I Am Ozzy (29 page)

The next day we went back for my results. I'd been a fucking wreck all night, but Sharon wasn't exactly in the mood to give me any sympathy. The only thing she was in the mood for was divorce. I honestly thought my marriage was over.

'So, Mr Osbourne,' began the doc. 'We ran another test on you, and I'm delighted to say that you don't seem to have HIV - although we should do the test one more time, to be sure.'
I put my head in my hands, released all the air from my lungs, and thanked God like I'd never thanked Him before. Meanwhile, I heard Sharon let out a sob of relief and blow her nose.
'The confusion seems to have arisen from the state of your immune system,' the doc went on. 'Basically, Mr Osbourne, your immune system currently isn't functioning. At all. At first, the lab couldn't understand it. So they did some more blood-work, and then they came across some - well, er, some
lifestyle factors
that probably explain the anomaly.'
'Lifestyle factors?'
'Your blood contains near-fatal quantities of alcohol and cocaine, Mr Osbourne, not to mention a number of other controlled substances. The lab's never seen anything like it.'
'So I really
don't
have HIV?'
'No. But your body thinks it does.'
'Well, that's a relief.'
'Mr Osbourne, you might not be HIV positive, but your life is still in grave danger if you don't take it easier.'
I nodded, but by then I wasn't even listening. I was too busy planning the drink I needed to celebrate. Mind you, I did change my lifestyle in one way - I never cheated on Sharon again.

