I Am Ozzy by Ozzy Osbourne

  Never Say Die bombed like none of our albums had ever done before in America, but it did OK in Britain, where it went to number twelve in the album charts, and got us a slot on Top of the Pops. Which was good fun, actually, ’cos we got to meet Bob Marley. I’ll always remember the moment he came out of his dressing room – it was next to ours – and you literally couldn’t see his head through the cloud of dope smoke. He was smoking the biggest, fattest joint I’d ever seen – and believe me, I’d seen a few. I kept thinking, He’s gonna have to lip-synch, he’s gonna have to lip-synch, no one can do a live show when they’re that high. But no – he did it live. Flawlessly, too.

  There were other good things happening for Black Sabbath around that time, too. For example, after sorting out our finances, we’d decided to hire Don Arden as our manager, mainly because we’d been impressed by what he’d done for the Electric Light Orchestra. And for me, the best thing about being managed by Don Arden was getting to see his daughter Sharon on a regular basis. Almost immediately, I began falling in love with her from a distance. It was that wicked laugh that got me. And the fact that she was so beautiful and glamorous – she wore fur coats, and had diamonds dripping from everywhere. I’d never seen anything like it. And she was as loud and crazy as I was. By then, Sharon was helping to run the business with Don, and whenever she came over to see the band, we’d end up having a laugh. She was great company, was Sharon – the best. But nothing happened between us for a long time.

  But I knew it was all over with Black Sabbath, and it was clear they’d had enough of my insane behaviour. One of my last memories of being with the band was missing a gig at the Municipal Auditorium in Nashville during our last US tour. I’d been doing so much coke with Bill while driving between shows in his GMC mobile home that I hadn’t slept for three days straight. I looked like the walking dead. My eyeballs felt like someone had injected them with caffeine, my skin was all red and prickly, and I could hardly feel my legs. But at five o’clock in the morning on the day of the gig, after we pulled into town, I finally hit the sack at the Hyatt Regency Hotel. It was the best fucking sleep I’d ever had in my life. It was like being six feet under, it was so good. And when I woke up, I felt almost normal again.

  But I didn’t know that the key I’d used to get into my room was from one of the other Hyatt hotels we’d stayed at earlier in the tour, in another city. So while my bags had been sent to the right room by the tour manager, I’d gone to the wrong room. Which wouldn’t normally have been a problem: the key I had in my pocket just wouldn’t have worked and I would have gone down to reception and realised the mistake. But when I got to the room, the maid was still in there, plumping the pillows and checking that the minibar was full. So the door was open and I walked straight in. I just showed her the key – which had the right number and the Hyatt logo on it – and she smiled and told me to enjoy my stay. Then she closed the door behind her while I got into the wrong bed in the wrong room and fell asleep.

  For twenty-four hours.

  In the meantime, the gig came and went. Of course, the hotel sent someone up to my room to look for me, but all they found was my luggage. They had no idea I was zonked out on a different floor, in another wing of the hotel. The lads panicked, my ugly mug was plastered all over the local TV stations, the cops set up a special missing persons unit, the fans began to plan a candlelit vigil, the insurance company was on the phone, venues across America were preparing for the tour to be cancelled, the record company went apeshit, and Thelma thought she’d become a widow.

  Then I woke up.

  The first thing I did was call down to the front desk and ask them what time it was. ‘Six o’clock,’ the woman told me. Perfect timing, I thought. The gig was at eight. So I got out of bed and started looking for my suitcase. Then I realised that everything seeemed very quiet.

  So I called back down to the front desk.

  ‘Morning or evening?’ I asked.

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘You said it was six o’clock. Morning or evening?’

  ‘Oh, morning.’

  ‘Ah.’

  Then I called the tour manager’s room.

  ‘Yeah?’ he croaked.

  ‘It’s me, Ozzy,’ I said. ‘I think there might be a problem.’

  First there was silence.

  Then tears – of rage. To this day, I’ve never had a bollocking like it.

  It was Bill who told me I was fired.

