===== OZZY - BACK DOWN TO EARTH (interview) =====

Ozzy is the king! Yeah, yeah, yeah, Elvis was king, but when
it comes to heavy rock and all things remotely heavy 
musically, Ozzy is king. Osbourne released his first
album with Black Sabbath in 1970. In 1980 he recorded his
first solo album. In ’96 he began the phenomenon that is 
OZZfest, which has helped introduce many of today’s hottest
hard-rock acts to the world at large. Thirty-one years of 
music, touring, legendary stories and at 52 years old Ozzy
is just hitting his prime. Is there anything that can be
said here that hasn’t been said about Ozzy before? Doubtful. 
So with his eighth solo studio release, Down To Earth, about
to hit the bins, we checked in with Ozzy from his home in 
Los Angeles to ask a few questions--and let Ozzy do the rest. 

You were very busy with OZZfest and now the new album. Do you
ever slow down at all?

I keep on saying to myself, "When is it going to slow down?" 
I can’t complain because it’s not like I’m being forced to
play to empty halls, I’m playing to f*cking monumental crowds.
For the life of me, I can’t work it out. I had the Black
Sabbath thing, then I had the OZZfest where we played my set 
and Black Sabbath sets, two shows in one day. Then I did the
OZZfest with my own band and then I did OZZfest with Black
Sabbath, then I did the Black Sabbath tour after OZZfest. In
between I’m trying to f*cking make an album. It was like 
putting on a different hat every day and then at the end of 
it, I’ve got a f*ckin’ album done. 

Speaking of OZZfest, how long do you plan to keep doing it?

I keep saying to Sharon [Osbourne], "How long is it gonna go?" 
And she’ll go, "We’ll know when it’s time to pull out." Every
year it gets bigger and bigger what else am I gonna do?

What about the album title, Down To Earth? What does that 
signify to you?

If you’ve seen the single, well, on the album art it goes from
that--every photograph I’m in different poses and everyone’s
kind of changing. So in the end, I’m not in a forest--I’ve
kind of imploded on myself. What they did for the actual
photograph itself was x-ray my whole body; I left my jewelry 
and my tattoos on and you can see the skeleton of me. It’s the 
most bizarre f*ckin’ thing. 

You actually x-rayed yourself?

Yeah, and it was not my ideal way of spending a nice Wednesday
afternoon, in a f*cking x-ray machine. The guy was going, "You’ll
be fine, you’ll be fine," and he closes a 14-foot lead door and 
you’re in an x-ray room being exposed to radiation, you know? But
anyway, when I saw the results I was like, "Man, that's really
so f*cking incredible!" So then I thought, "What the f*ck are we
gonna call the album?" I reflected on my whole career and it 
started off with Black Sabbath really, but then before there
was Black Sabbath it was called Earth. I thought, "Yeah, it was 
all down to Earth," and it went "bing."

What about the first single, "Gets Me Through?" It seems very 
straight from the heart, directed toward your fans.

Some people think I’ve got some supernatural powers, [but] I’m not
the Antichrist. I’m not the Iron Man; I’m just me. I bleed, I hurt,
I smile, I laugh, I cry, I get worried like anybody else does. In
fact, I do a lot of worrying, especially in today’s climate since 
the f*cking Twin Towers got blasted and the Pentagon. I was in New
York when that went down. I was in the Peninsula Hotel, which is
some distance from the Trade Center, and my assistant phones me up
just before nine and he goes, "Put the TV on, a plane just ran into
the Twin Towers." I saw these really bizarre pictures and I’m going,
"F*ck, man, what a dreadful, terrible accident." I’m thinking it’s 
a small commuter plane. 

So the second plane hadn’t even hit yet?"