With the AIDS crisis over, I flew back to England to prepare for the next tour. I'd only been back a week or two when I got a frantic call from Sharon, who was still in California.
'Ozzy, get on the next plane out here.'
She sounded terrible.
'What?
Why?
' I said.
'Just go to the airport, buy a ticket, then call the Beverly Hills Hotel and let me know which flight you're on.'
'Is everything OK?'
'No. One more thing, Ozzy.'
'Yeah?'
'DO. NOT. GET. DRUNK.'
Click
.
Fifteen hours later, I was walking through immigration at LAX when about ten thousand flashbulbs went off. I thought there must have been a royal visit going on or something. Then a reporter shoved a TV camera in my face and said, 'What do you think, Ozzy?'
'Oh, er, well, the chicken was a bit soggy,' I said. 'But other than that, it was a pretty decent flight.'
'I mean about the kid. The dead kid. Any comment?'
'
What?
'The suicide. Your thoughts?'
'I have no idea what you're talki--'
Before I could say any more, about ten security guards pushed the cameraman out of the way and formed a circle around me. Then they escorted me outside and bundled me into a black limo.
Waiting on the back seat was Howard Weitzman, my lawyer.
'The kid's name is - or rather
was
- John McCollum,' he explained, handing me a copy of the
Los Angeles Times
. 'Nineteen years old. Big fans of yours. According to his parents, he was drinking and listening to
Speak of the Devil
when he shot himself with his father's .22. He was still wearing headphones when they found him. And they're blaming it all on you.'
'Me?'
'The father says his son was just doing what the lyrics of "Suicide Solution" told him to do.'
'But
Speak of the Devil
is a live album of Black Sabbath songs. "Suicide Solution" isn't even on there.'
'Right.'
'And has he actually
read
the lyrics?'
'Look, you and I both know the song's about the perils of too much liquor, but he doesn't see it that way.'
'He thinks I want my fans to kill themselves? How the fuck does he think I plan to sell any more records?'
'That's not all, Ozzy. They're saying that your songs have subliminal messages embedded in them, instructing the young and impressionable to "get a gun", "end it now", "shoot-shoot-shoot", that kind of thing. It's all in the lawsuit. I'll have a copy sent over to your hotel.'
'How much are they suing me for?'
'Everything. Plus damages.'
'You're kidding me.'
'Unfortunately not. We're on our way to a press conference right now. Let me do the talking.'
The press conference was at a tennis club. I was jet-lagged, pissed (I couldn't help myself) and in shock. It got even worse when I was led on to this little podium to face the cameras. I was used to being interviewed by music magazines or whatever, but not by this hardcore national media gang. It was like being back in the classroom with Mr Jones. The reporters were throwing questions at me so hard and so fast, I almost wanted to duck for cover.
One guy said, 'Listen, Mr Osbourne, isn't it true that you sing on one of your songs, "Paranoid", "I tell you to
end
your life"?'
I had to take a moment to run through Geezer's lyrics in my head. Then I said to him, 'No, I sing "
enjoy
life".'
But the other reporters were already shouting their follow-up questions, so no one could hear.
'It's ENJOY life,' I kept repeating. 'ENJOY life.'
No one listened.
'Ozzy,' said another reporter. 'Mr McCollum's attorney says he went to one of your concerts, and that it was like being at Nuremberg, with the crowd chanting your name. Any comment?'
'
Nuremberg?
' I should have said, 'I don't think Hitler spent much of his time at Nuremberg making the peace sign and shouting "rock 'n' roll".' But I didn't. I couldn't get my words out. I just froze.
Then they started asking about 'Suicide Solution'. All I can remember is Howard Weisman shouting above the crowd, 'The song is autobiographical. It's about Mr Osbourne's well-publicised battle with alcoholism, which he believes is a form of suicide, as evidenced by the tragic death of Mr Osbourne's good friend Bon Scott, lead singer of the Australian band AC/DC.'
'But Ozzy,' shouted the reporters, 'isn't it true that...'
Finally, it was over and I went back to the hotel, shaking. I flopped down on the bed, flicked on the TV, and there was Don Arden, discussing the case. 'To be perfectly honest, I would be doubtful as to whether Mr Osbourne knew the meaning of the lyrics - if there was
any
meaning - because his command of the English language is minimal,' he said.
I suppose it was his way of showing support.
The press conference was very frightening, and it gave me a taste of what was to come. I became public enemy number one in America. I opened a newspaper one morning in New York and there was a picture of me with a gun pointed at my head. They must have cut and pasted it together 'cos I'd never posed for it, but it freaked me out. Then I started to get death threats wherever I went. The cops would use them to try to get me to cancel gigs. One time in Texas, the local police chief called up our tour manager and said, 'There's been some dynamite stolen from the local quarry, and we've had a letter from an anonymous source saying it's going to be used to blow up Ozzy.'
I was scared for the kids, more than anything. I told the nannies never to stop for anyone on the street. It was 1986, just over five years since John Lennon had signed a copy of
Double Fantasy
for a fan and then been shot by the same bloke. And I was well aware that it was often the fans who could be the most psycho. One guy started to follow me around with this five-million-year-old mammoth tusk. Another bloke sent me a video of his house: he'd painted my name over every single thing, both outside and in. Then he sent me another video of this little girl wearing a pair of welly-boots and dancing to 'Fairies Wear Boots'.
He was insane, that guy. He built a tomb so that me and him could spend the rest of eternity together. I could think of better fucking things to do with eternity, to be honest with you. It got to the point where the cops had to take him into custody every time I played a gig anywhere near where he lived. And if I did a signing at a record shop in the area, they'd make me wear a bullet-proof jacket, just to be safe.
I got well and truly pissed off with the crazy stuff after a while. I remember one time, me and my assistant Tony were on a flight from Tokyo to LA. There'd been a six-hour delay at the gate, and they'd handed out free drinks coupons, so everyone was pissed. But this one American chick wouldn't leave me alone. She was sitting behind me, and every two seconds she'd tap me on the back of my head and go, 'I
know
you.'
Tony kept saying to her, 'Now, missus, please just go away. We don't want to be bothered,' but she wouldn't listen.
In the end, she got out of her seat, came round, and wanted a photograph. So I let her take one. Then she went, 'I got it! You're Ozzy Bourne!'
I'd had enough. 'FUCK OFF!' I shouted.
A stewardess came over and told me not to be rude to the other passengers.
'Well, keep that woman away from me then!' I told her.
But she kept coming back. And back. And back.
Finally, I thought, Right, I'm gonna do something about this.
In those days, I used to carry around these things called Doom Dots. They're basically chloral hydrate, and they come in little gel caps. All you do is stick a pin in the end and squirt the stuff into someone's drink. When you hear about people being 'slipped a Mickey', that's what they're being given - a Doom Dot. Anyway, I waited for this chick to get up and go for a piss, then reached behind me, and squirted a Doom Dot into her glass of wine.
When she came back, I told Tony, 'Keep looking behind me, and tell me what's happening.'
He said, 'Whey, she's ahl-reet right now, but she's leaning forward a bit. She's lookin' a bit dazed. Oh, hang on now -
she's goin', she's goin', she's--'
I felt a jolt in the back of my seat.
'What happened?' I asked Tony.
'Face down on the tray. Fast asleep.'
'Magic,' I said.
'Aye. It's just a shame she didn't get her soup oot the way first, lyke. Poor lass. She's gonna be covered.'

But the Jesus freaks were the worst. While the 'Suicide Solution' case was going through the courts they followed me around everywhere. They would picket my shows with signs that read, 'The Anti-Christ Is Here'. And they'd always be chanting: 'Put Satan behind you! Put Jesus in front of you!'

One time, I made my own sign - a smiley face with the words 'Have a Nice Day' - and went out and joined them. They didn't even notice. Then, just as the gig was about to start, I put down the sign, said, 'See ya, guys,' and went back to my dressing room.

The most memorable Jesus-freak moment was in Tyler, Texas. By then, the death threats were coming in pretty much every day, so I had this security guy, a Vietnam vet called Chuck, who was with me at all times. Chuck was so hardcore he couldn't even go into a Chinese restaurant. 'If I see anyone who looks like a Gook, I'm gonna take 'em out,' he'd say. He had to turn down a tour with me in Japan 'cos he couldn't handle it. Whenever we stayed in a hotel, he'd spend the night crawling around on his belly through the undergrowth in the garden or doing push-ups in the corridor. Really intense guy.