  The date was April 27, 1979 – a Friday afternoon.

  We were doing some rehearsals in LA, and I was loaded, but then I was loaded all the time. It was obvious that Bill had been sent by the others, because he wasn’t exactly the firing type.

  I can’t remember exactly what he said to me. We haven’t talked about it since. But the gist was that Tony thought I was a pissed, coked-up loser and a waste of time for everyone concerned. To be honest with you, it felt like he was finally getting his revenge for me walking out. And it didn’t come as a complete surprise: I’d had the feeling in the studio for a while that Tony was trying to wind me up by getting me to sing takes over and over again, even though there was nothing wrong with the first one.

  I didn’t let it affect my friendship with Bill. I felt bad for the guy, actually, ’cos his mum had just died. Then not long after I was kicked out of Black Sabbath, his father died too. When I’d heard the news, I thought, Fuck the war, I’m still his mate, we’re still the same people who lived in a GMC together for months on end in America. So I drove straight up to Birming ham to see him.

  He’d taken it really badly and I felt terrible for him. Then his dad’s funeral turned into a joke. They were carrying the coffin out of the church when they realised that someone in the funeral party had nicked the vicar’s car. The vicar refused to continue with the service until he got it back, but whoever had nicked the fucking thing couldn’t get the steering lock off, and ended up crashing into a garden. Imagine that kind of bullshit going down when you’re trying to lay your old man to rest. Unbelievable.

  But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t feel betrayed by what happened with Black Sabbath. We weren’t some manufactured boy band whose members were expendable. We were four blokes from the same town who’d grown up together a few streets apart. We were like a family, like brothers. And firing me for being fucked up was hypocritical bullshit. We were all fucked up. If you’re stoned and I’m stoned, and you’re telling me that I’m fired because I’m stoned, how can that fucking be? Because I’m slightly more stoned than you are?

  But I don’t give a fuck any more – and it worked out for the best in the end. It gave me the shove up the arse I needed, and it probably made it a lot more fun for them, making records with a new singer. I don’t have anything bad to say about the guy they hired to replace me, Ronnie James Dio, who’d previously been with Rainbow. He’s a great singer. Then again, he ain’t me, and I ain’t him. So I just wish they’d called the band Black Sabbath II.

  That’s all.

  Part Two

  Starting Over

  7

  Des Moines

  All of a sudden I was unemployed.

  And unemployable.

  I remember thinking, Well, I’ve still got a few dollars in my pocket, so I’ll have one last big fling in LA – then I’ll go back to England. I honestly thought I’d have to sell Bulrush Cottage and go and work on a building site or something. I just resigned myself to the fact that it was over. None of it had ever seemed real, anyway. The first thing I did was check myself into a place called Le Parc Hotel in West Hollywood, paid for by Don Arden’s company, Jet Records. I was amazed Don had forked out for it, to be honest with you. The second he realises I ain’t going back to Black Sabbath, I said to myself, they’re gonna kick me out of this place – so I might as well enjoy it while I still can. You didn’t get a room at Le Parc – you got a little apartment-type thing with its own kitchen where you could make your own food. I never left. I just sat on the bed and watched old war films wi
th the curtains closed. I didn’t see daylight for months. My dealer would come over and give me some blow or some pot, I’d get booze delivered from Gil Turner’s up on Sunset Strip, and every once in a while I’d get some chicks over to fuck. Although I dunno why anyone was prepared to fuck me, not in those days. I was eating so much pizza and drinking so much beer, I had bigger tits than Jabba the Hutt’s fat older brother.

  I hadn’t seen Thelma or the kids for ages. I’d call them up from the phone in my room, but it felt like they were slipping away from me, which made me feel even more depressed. I’d spent more time with Black Sabbath than I ever had with my family. We’d come back from months on the road, take a three-week break, then go straight off to some farm or castle where we’d fuck around until we came up with some new songs. We did that for a decade, until all our personal lives were ruined: Bill’s marriage failed, Tony’s marriage failed, Geezer’s marriage failed. But I didn’t want to accept it, because it would mean losing my home and my kids, and I’d already lost my dad and my band.

