very drugged throughout. Which of course, is how Ozzy Osbourne sounds! His drunk Brummie accent had strangely disappeared completely, and been replaced by a really strong American accent - most unusual. And I got the impression throughout that none of the audience understood a word of what he was singing or saying - after all, it was difficult enough for me to understand him, and in theory we speak the same language.

In reality, much of what was going on seemed quite sad. Ozzy was doddering around on stage like an old man, rather than any swaggering or prancing. The instances of staged rock and roll excess, like throwing a bucket of water over the crowd, or saying "come on you fuckers", just seemed to be so ridiculous as to be simultaneously funny and sad. But maybe these over-the-top cliches are all the rage either at heavy metal gigs, or in Eastern Europe, or both. In between most songs, Ozzy would say "Are you having a good time tonight?" in his American accent. The crowd would cheer, then Ozzy would say "I can't fucking hear you". The crowd would cheer a bit louder, then he would say "I love you all". When this was repeated for the tenth time, it all seemed highly contrived.

In between all this nonsense, some of the songs actually sounded OK, although obviously a bit heavy for my normal liking. Or maybe it was just because we had just been treated to Korn. There were a decent number of Black Sabbath songs, which went down really well, some from Ozzy's solo career, and about the same number from his new album, which nobody seemed to have heard, let alone to care much about. My colleagues were enjoying the show as little as I was, so we slipped out after a good hour and a half, but while Ozzy was still going strong on stage. A very strange experience all in all, one that I am unlikely to forget in a hurry, but have absolutely no desire to ever repeat. A heavy metal gig in London is bad enough, but transplanted to Eastern Europe, it is a positively surreal experience.