One of rock's best entertainers puts on priceless show

The eyes of the rock world will be on the Northwest next week.

And we mean both eyes. That's because the historic, 24-date "Ozzfest 2007" tour, aka "Freefest 2007," kicks off Thursday at White River, then hops over the Cascades to play the Gorge a week from Saturday.

The tour hasn't even started, but it already looks like another triumph for Sharon Osbourne, Ozzy's canny manager/wife. When the two announced in February that the 12th edition of Ozzfest, one of the longest-running, most profitable annual festival tours, would be free, the music industry scoffed. Bands wouldn't sign on to a free fest. Sponsors wouldn't materialize. It would lose money.

But more than enough sponsors came on board, bands were happy to play for free (as many had at the fest's side stages over the years), and Live Nation, the biggest concert promoter, partnered with the Osbournes for the whole tour. All 428,000 tickets were snatched up on livenation.com, with no surcharges, in one day last month.

It may be free, but Ozzfest won't be cheesy. Any fan who's heard Ozzy's new album, "Black Rain," knows that. It's one of his best recordings ever. And he's been making them for more than 35 years.

Ozzy may stumble through everyday life, but there is one thing he does to near perfection: rock 'n' roll. He is energized, focused and more ornery than ever on "Black Rain." The first single from it, the stomping, defiant "I Don't Wanna Stop," is his biggest hit in more than a decade, and deserves to be. In other songs on the new CD, he lets Bush have it over the Iraq war and the environment, injecting some badly needed political awareness into mainstream rock.

His recordings are solid. But Ozzy is ever better live, when he has an audience to play with. Nobody works a crowd better than he does, and his shows always turn into wild, free-for-all parties, with everyone going home happy.

The other bands on the bill are there to impress, and will be performing for a contented, pumped-up, celebratory crowd. The staging will be bare bones, but who cares? The only special effect Ozzy needs are buckets of water to throw on the crowd — a rock 'n' roll baptism devoutly to be wished.

Patrick MacDonald: 206-464-2312 or pmacdonald@seattletimes.com