  I just wanted to shut everything out, make everything go away.

  So I hid in Le Parc and drank.

  And drank.

  And drank.

  Then, one day, this bloke called Mark Nauseef knocked on my door. He was a drummer, also managed by Don Arden, and he’d played with everyone from the Velvet Underground to Thin Lizzy. He told me that Sharon from Jet Records was coming over to pick something up from him – he was staying in one of the other apartments – but that he had to leave town for a gig. Then he handed me an envelope.

  ‘Would you do me a favour and give this to her?’ he asked. ‘I told Sharon just to call for you at reception.’

  ‘No worries,’ I said.

  As soon as I closed the door, I got a knife and opened it.

  Inside was five hundred dollars in cash. Fuck knows what it was for and I didn’t care. I just called up my dealer and bought five hundred dollars’ worth of coke. A few hours later, Sharon came over and asked if I had something to give her. ‘No, I don’t think so,’ I said, all innocent.

  ‘Are you sure, Ozzy?’

  ‘Pretty sure.’

  But it didn’t take Einstein to work out what had happened. There was a massive bag of coke on the table next to a ripped-up envelope with ‘Sharon’ written on it in felt-tip pen.

  Sharon gave me a monumental bollocking when she saw it, shouting and cursing and telling me I was a fucking disaster.

  I guess I won’t be shagging her any time soon, then, I thought.

  But she came back the next day, to find me lying in a puddle of my own piss, smoking a joint.

  ‘Look,’ she said. ‘If you want to get your shit together, we want to manage you.’

  ‘Why would anyone want to manage me?’ I asked her.

  I couldn’t believe it, I really couldn’t. But it was a good job that someone wanted me, ’cos I was down to my last few dollars. My royalties from Black Sabbath were non-existent, I didn’t have a savings account, and I had no new income coming in. At first, Don wanted me to start a band called Son of Sabbath, which I thought was a horrendous idea. Then he wanted me to team up with Gary Moore. I wasn’t too keen on that, either, even though me and Sharon had gone to San Francisco with Gary and his bird one time, and we’d had a lot of fun. (I really thought I was in with Sharon on that trip, to be honest with you, but nothing happened: she just went back to her hotel at the end of the night, and left me dribbling into my beer.)

  The worst idea that Don Arden had was for me and Sabbath to do gigs together, one after the other, like a double bill. I asked Sharon, ‘Is he having a laugh?’

  But then Sharon started to take more control, and we decided that I should make a proper solo album.

  I wanted to call it Blizzard of Ozz.

  And little by little, things started to come together.

  I’d never met anyone who could sort things out like Sharon could. Whatever she said she would do, she’d get it done. Or at least she’d come back to you and say, ‘Look, I tried my best, but I couldn’t make it happen.’ As a manager, you always knew exactly where you stood with her. Meanwhile, Sharon’s father would just shout and bully like some mob captain, so I tried to stay out of his way as much as I could. Of course, before I could make an album and go on tour, I needed a band. But I’d never held auditions before, and I didn’t have a clue how or where to start. So Sharon helped me out, taking me to see all these young, up-and-coming LA guitarists. But I wasn’t really in any state for it. I’d just find a sofa in the corner of the room and pass out. Then a friend of mine, Dana Strum – who’d auditioned to be my bass player – said to me, ‘Look, Ozzy, there’s one guy you really have to see. He plays with a band called Quiet Riot, and he’s red hot.’

  So one night this tiny American bloke came over to Le Parc to introduce himself. The first thing that came into my mind was: he’s either a chick or gay. He had long, wet-looking hair, and this weirdly deep voice, and he was so thin he was almost not there. He reminded me a little of David Bowie’s guitarist, Mick Ronson.

  ‘How old are you?’ I asked, as soon as he walked through the door.

  ‘Twenty-two.’

  ‘What’s your name?’

  ‘Randy Rhoads.’

  ‘Do you want a beer?’

  ‘I’ll take a Coke, if you have one.’

