Woe betide anyone who messes with Sharon Osbourne’s family or business, and that includes the lead singer of one of the biggest bands in the world.
She has been fiercely protecting hubby Ozzy’s interests since they started dating in 1979. He’d been dropped as lead singer of Black Sabbath by their manager Don Arden, who was also her father. Everybody had written him off (including himself), but she masterminded a spectacular solo career, and then launched a game-changing rock and heavy metal festival and tour, Ozzfest.
As Black Sabbath and an increasingly frail Ozzy prepare to for one last farewell hurrah, supported by a dizzying array of fellow legends at Villa Park in Birmingham on July 5, Sharon has revealed that she is no less formidable at 72 than she ever was. As the band who she booted from the line-up just learned.
She also set the record straight on the fantastically messy revenge she wreaked on a huge band behind Ozzy’s back…
Back in 2005, across multiple shows, Iron Maiden were supporting Ozzy who had reunited with Black Sabbath to headline Ozzfest. Unbeknown to Ozzy, Maiden’s lead singer Bruce Dickinson kept making disparaging remarks about his to the crowds.
It’s gone down in legend how Sharon pulled the power on Maiden three times and had him pelted with eggs and now she has spoken to Metal hammer to explain precisely what happened.
Sharon said: “If you’re going to take Ozzy’s money, and play before him every night of a festival, and you’re bad-mouthing him to the crowd, you’ve got to pay. So I had him pelted with cans of baked beans that were open, and cut his sound.”
When rumours began circulating that Sharon had dropped a band from this July’s show, many suspected the Maiden feud had flared up again but she clarified: “Oh god, no. Ozzy only has respect for the guys in Maiden. And he didn’t even know what Bruce was doing. I never told him, until the night that it happened when it was the last show, and he just looked at me and goes, ‘You’re terrible!'”
The full July 5 line-up has now been confirmed and includes Iron Maiden, Metallica, Guns ‘N Roses, Pantera, Fred Durst, Steven Tyler and many more. There’d been speculation that Tool had been dropped, but the band is on the list.
So who is it? Sharon only had this to say: “I had a huge, huge to-do with a manager over this celebration for Ozzy and Sabbath. And it was probably the worst way I’ve felt in years. And I don’t care what this person says about me, thinks about it, because he doesn’t know me. And he’s now going around making up bullsh** lies because I threw his band off the bill.
“I don’t care what people say. Because, do you know what? I don’t love them. I care about people who love me, what they say about me. You can’t care what an industry says, because you don’t love them, so how can it hurt you? It doesn’t.”
ORIGINAL SHARON OSBOURNE INTERVIEW IN METAL HAMMER