Vanessa PearceBBC News, West Midlands
Ross HalfinAs Birmingham plays host to a weekend of festivals music industry insiders said there had been a boost in interest in the city’s musical heritage, thanks to the city’s final Black Sabbath gig and Ozzy Osbourne.
But can the city hold on to the Ozzy effect?
On 5 July thousands of people flocked to Birmingham to see some of the greatest names in heavy metal music perform.
Black Sabbath’s Back to the Beginning gig, which featured the band plus other big names such as Metallica, “served as an amazing reminder of the city’s music scene,” said DJ Andrew Miller.
“And the intensity of that reminder was off the scale. It was turned all the way up to eleven.
“And there’s been so much happening ever since.”
The Brum Radio presenter recently set up a monthly event, Let’s Build an Alternative Network.
The aim was to help Birmingham musicians meet promoters, labels and other industry professionals.
Connor HarveyInterest at the first meeting had been “off the chart,” he said.
“The thing I was asking around the Villa Park gig is what’s the legacy going to be, and who’s going to be the next Brum band with the profile to be able to play a gig like that?’
“That night and the next morning I had a little cry just because of the reception and the messages I received,” he said.
“But that’s the heavy music scene for you, they’re beautiful people and they really inspire me.”
There has been a recent series of metal festivals with sell-out crowds and attendances breaking previous records, said Dr David Gange of Birmingham University.
“I think something really exciting is going on,” he said, “I’ve never seen the mood in this scene so positive and vibrant”.
There were a lot of people working very hard to make sure the Ozzy effect continues and grows, he added.
“There are so many ways in which it’s been brilliant, just seeing the pride with which people have been wearing their metal gear around Birmingham, it’s felt like such a shift.”
The associate professor of history is carrying out a research project Why Metal Matters.
The recent ban on busking in the city centre wasn’t helpful, he said, “but that’s galvanised bands and got people talking about the right things,” he added.
Dr David GangeMeatdripper are a Birmingham-based band who recently played at Metal in the Midlands, a showcase event for bands which took place just before the Black Sabbath gig.
Since the Town Hall Sabbath celebration the band had been getting regular gigs, including their first festival, bass player Liv Barlow said.
The band were excited to be playing at Supersonic, a three day event at various venues in the city, with organiser Lisa Meyer being a cheerleader of theirs since day one.
Despite the music industry “being dominated by white men,” the scene in the city had evolved and was being reclaimed “by queer, by non-binary people, by women,” she said.
“It’s nice that we can be in that space and feel welcomed, and there’s some really good pockets of communities for that in Birmingham””.
Sarah JfqAlso playing this weekend, at Noose Fest, held at Digbeth’s Dead Wax, is James Cole with band Morbid Atrocity.
He said the Ozzy effect had certainly been felt by small bands like his.
University of Birmingham research showed Sabbath’s last concert had contributed £28m to the local economy.
“It’s very easy just to think of it as a number,” the guitarist said, “but the real human and cultural effect of that was pretty immense”.
His band had played a city venue the same weekend as the Sabbath concert which, he said was “like a spark in a powder keg”.
“I’ve never seen (Birmingham’s heavy metal pub) Scruffy Murphy’s so packed, and not just with Brummies but people all over the world,” he said.
“That event was really important for us, it was about sparking this massive interest in metal music and sustaining it, not just for Ozzy but for other smaller bands as well.”
Dr David GangeBlack Country duo Gans have called on the city council to reverse the busking crackdown calling it “short-sighted and detrimental” to the local music industry.
Thomas Rhodes from the band said seeing thousands fill the streets to pay respects to Ozzy Osbourne after his death less than three weeks after the Villa Park concert “showed there was a clear drive and hunger” for the city’s cultural heritage.
“As an artist community I think we started to believe that this would create an insurgence of investment in infrastructure in the industry,” he said.
“But with a ban like this it’s clear the council won’t have the same vision and that’s pretty heartbreaking to be honest.”
Dr David GangeThe Back to the Beginning gig, and associated events were “much needed” in the city, concluded Lyle Bignon, Birmingham’s night time economy ambassador.
Reduction of the city’s cultural budget as well as coverage of the council’s financial woes and the ongoing bin strike, meant the city had had a “tough run of it in terms of civic pride and identity”.
“Birmingham is very much built on its working class music interests, whether that’s two tone, whether that’s Bhangra, whether that’s heavy metal music and this feels like one of those moments even now weeks after after the Back to the Beginning show and Ozzy’s funeral cortege that there’s still something in the air”.
The benefit of holding city events such as Supersonic is to “put the city and its venues on the map for the agents, the managers, the promoters and the people that are kind of the soft power within the industry.
“So I’m not under any pretense that something huge has shifted here, but I do think what it has given us is a bit of a joie de vivre, a bit of a boost in our confidence.”
