Anyway, enough nostalgia. I found myself at a loose end last Saturday and headed off to spend the afternoon in town for the first time in years. It’s different to how it used to be. It was the last weekend of the Birmingham Jazz & Blues Festival so I started off with a bit of music. The Honeyboy Hickling Blues Band were playing at Millennium Point. It’s a bit out of the way and not the most attractive of venues so I wasn’t expecting much of an audience but when I arrived it was standing room only and by the end of the first set there must have been more than a hundred people watching.

Honeyboy himself was telling tales of playing alongside Bo Diddley and Nine Below Zero amongst others while guitarist Bob Wilson, a Brummie legend who’s played with just about every local band worth mentioning, was providing solid work. There was a bit of Jimmy Reed, some Muddy Waters and a lot of appreciation for a fine band who set up the rest of the day well.

Then it was off to Selfridges for the best-named band of the day, the Sax Pistols. Not the greatest musicians but they were the sort of fun band that the festival, now in its fifth decade, has specialised in from the start. Sadly they didn’t do a jazz version of Anarchy in the UK.

Through the Bullring and down the steps to the Market area and the highlight of the day. Playing Django were exactly what they were supposed to be. A gypsy jazz ensemble playing the music of Mr Reinhardt and others, they were the perfect thing for a summer’s afternoon. I did intend to go back to Millennium Point for Tipitiana but this was so good I decided to stay for their second set and during the interval caught a bit of the Roy Forbes Trio in the Rag Market. Roy’s another veteran of the local scene and while the audience was a bit sparse they enjoyed themselves well enough.

With a bit of a gap until my next scheduled appointment I had a wander round the newly-appointed tourist traps of Ozzymania. There were so many photographers outside the Crown that the traffic was being brought to a halt, while security were marshalling crowds at the murals. There were a multitude of accents – American, German, Japanese amongst others. I knew Sabbath were probably bigger abroad than in the UK but I had no idea they had this sort of global appeal.

There were plenty of people walking into the Museum & Art Gallery exhibition and multitudes of Sabbath t-shirts standing around Victoria Square thinking about where to go next, but the biggest draw was the bridge. If it was ever proved that Ozzy’s death was in any way mysterious the owners of the Brasshouse should be taken in for questioning because the place was absolutely rammed. Not since the Undertones and John Peel has anyone had such an upturn in trade from a death without the inconvenience of dying themselves.

A quick pit stop in the Prince of Wales (Holden’s Golden Glow, it was magnificent) then it was off to Snobs for another outburst of the blues, courtesy of Mike Davids, whose music was at the more soulful end of the genre. Nothing spectacular but another thoroughly pleasant way to while away an hour before going on somewhere else. Former MP John Hemming was leading his jazz band at the Queen’s Arms on Newhall Street while there was a second helping of Honeyboy and Bob Wilson at the Wellington, but by now I was starting to feel my age so it was time to go home.

On the way back to the station I noticed another strange phenomenon of modern Birmingham – the surprisingly large number of hen parties that come here for the weekend. From the cowboy hats and glitter of the gloriously tacky Broad Street to the upmarket bars and restaurants off New Street, this is nothing like I can remember. There’s a big crowd standing next to the Town Hall, on Victoria Square. They’re joining in with a couple of buskers and the song, naturally enough, is Ozzy’s Crazy Train.

There might be too much rubbish on the streets and we’ll never get rid of the sense that it’ll be nice when it’s finished but I couldn’t help feeling that the past couple of Sabbath-inspired weeks have given Birmingham the sort of attention we haven’t enjoyed since the Commonwealth Games. We blew that one; if whoever is now running the council had any sense they’d bang a few heads together and sort out building on this legacy.