Ozzy Osbourne - I Am Ozzy

‘You fired me and now I don’t need you, so fuck you.’ Looking back now, all I can think is, Why was I like that? Why did I have to be such a dickhead?

But the gig went smoothly enough. We just checked in to the hotel, met up at the sound check, ran through the set list, got up there, did the songs and fucked off home.

As for Don Arden’s lawsuit, it probably shouldn’t have come as much of a surprise. Jet Records had taken a big hit when we left. And a lot of other things were going wrong for him too.

For example, it was around that time Sharon’s brother David ended up in court in England for allegedly kidnapping, black-mailing and beating up an accountant called Harshad Patel. It was a very bad scene. David was sentenced to two years in Wandsworth for whatever part he had in it, but he only served a few months. By the end of it, he’d been moved to Ford Open Prison.

Then they went after Don, who was still living in the Howard Hughes house at the top of Benedict Canyon. In the end, Don realised he was going to be extradited, so he went back of his own accord to stand trial. Then he hired the best lawyers in London and got off, scot-free.

A few months after Live Aid, on November 8, 1985, Jack was born. I was too pissed to remember much of it—I spent most of the time in the pub opposite the hospital—but I remember Sharon wanting to have him circumcised. I didn’t put up a fight. I mean, the funny thing is, even though my mother was a Catholic, she had me circumcised. None of my brothers had it done—just me. I remember asking my mum what the fuck she was thinking, and she just went, ‘Oh, it was fashionable.’ I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. ‘It was fashionable to cut my dick off!’ I remember shouting at her.

But I have to admit, it is cleaner that way. And because Jack was part-Jewish—because of Don Arden, whose real name was Harry Levy—it seemed like the right thing to do.

The most amazing thing about Jack being born is that he was our third kid in three years.

We hadn’t planned it that way. It just happened. Every time I came off the road, me and Sharon would get in the sack together—as you do—one thing would lead to another, then nine months later Sharon would be giving birth to another little Osbourne.

It was crazy, really, because I ended up touring the world as the Prince of Darkness with three little kids in tow, which wasn’t exactly good for the image. For a few years I spent most of my time between gigs in a panic trying to find Jack’s comfort blanket, which was this little yellow teddy bear thing called Baby. Jack would go fucking insane if he didn’t have Baby to cuddle and chew on. But we were travelling so much, Baby would always end up getting left behind. I became obsessed with that fucking bear. I’d come off stage after singing ‘Diary of a Madman’, and the first thing I’d say was, ‘Where’s Baby? Has anyone seen Baby? Make sure we don’t lose Baby.’

On more than one occasion we had to send our private jet halfway across America just to get Baby back from the hotel were we’d stayed the previous night. We’d drop twenty grand on jet fuel, just to rescue Baby. And don’t think we didn’t fucking try to just buy Jack a replacement. He was too smart for that—he wouldn’t have any of it. You’d find a comfort blanket that was absolutely identical in every way to Baby, but Jack would take one look at it, throw it back at you, and bawl his eyes out until he got his real Baby back. And of course as time went on, Baby ended up having major surgery after being eaten by Sharon’s dog a few times, so in the end there was no mistaking him.

As much as I was drunk and absent a lot of the time, I loved being a dad. It’s just so much fun watching these little people you’ve brought into the world as they develop and grow up.

Sharon loved being a mum, too. But enough was enough after a while. After Jack was born, I remember her saying to me, ‘Ozzy, I can’t have you anywhere near me next time you finish a tour. I feel like I’ve been pregnant for ever, I can’t do it any more.’

So I went and got the snip. What a strange experience that was.

‘You know this can’t be reversed, don’t you, Mr Osbourne?’ said the doc.

‘Yeah.’

‘So you’re sure about this?’

‘Oh, yeah.’

‘Absolutely sure?’

‘Doc, believe me, I’m sure.’

‘OK then, sign this form.’

After the operation, my balls swelled up to the size of watermelons. They ached terribly, too. ‘Hey, Doc,’ I said. ‘Can you give me something that will leave the swelling but take away the pain?’

All in all, I don’t recommend it, as far as elective surgery goes. When you pop your load after you’ve had the snip, nothing but dust comes out. It’s like a dry sneeze. Really weird, man.

Then, nine months later, Sharon got broody again. So I had to go back to the doc and ask him to unsnip me.

‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ he said. ‘I told you that couldn’t be done. But we can always try, I suppose.’

It didn’t work. As the doc said, it’s very hard to reverse a snip. Maybe if I’d gone back to get my pipes cleaned out, it would have been OK. Who knows? But we gave up on having any more kids after that. Still, five kids in one lifetime ain’t bad—and I love them all so much.

They’re the best things that ever happened to me, no question about it.

Another problem with getting the snip was that it made me think I suddenly had the freedom to do whatever I wanted to—or at least whatever I thought I wanted to, when I was pissed out of my skull. But my wife was brought up in a rock ’n’ roll environment, and she can sniff out a lie from six thousand miles away. And I’m the world’s worst liar, anyway.

So she knew exactly what I was up to. Of course, she hated it, but she put up with it. At first.

It wasn’t like I was having affairs. I just wanted to think I was Robert Redford for an hour.

But I was never any good at that game. Most of the time, when I was with a chick, she’d be calling an ambulance or carrying me back to my hotel room in a cab while I puked my guts out. I’d start the night like James Bond, and end it like a pile of shit on the floor. And the guilt that followed was always fucking lethal. I hated it. I felt like such an arsehole. And I’m a terrible hypochondriac, so I’d always be shitting myself that I’d caught some rare and deadly virus. I can catch a disease off the telly, me. I’ll be taking some pill to help me get to sleep, then I’ll see an ad for it on TV, and the voiceover will say, ‘Side-effects may include vomiting, bleeding and, on rare occasions, death’ and I’ll convince myself I’m halfway to the morgue. It got to the point where I had doctors coming over to look at my dick twice a week, just to be on the safe side.

Then AIDS came along.

I wasn’t worried at first. Like most people, I thought it was a gay thing. And no matter how drunk or high I got, I never felt the urge to jump in the sack with some hairy-arsed bloke.

But it didn’t take long for everyone to realise that you don’t have to be gay to get AIDS.

Then, one night, I bonked this chick in the Sunset Marquis Hotel in West Hollywood. As soon as I was done, I just knew something wasn’t right. So, at two in the morning, I called the front desk and asked if they had a doctor on duty. They did—those fancy hotels always have their own in-house quacks—so he came up to my room, checked out my tackle and told me I should go and have a test.

‘What d’you mean, a test?’ I asked him.

‘An HIV test,’ he said.

That was it, as far as I was concerned. I was a goner.

For a few days I drove myself halfway insane with worry. I was impossible to be around.