  ‘I’ll get you a beer. Are you a bloke, by the way?’

  Randy just laughed.

  ‘Seriously,’ I said.

  ‘Er, yeah. Last time I checked.’

  Randy must have thought I was a fucking lunatic.

  Afterwards, we drove over to a studio somewhere so I could hear him play. I remember him plugging his Gibson Les Paul into a little practice amp and saying to me, ‘D’you mind if I warm up?’

  ‘Knock yourself out,’ I said.

  Then he started doing these finger exercises. I had to say to him, ‘Stop. Randy, just stop right there.’

  ‘What’s wrong?’ he said, looking up at me with this worried expression on his face.

  ‘You’re hired.’

  You should have heard him play, man.

  I almost cried, he was so good.

  Soon we were flying back to England for rehearsals. I quickly found out that although Randy looked like Mr Cool, he was an incredibly sweet, down-to-earth guy. A real gentleman, too – not at all what you’d expect of a flash American rock ’n’ roll guitar hero.

  I couldn’t understand why he even wanted to get involved with a bloated alcoholic wreck like me.

  At first, we stayed at Bulrush Cottage with Thelma and the kids. The first thing we wrote was ‘Goodbye to Romance’. Working with Randy was like night and day compared with Black Sabbath. I was just walking around the house one day, singing this melody that had been in my head for months, and Randy asked, ‘Is that your song, or a Beatles song?’ I said, ‘Oh no, it’s nothing, just this thing I’ve got stuck in my head.’ But he made me sit down with him until we’d worked it out.

  He was incredibly patient – I wasn’t surprised at all when I found out that his mum was a music teacher. It was the first time I’d ever felt like I was an equal partner when it came to songwriting.

  Another vivid memory of working with Randy was when we wrote ‘Suicide Solution’. We were at a party for a band called Wild Horses at John Henry’s, a rehearsal studio in London. Everyone else was fucked up on one thing or another, but Randy was sitting in a corner experimenting with riffs on his Flying V, and all of a sudden he just went Dah, Dah, D’La-Dah, DAH, D’La-Dah. I shouted over, ‘Whoa, Randy! What was that?’ He just shrugged. I told him to play what he’d just played, then I started to sing this lyric I’d had in my head for a while: ‘Wine is fine, but whiskey’s quicker/ Suicide is slow with liquor’. And that was it, most of the song was written, right there. The night ended with everyone on stage, jamming.

  Phil Lynott from Thin Lizzy was there. That might have been the last time I saw him before he died, actually. He
was a tragic case, was Phil. I mean, I thought he missed his mark so badly. Great fucking performer, great voice, great style, but the old heroin got him in the end.

  Thank God I never got into that shit.

  Randy loved Britain.

  Every weekend, he’d get in the van and drive somewhere, just to have a look around. He went to Wales, Scotland, the Lake District, you name it. He also collected toy trains, so wherever he went, he’d buy one. He was a quiet bloke, very dedicated, didn’t like showing off, but he could be a laugh, too. One time we were in this bar and there was a guy in the corner playing classical music on the piano, so Randy goes up to him and says, ‘D’you mind if I join you?’ The guy looks at Randy, looks around the bar, sees me, and goes, ‘Er, sure.’ So then Randy gets out his Gibson, hooks up his little practice amp, and starts playing along to this Beethoven piece or whatever it was. But as he goes along, he starts throwing in all these rock ’n’ roll moves, and by the end of it he’s on his knees, doing this wild solo with his tongue hanging out. It was fucking hilarious. The whole bar was in stitches.

  The funny thing is, I don’t think Randy really ever liked Black Sabbath much. He was a proper musician. I mean, a lot of rock ’n’ roll guitarists are good, but they have just one trick, one gimmick, so even if you don’t know the song, you go, ‘Oh, that’s so-and-so.’ But Randy could play anything. His influences ranged from Leslie West to jazz greats like Charlie Christian and classical guys like John Williams. He didn’t understand why people were into ‘Iron Man’, ’cos he thought it was so simple a kid could play it.