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Metal to medal? Military recruiters work the Ozzfest The U.S. Marines manning a recruiting tent at the music festival were wearing camouflage but they didn't exactly blend in. BY WILLIAM WEIR The Hartford Courant Posted on Sun, Aug. 14, 2005 POP CULTURE Commerce at the Ozzfest in Hartford, Conn., is plentiful and brisk, and tends toward the countercultural. Items for sale include marijuana-flavored candy, clothing with spikes, and Cat-in-the-Hat-style hats with pictures of pot leaves. The river of people that flows from booth to booth on a recent Sunday boasts a lot of fishnet and hairstyles that fully exploit the...

Bush/Hitler Image Removed From Ozzfest Video Montage 07.22.2004 2:38 PM EDT Ozzy Osbourne (file) Photo: Peter Pijlman / Image Direct There's something a little different about Black Sabbath's performance at Ozzfest nowadays, and if you blink you might miss it. Two images of George W. Bush, shown during Sabbath's performance of the metal classic "War Pigs," have been removed from the video montage that accompanies the song, which usually kicks off the band's headlining set. One image that juxtaposed Bush and Adolf Hitler was captioned "Same sh--, different a--hole," while the second superimposed a round, red clown nose on the...

<p>When it was hyped in the spring, the summer concert season sure looked rosy.</p> <p>The live music industry was coming off a record year for revenue in 2003 and a strong first quarter in 2004, and there was no reason to think that wouldn't continue through the summer.</p>

Days after confounding fans with a so-called "special announcement" that fell short of expectations, organizers have confirmed that Black Sabbath will headline Ozzfest 2004. The timing of the announcement comes as more of a surprise than the news it contained, since, for weeks, assumptions were high that the legendary metal quartet was on board for the trek. Last week, Ozzfest.com promised a big announcement on Friday, though visitors to the site were met with a message about an unsigned-band contest instead of the news that Ozzy Osbourne himself first hinted at in a radio interview in early April (see "It's...

10th miner was spared from ordeal by day off (OR, How the Prince of Darkness saved my life, can I have my 15 minutes now?) When mine flooded, he was at Ozzfest Monday, August 05, 2002By Bob Batz Jr., Post-Gazette Staff Writer They were supposed to be 10. Ten miners, not nine, were scheduled to be on the crew that wound up trapped 240 feet underground at the Quecreek Mine last month. Roger Shaffer Jr. thanks Ozzy Osbourne that he didn't have to go through that now world-famous, 78-hour ordeal near Somerset. Shaffer, 22, who lives outside nearby Hollsopple, is...