Anyway, in Tyler, we did the gig, went out on the town, and got back to the hotel at about seven in the morning. I'd agreed to meet a doctor in the lobby at noon that day - my throat had been bothering me - so I went to bed, got a few hours' sleep, then Chuck knocked on my door and off we went to see the quack. But the doctor was nowhere to be found, so I said to the chick on the front desk, 'If a bloke in a white coat turns up, just tell him I'm in the coffee shop.'

But I didn't have a clue that the local evangelist guy had been doing this TV campaign about me in the run-up to the gig, telling everyone that I was the Devil, that I was corrupting the youth of America, and that I was going to take everyone with me to hell. So half the town was out to get me, but I had no idea. There I was, sitting in this coffee shop, with Chuck twitching and muttering beside me. Thirty minutes went by. No doctor. Then another thirty minutes. Still no doctor. Then, finally, this guy comes in and says, 'Are you Ozzy Osbourne?'

'Yeah.'

'PUT SATAN BEHIND YOU! PUT JESUS IN FRONT OF YOU! PUT SATAN BEHIND YOU! PUT JESUS IN FRONT OF YOU! PUT SATAN BEHIND YOU! PUT JESUS IN FRONT OF YOU!'

It was the preacher from the telly. And it turned out that the coffee shop was full of his disciples, so as soon as he started to do his nutty Jesus bullshit, all these other people joined in, until I was surrounded by forty or fifty Jesus freaks, all red in the face and spitting out the same words.

Then Chuck went fucking mental. The whole thing must have triggered some sort of 'Nam flashback, 'cos he just flipped. Stage-five psycho. The guy must have taken down about fifteen of the Jesus freaks in the first ten seconds. There were teeth and Bibles and glasses flying everything.

I didn't stick around to see what happened next. I just elbowed the preacher in the nuts and legged it. The funny thing is, I'm actually quite interested in the Bible, and I've tried to read it several times. But I've only ever got as far as the bit about Moses being 720 years old, and I'm like, 'What were these people smoking back then?' The bottom line is I don't believe in a bloke called God in a white suit who sits on a fluffy cloud any more than I believe in a bloke called the Devil with a three-pronged fork and a couple of horns. But I believe that there's day, there's night, there's good, there's bad, there's black, there's white. If there is a God, it's nature. If there's a Devil, it's nature. I feel the same way when people ask me if songs like 'Hand of Doom' and 'War Pigs' are anti-war. I think war is just part of human nature. And I'm fascinated by human nature - especially the dark side. I always have been. It doesn't make me a Devil worshipper, no more than being interested in Hitler makes me a Nazi. I mean, if I'm a Nazi, how come I married a woman who's half Jewish?
All those Jesus freaks ever had to do was listen to my records, and it would have been obvious. But they just wanted to use me for publicity. And I suppose I didn't care that much, 'cos every time they attacked me, I got my ugly mug on the telly and sold another hundred thousand records. I should probably have sent them a Christmas card.
But in the end, even the American legal system came down on my side.
The 'Suicide Solution' lawsuit was filed in January 1986, and was thrown out in August of that year. At the court hearing, Howard Weitzman told the judge that if they were gonna ban 'Suicide Solution' and hold me responsible for some poor kid shooting himself, then they'd have to ban Shakespeare, 'cos
Romeo and Juliet
's about suicide, too. He also said that the song lyrics were protected by the right of free speech in America. The judge agreed, but his summing up wasn't exactly friendly. He said that although I was 'totally objectionable and repulsive, trash can be given First Amendment protection, too'.
I had to read that sentence about five times before I realised that the bloke had actually ruled in our favour.
The one thing the McCollums were right about was that there
was
a subliminal message in 'Suicide Solution'. But it wasn't 'Get the gun, get the gun, shoot-shoot-shoot'. What I actually say is 'Get the flaps out, get the flaps out, bodge-bodge-bodge'. It was a stupid dirty joke we had at the time. If a chick took her kit off, we said she was getting her flaps out - her piss flaps. And 'bodge' was just a word we had for fuck. So I was basically saying, 'Get a chick naked and give her one,' which was a whole fucking lot different to saying, 'Blow your brains out.'
But the media was obsessed with that stuff for a long time. Which was great PR as far as we were concerned. It got to the point where if you put a 'parental advisory' sticker on your album saying it contained explicit lyrics, you sold twice as many copies. Then you
had
to have one of those stickers, otherwise the album wouldn't chart.
After a while, I started to put subliminal messages in as many of my songs as I could. For example, on
No Rest for the Wicked
, if you play 'Bloodbath in Paradise' backwards, you can clearly hear me saying, 'Your mother sells whelks in Hull.'