Right. I’m watching this thing and there’s a hole in one of them 
and I’m thinking they must be having an action replay because there’s
another plane crashing into the other side. I’m going, "This is
f*cking weird, man. How can there be a hole in a building and the
f*cking plane is still flying?" But then all of a sudden reality
kicks in and I’m screaming, "Sharon, for f*ck’s sake, f*cking watch
this sh*t!" When they both collapsed, f*ck, I couldn’t believe it,
man. 

Being an entertainer, you’re constantly traveling and performing in 
front of large crowds. How much does that worry you now?

I can’t let it worry me much because I have my job in life and it’s 
to entertain people. When it first happened I said, "Oh my God, I’ve
got to get out of here and get back to my kids!" Two of my kids are 
in California. I didn’t know if it was the beginning of a major
f*cking out-and-out terrorist campaign all across America, where 
they were gonna f*cking gas L.A. or drop something on L.A.

Nobody knew what the f*ck was gonna happen. On Monday, Michael 
Jackson had that thing at the [Madison Square] Garden, that "I Love 
Me" f*cking gig or whatever it was called. His stage manager, Opie,
is my stage manager and he phoned a bus company--I think it was in 
Nashville--and they drove from Nashville and, just as they got to 
New York, they opened the tunnel. We got on the bus and just as we
got out of New York, they closed the f*cking tunnel again. It was
unbelievable. It was a stroke of f*cking luck to get out. 

You make reference to Mother Earth and mankind abusing it in the 
track "Dreamer." Are you concerned with environmental issues? 

I’ve always been. Going back to Sabbath again, I talked about that 
in several songs. It’s always been in my mind, not so much for me,
but I’d like somewhat of a life for my kids and their kids. That
World Trade Center, getting back to that again, I get sad that
f*cking people do such crazy sh*t to each other. What good’s gonna
come out of it? A lot of people are gonna f*cking die, both over
here and in the Middle East by the looks of it.

I read a comment that was really interesting, about how this is 
gonna be a long process, five, maybe six years. How will we know 
when we’ve won--or if we’ve won? How will we know when the last
terrorist is stopped? Terrorism doesn’t wear a uniform or have a
flag. It’s the heaviest kind of warfare that you can imagine because
these guys obviously don’t give a f*ck what happens to them or 
anybody else. When will our leaders go, "Okay, today we got the 
last terrorist and his name was Ali Baba and we f*cking blew his 
eyes off. Now it’s all normal, go back to normal?" Forget America
pre-f*cking-two weeks ago, because that ain’t never gonna be again. 

Yeah, it’s crazy. But "Dreamer," it seems there’s a lot of hope in 
that song. 

I didn’t go, "Oh f*ck it, they just blew New York up, I better write
a song appropriate for the times." I co-wrote that with Steve Jones
and Marti Frederiksen about two years ago. It’s just one of those 
songs that’s hopeful. It’s kind of like Ozzy’s "Imagine," if you like.

It could be inspirational for a lot of people.

I hope people in the world who are suffering can get some 
satisfaction and comfort from any one of my songs. There’s a lot of
sad people around the world right now, people that are really sad. 

Which track on the album is closest to your heart and why?

I don’t go by a track, [but] "Gets Me Through" is good. The whole
composition of the album, to be honest with you, is a good all-around
album. It’s a good representation of what I’m about. There’s not any
one specific song. I like "Dreamer" for what it’s about. But I like 
every other track and like them all for what they are; otherwise, 
they wouldn’t have been on my album. 

Your interviews on Howard Stern are always great.

Howard is a very good guy to me. He’s a very clever guy and I admire
him immensely. There’s only one Howard Stern. He remembers things I 
did, what I said, when I first met him. You can imagine how many
people he f*cking sees every day, you know? He’s a really nice guy
and I have a lot of love for him. He’s been really, really a nice guy
to work with. 

Is there anything that you haven’t done yet that you really want to
accomplish?

[I’d like] to spend a year at home with a big box of popcorn, watching 
TV and drinking Diet Pepsis.

-- Greg Sorrels, Clear Channel