You think you know classic Rock? Ozzy Ozbourne.....

In the entire of rock 'n' roll, no character exists like John 'Ozzy' Osbourne. At no point along the circumference can anyone of similarly irresponsible persuasion be found; and to go off at a tangent, never have so many appallingly pithy one-liners emanated from such a mundane music-maker.

As a writer/singer/seer Ozzy is out-classed in every single department. As a performer/ superstar/ presence, however, he sets the agenda. This is the man who added the final flared vocal to the Black Sabbath harangue, the man who came out of various booze and cocaine binges cackling and demanding more, the man who defected in a hotel life and sought to ease the manager's apoplexy by assuring him,'It's all right, mate. I'm a resident.'

He was born in Aston, Birmingham, in December 1948 and his early career embraced house burglary and slaughterhouse menial work. He took to the abattoir with relish and showed a propensity for separating animals from their heads that was never really to desert him. The burglary was not quite so successful and he spent some time in prison after a botched robbery attempt. Drifting around towards the end of the Sixties he found himself more by accident than design in a local band variously called Rare Breed, Polka Tulk and Earth.

The other band members, Tony Lommi (guitar), Terry 'Geezer' Butler (bass) and Bill Ward (drums) were similarly disenfranchised young men with a love of basic blues and booze. Eventually the quartet renamed themselves after one of their better songs, Black Sabbath.

Black Sabbath- or The Sabs as most playgrounds in the western world swiftly dubbed them- was an extraordinary concept, almost menacing in its simplicity. Rather than perfect any degree of virtuosity, which was what other self-styled heavy rock bands of the ear were doing (Deep Purple, Led Zeppelin), and rather than adhere to a traditional blues outline, as Jethro Tull, Free and Fleetwood Mac were attempting to do, Black Sabbath resorted to brutal force. There would be one riff per song, agonizingly intense; there would be waiting lyrics about war, death, paranoia, night and darkness. They were rejected by fourteen record companies. Somehow, however, a record crept out on Vertigo label and to a chorus of critical scorn the first Sabbath Album scaled the charts and became a hit.

It would later be commonplace for Black Sabbath to release a album to the immediate and damning reactions of the rock press, but to the manifest delight of the Sabbath army of loyal followers. The appeal of the group was always a mystery to those who could not see it, but irate letters of defense from fans assured the press that the key adjectives were 'strange', 'mystical' and 'errie' and the key noun 'graveyard'. The nose of Sabbath on stage was enhanced by the anti-social antics of its lead singer. Singing about madness, he and damnation, he would make like he was the Devil. The kids of America, who had gone for Led Zepplin for their ability to fuse heavy metal and elementary psychological concerns, went customarily ape for Sabbath and pretty soon the new world of drugs, orgies and lakes of alcohol presented itself. When it did, it was not turned away.

Osbourne quickly left behind the LSD experiences and moved over to the comfort of cocaine. On their 1972 US tour they did their best to outdo the similarly engaged Zeppelin and Rolling Stones by indulging more for indigence's sake than any real physical need. Braving the uncertainties of the social disease they entertained floods of groupies and showed libral gung-ho when offered a new drug thrill. And when the evenings got a bit boring, they would liven them up by setting fire to their drummer, Bill Ward. One time guitarist Tony Lommi poured lighter fuel on Ward's legs and set them alight. Ward needed medical attention.

Strangely enough, this did not lead to Sabbath having to scour the Musicians Available ads for a new drummer. Instead, the rift was between Lommi and Ozzy Osbourne. Lommi was exhibiting a peculiar reluctance to join in the revelry backstage and occasionally admonished Osbounre for his cheerful excess. Osboune, in retaliation, used to go off stage for a cigarette during Lommi's guitar solos.

Events took a turn for the worse in 1976 when Black Sabbath had their first flop. They had never been a 'singles' band- their only hit single had been 'Paranoid', which they had not attempted to follow up- but they took pride in mammoth album sales. With Technical Ecstasy, it was universally decided, they had made a prime bummer. This intrigued the critics, who could not see any difference from previous records, but slagged it off anyway. Osbourne was now well embedded in cocaine, sick of constant touring and management pressure. One day he snapped and blasted all his farmyard chickens to pieces with a shot gun.

He left Black Sabbath in November 1977 and soon afterwards checked into a mental asylum. By January 1978 he was back in the band, supposedly recuperated. The ensuing album, Never Say Die, was arguably the worst of the bands entire career, although it did spawn a hit single (the title track) and thus enabled new legions of Sabbath fans to see their heroes on 'Top Of The Pops'. The next time he was sacked. In the summer of of 1979 he was replaced by the tiny US singer Ronnie James Dio and, as far as anyone who cared was aware, that was the last we would hear from Ozzy Osbourne.

The immediate future was spent consuming as much cocaine and drinks as his burly frame could handle. A life-line was only provided by the intervention of Sharon Arden, Daughter of the legendary terrifying manger/impresario Don, whose Jet Records offered Ozzy a contract. And sure enough Sharon (to whom Osbourne is now married) was able to sort her charge out well enough for him to audition and hire some backing musicians, two of them well-traveled and hardly adventurous journeymen, the other the exciting American guitarist Randy Rhodes. The band called Blizzard of Ozz, made a self-tilted album and it was fairly typical stuff, apart from one interesting moment- a song called ' Suicide Solution'- which would haunt Osbourne in later years.

The Ozzy name, it was feared, had been too long out of the public consciousness, so a little publicity was needed. Therefore, a CBS Records convention was chosen as the best place for some Osbourne theater of the nauseating kind. He was equipped with some white doves, which he produced at the appropriate moment. Then, to the horror of those present, he bit the head off one of them, splattering blood over his trousers, and grinning amiably.

The immediate result was his banishment for all time from the CBS building and the real threat of being thrown off the label. Osbourne now launched himself on an unsuspecting world as the Man Who Eats Whatever You Care To Throw At Him. And so it was that, during a concert of much projectile-lobbing and mirth, Osbourne found himself the recent of a rubber bat. He raised it to his lips and sank his teeth in ... oops, not a rubber bat. A real bat.

The joke that circulated at the time was 'Did the bat have to get a rabies shot?' Osbourne, of course did and he did not enjoy the experience. However a toning-down of his act was not the answer and so mock dwarfhanging, offal-catapulting and other atrocities took place with regularity whenever the Ozzy Osbourne roadshow came to town. His biggest mistake, as far as the States was concerned, was to relieve himself in a spot in San Antonia, Texas, without checking put the lie of the land. When comforted by an outrage local, he realized he had urinated on the Alamo. This defilement of Texans of most scared heritage got him fined and banned him from the district for all time. Soon the Humane Society urged the banning of his shows; meanwhile Osbourne announced his attentions to wet the steps of the White House next. The Osbourne of old has mellowed now- a spell in the Betty Ford clinic has helped- and asides from the odd hiccup like getting a mouth full of glass when a mirror shattering trick went wrong during the shooting of a video, his life almost content.

The only major danger came when a young American boy took his life after listening repeatedly to the Osbourne song 'Suicide Solutions'. The boy's parents sued him for damaged, but the Los Angeles Supreme Court found him not guilty, with the impressive and not totally reassuring quote 'Ozzy's music may be totally objectionable to many but it can be given First Amendment protection too'.

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