The legendary life of Ozzy Osbourne

“If I had done normal and sensible things, I would not be Ozzy Osbourne,” he said only a few days ago, announcing the release of a new autobiography, “Last Rites”, scheduled for October 7th. It will be one of the first posthumous publications of Ozzy Osbourne, the prince of darkness, who passed away today at the age of 76. To reread them today those words play as the most beautiful epitiffio, for Ozzy Osbourne. Only on 5 July in front of 50 thousand adoring fans, those gathered at Villa Park, the stadium of the House of Aston Villa, his team of the heart, in the Natìa Birmingham, the Black Sabbath frontman had put an end to one of the most controversial and terrifying careers in the history of rock: beheaded doves in front of their records, bats taken to bites on stageself -destructive behavior children ofAbuse of drugs and alcoholnon -ending controversies for the lyrics of his songs (when he came out “Suicide Solution“In 1980, public opinion accused him of instigating suicide when a 19 -year -old boy, John McCollum, was found dead after shooting himself with a shotgun just as he listened to that song), Ozzy did not miss anything. During the preparation of that final show, very tiring and very busy, they had kept him alive who knows how. They measured blood pressure 15 times a day: «I have this trainer who helps people return to normal. He is hard, but he is convinced he can do it for me. I’m giving everything I have. I have a crazy head. I would have died before starting the exercises, so I try to put this aspect in the background », he made it known, to which Life, after the abuses, had presented a very salty account.

The debuts of the Black Sabbath, before falling into the underworld

Real name John Michael Osbourne, born in the 1948 Birmingham, He chose music as an escape route from that reality. In 1968 in the Aston district he founded the Black Sabbath together with the guitarist Anthony “Tony” Iommi and the drummer William “Bill” Ward. Ozzy had covered the announcement neighborhood: «Ozzy Zig is looking for a group. It has its own amplification ». The formation completed with the insertion of Terence guitarists “Geezer” Butler and Jimmy Phillips and the saxophonist Alan “Aker” Clarke. However, it was only when Phillips and Clarke left the band, which was initially called Pola Tulk Blues Band, that the Black Sabbath found their identity. On purpose: The name of the group was inspired by a 1963 film by Mario Bava, master of Italian horror. The film was titled “The three faces of fear”, but in the English version, seen in the cinema by Butler, the title was, in fact, “Black Sabbath”. At the debut of February 1970 for the Vertigo with the eponymous “Black Sabbath“He followed seven months later”Paranoid“, Inspired in part by the Vietnam War: with their mix between Heavy Metal, Hard Rock and Proto Doom I Black Sabbath, who recorded the album in just five days, consecrated themselves.”Not even we at the time knew we were going to compose future classics, when we had done War Pigs or Paranoid», Ozzy himself will say. And so album after disco, from 1971 “Master of Reality” to “Sabbath Bloody Sabbath” of 1973, Osbourne and companions changed the rules of rock. But The dark side of success was there, waiting for the singer. That between drugs, alcohol and excesses soon became A cursed rock icon. Osbourne’s dissolute lifestyle became a problem for the band, which In 1979 he made the difficult decision to remove him. «None of us thought about music as much as possible. I remember that every single day I was done or drunk », he will admit Ozzy years later.

The solo turning point with “Blizzard of Ozz” (and that overturned cross)

The singer, who in Black Sabbath was replaced by Ronnie James Godsupported by his wife and manager Sharon, he decided to start his own, so as not to give it to the now former bandmates. With the complicity of a very young and talented guitarist, Randy Rhods (he died two years later, in a plane crash), he left the fans of the Heavy Metal with a surprising debut album, “Blizzard of Ozz”, Released in 1980. On the cover of the disc, signed by the photographer Fin Costello, Ozzy Osbourne was depicted on his knees on a wooden floor with A cross overturned in hand (element that generated several controversies, fueling the association between the singer and satanic themes). He wore a red cloak access and had an almost ecstatic expression. The image became iconic. And also that of Ozzy, of image, became it, thanks to a series of episodes that fueled the myth, while the various “Diary of a Madman”, “Bark at the Moon”, “The Ultimate Sin”, “No rest for the Wicked”, “on the shelter”: from that time I bit the head of a living bat launched on the stage, believing it to be on the stage,He was urgently brought to the hospital and subjected to a series of anti -rabular vaccinations, risking a serious infection), to live appearances always over the top. In the 90s he released only two solo albums, “No More Tears” of 1991 and “Ozzmosis” of 1995, before gathering in 1997 at the Black Sabbath (but a reunion had already been in 1985, on the occasion of the live AID organized by Bob Geldof and Midge Ure).

The reality show of MTV, the reunion and health problems

It was “The Osbournes“, On MTV, to relaunch him, in 2002: the program transformed his life into a real reality show, doing of Ozzy – Portrait like a funny and confused gentleman – And of the other members of the Osbourne house of the idols also for the very young. In 2011 Tony Iommi confirmed the rumors about a new reunion of the Black Sabbath, who shortly thereafter, in 2013, would also have sent a new unreleased album in the shops, “13”, the first with the participation of Ozzy by “Never Say Die!” of 1978. At the end of the tour, in 2018, Osbourne will not have beautiful words towards the experience: «I didn’t have much fun. I’m just a singer with them». Among the announcements of retreats and second thoughts, in 2023 health problems, on the one hand the parkinson disease of which he revealed that he was affected in 2020 and on the other the tumor between two vertebrae that had been found during a surgery, forced him to take the white flag seriously.

The latest interviews: “Why didn’t I die?”

In the last interviews he said: «The cemetery is full of my drinks: I would have had to die before them. Sometimes I look in the mirror and tell myself: “Why the fuck did you make it?” I don’t let me because I should have died a thousand times. Gastric lavender god made me only knows how many times. I like the idea that if you have a terminal disease, you can go to a place in Switzerland and do things quickly. I saw my father die of cancer». Before the farewell to the scenes of last July 5, he announced that he had put on sale of tea cans containing his DNA, at the price of $ 450 each (383 euros), inviting fans to buy them and clon it. But Ozzy Osbourne will remain unique and inimitable forever.