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Sunday Conversation: Ozzy Osbourne, ‘I Don’t Know, For The Life Of Me, How I Made It To 74. [But] I’m Glad I Did.’
Steve Baltin
Senior Contributor
I write about music and the business of music.
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Dec 18, 2022,05:38pm EST
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INGLEWOOD, CALIFORNIA – SEPTEMBER 08: Musician [+]Ozzy Osbourne performs during half-time of the NFL game between the Los Angeles Rams and the Buffalo Bills at SoFi Stadium on September 08, 2022 in Inglewood, California. (Photo by Harry How/Getty Images)
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Having just turned 74 December 3, three days before I get on the phone with Ozzy Osbourne for our end of year talk, Osbourne is feeling very philosophical and reflective.
“Three days ago I turned 74 and I don’t know, for the life of me, how I made it to 74. [But] I’m glad I did,” Osbourne says.
I’ve been fortunate to know Osbourne for decades now and at the end of thoughtful half hour talk he thanks me multiple times for the support over the years. It’s not been an easy few years for Osbourne with multiple health issues, including neck surgery and a public battle with Parkinson’s. But as he tells me, being sober, he is feeling good and determined to be back on the stage with a self-imposed deadline of May, 2023.
I spoke with Osbourne about the ease he had making his most recent album, Patient Number 9, which led to four Grammy nominations, working with Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton and the late Taylor Hawkins on the album, his health and why he is teaming with fundraising platform Omaze to give away a custom Dodge Demon to benefit Save The Music.
Steve Baltin: How are you feeling?
Ozzy Osbourne: I’m getting there. I don’t know if you’re familiar with this. They put on these bionic legs on you and put you in a computer. It’s kind of like in that film Alien, with Sigourney Weaver, and she finds the alien.
Baltin: We spoke at the beginning of lockdown and because you had the neck surgery a year earlier you were already so anxious to get back to touring.
Osbourne: I know, but at the time I was thinking, “Nobody could work, so at least I’m not on my own.” I couldn’t work, neither could no one else. So I thought, “I’ll recuperate pre-tour, I’ll be okay.” But I’m still f**king suffering now. Not as badly as I was by any means. But I got this thing where they put these leg things on you, bionics, and you do a few exercises and it corrects your walking. Because the problem I was having is balance along with stability. When they cut my neck they cut the nerves. This bionic thing that they do reprograms your brain so you can walk better.
Baltin: It’s crazy the medical advances they have now.
Osbourne: It’s f**king scientific now. There was a point where I thought, “I suppose this is it.” And I’d just kind of get up in the morning and doing nothing so I had nothing to get up in the morning [for] and do in the day. But now I’m working out with these new apparatuses, proving to be okay and I’m dying to get back on the stage.
Baltin: And obviously you had four Grammy nominations so when you get back on the stage in 2023 there is a lot of excitement for Patient Number 9.
Osbourne: Working with Andrew Watt we just did it. Cause usually I torture myself and everybody around me when I’m making a f**king record. I have a problem getting to the people I’m working with my ideas. I don’t play an instrument so I have to try to explain what I want. But this album with Andrew Watt I just went down and had a few suggestions, did work on the melodies, and it was so easily done. Andrew goes, “We’ll work on it a long time.” But we weren’t really working on it a long time. We did it in such a relaxed way.
Baltin: Do you feel the response has been so great because you were relaxed and enjoyed making the album?
Osbourne: Usually I’m a bitch to be around. It’s like me giving birth. But Ordinary Man and this album I just went and did what he asked me to do, worked on a few ideas. We could’ve tortured myself, my wife and everybody in the f**king house. It came together so easy. We released the first radio track and the title track was [just] there.
Baltin: Was your approach to the album different mentally because you had gone through the neck surgery?
Osbourne: The thing was music, to me, is the only act I really have in my life. It’s really difficult to try and explain because I didn’t put that much time out of me. No one was working, I hadn’t got a deadline. Usually I got like so much time to finish the f**king album before I go on the road. But I didn’t have that with these last two albums I did with Andrew Watt. I can’t emphasize how effortless this was. You could always relax and I didn’t have this, “Gotta finish it by a certain time.” Usually when you make a record you plan when it’s going to be released, book a tour around it, it’s a big thing. But because nobody could work I thought, “I’ll get some creativity going.” And the record just happened.
Baltin: So how rewarding has the response and the Grammy nominations been?
Osbourne: Just yesterday I put it back on again. The players I got on the album — Jeff Beck, Eric Clapton, Taylor Hawkins, he’s on the album as well. He came down to the studio and he was a very nice guy. It was sad when he died. I was saying to my wife just recently, “I don’t drink booze anymore, I don’t smoke tobacco anymore, don’t do hard drugs anymore, don’t stay out late.” So I don’t do anything and I kind of like the way I’m feeling. I used to think, “You’ve got to have a few drinks in you. How can you create anything if your mind ain’t working?” I used to think that was food for your creativity. It’s bulls**t, it’s what addicts and alcoholics [say]. Life’s not bad. Three days ago I turned 74 and I don’t know, for the life of me, how I made it to 74. [But] I’m glad I did.
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Baltin: Are you getting healthier as you get older?
Osbourne: You know I’m a big Beatles fan. I was watching a thing about when they came off the road, when they stopped touring. On the road is where it all happens for me. Some nights I’m good, some nights I’m not so good. I’m getting slowly better and I don’t give a f**k if I have to crawl on the stage I will get back on that stage very soon. The date I’m putting in the books is May of next year. I’m going to get well by May. I’ve got to set myself a date.
Baltin: Talk about what you are doing with Omaze and Save The Music.
Osbourne: I’m always trying to give back. With the position I’m in in the business we’re all so f**king lucky to be in the position that we are. It’s been very good to me in this industry. I like being Ozzy Osbourne. Of course I try to give back.
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Steve Baltin
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I have written for Billboard, Rolling Stone, the L.A. Times, Yahoo, Vice and every… Read More
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