Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:08):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the barblas Sex Podcast. My
guest today is Geezer. Butler's autobiography Into the Void From
Birth to Black Sabbath and Beyond, has just been published
in a paperback edition. Geezer, where are you right now?
Speaker 2 (00:28):
Just outside Las Vegas in Henderson, Nevada?
Speaker 1 (00:33):
And where do you normally reside?
Speaker 3 (00:36):
Uh?
Speaker 2 (00:37):
Sometimes? Yeah, sometimes Park City, Utah and Lapworth in England.
Speaker 1 (00:45):
How do you end up in Park City?
Speaker 2 (00:49):
We used to. Me and my wife used to stay
with friends there every Christmas and I just loved it
there and love being up in the mountains and stuff
fight at So we ended up buying a house there
and we love living there, so we decided to buy
a bigger house. That's where we how we got there?
Speaker 1 (01:12):
And are you a skier?
Speaker 2 (01:14):
Nope? But my grandkids are. They come up every every
Christmas to go skiing and they come up in the
build there next week to go lying on the beach.
There is a nice little beach where we live and
a little lake that they like to go paddle board
(01:35):
and kayaking in.
Speaker 1 (01:37):
Okay, this deal in time. What's the difference in living
in the UK as opposed to living in the US.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Uh, mainly the weather. I just got back from the
UK literally three days ago and it was bloody for
a freezing It's like going from one extreme to the other.
It's like fifty eight degrees. When I left the UK
we landed in Las Vegas, it was one hundred and
(02:05):
fifteen degrees.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
And what about the politics. We hear all about Brexit,
We hear labor. You know what's going on in England.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Well, labor has just got in this allegedly for the
working class, but I don't ever believe it. Politicians are
ever for the working class. It's just a bit of
a mess over there. It's it's unrecognizable from when I
used to when I grew up there in the fifties
(02:37):
and sixties. It's more like West Pakistan.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
However, there are you talking because of immigration or because
of other reasons?
Speaker 2 (02:46):
A hell of a lot of immigration. We're in Birmingham
now it's it's more Muslim than Christian. So it's like
thirty two. I think it's thirty three percent Muslim, thirty
two say Christian, which is complete turnaround from when I
when I was born.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
Now, wasn't Braxfast supposed to reduce immigration.
Speaker 2 (03:11):
Yeah, but nobody ever believed that. I think only the
people that voted to come out of breakfait Brexit believe that.
But it's a lot of rubbish, especially if you're in
the music industry. Or it made it really hard for
up and coming bands to tour Europe because all the
(03:31):
restrictions on if you were from Britain had to pay
all extra taxes and stuff like that. When you touring,
you costs a lot more to tour.
Speaker 1 (03:41):
Okay, you were growing up in Brunning here. When did
you first get interested in music? Mainly when I first
heard the Beatles. I mean I had three brothers and
three sisters, so there was always music going on. We
brothers loved Elvis and Eddie Cochran and Frank Sinatra. My
(04:11):
other sisters like Cliff Richard, people like and my mom
and dad liked loads of Irish music because they were
from Dublin.
Speaker 2 (04:20):
So I used to get so there's all kinds of
music going on. There was like Irish folk songs, Irish
rebellion songs from the IRA, Elvis, Eddie Cocker and all
kinds of stuff going on. And then when I first
heard the Beatles, that's when I started getting into music.
Speaker 1 (04:40):
So how did you hear the Beatles?
Speaker 2 (04:44):
Well, pop music wasn't allowed on the radio in England
at the time, so there was this offshore radio station
called Radio Luxembourg. So if you wanted to hear pop music,
that's what you used to tune into every and that's
what I used to do, listen to Radio Luxembourg. And
(05:05):
then this one night the DJ says, who's a new
band from Liverpool called the Beatles, and this is called
Love Me Do? And it was like nothing else that
I'd ever heard before, and that was zero fell in
love with it. That's what I wanted to be a
Beatle from then on.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
Okay, the Beatles hit in America year Leader, if not
a year and a half lead, So you heard that song.
How long until beatle media took over in the UK?
Speaker 2 (05:37):
It was probably that was probably in the winter when
Love Me Do came out, and then by the summer
it was like full on beetle maniac that put out
please Please Meet from me to you, and then when
She Loves You came out, it was like all hell broke.
Speaker 1 (05:57):
And did you like the other Liverpool? The other so
called British vision was mostly the Beetles, Yeah, I like to.
I mean, nobody could touch the Beetles.
Speaker 2 (06:08):
But when the Stones came along, I love the Stones
because they looked totally radical for that time, with long
hair the beetles or still woar suits and everything. And
when they went on stage they used to dress identical.
And when the Rolling Stones came along, they were the
first band to not wear the same clothes or suits
(06:31):
and stuff like that on stage, so they were completely
radical to us, and the hair was much longer. And
then the Kinks came along with the Who. It was
all kinds of bands.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
So how long after the Beatles hit did you start
playing an instrument?
Speaker 2 (06:51):
Well, luckily enough, I was at school at the time
and this kid at school was asking if anybody wanted
to buy a guitar, and I said, oh, yeah, I'm interested.
And this is like a battered old acoustic guitar with
two strings on and I said how much you I'm
for it and it is fifty pence, which is like
(07:13):
that's seventy cents. Of course, I didn't have money at
the time, so my brother lent me fifty pence which
is like seventy cents or wherever, and I bought the
guitar and I started playing all the Beatles melodies on
the two strings, and and that's where it started. That's
(07:36):
how it started.
Speaker 1 (07:38):
Okay in Birmingham in America. I've never been to Birmingham.
We hear it's an industrial city. So what was Birmingham
like compared to the other cities in England when you
were growing up.
Speaker 2 (07:54):
Well, Birmingham was the that's where the industrial Revolution started
in seventeen eighteenth Entry where the first factories were from,
and it was eventually it became the in the World
War Two. That's where they made all the planes and
tanks and engines and armament at the armament factories. So
(08:20):
it was like a massive city, just full of factories
and stuff like that. And people looked at Birmingham as
the industrial capital of Britain, and it was like fairly
rough and ready. Where I lived, it was like opposite
two big factories. So I used to hear the noise
(08:44):
of the machines day in and day out, and you
were just destined to become, you know, a factory worker.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Okay, what did your father do for a living?
Speaker 2 (08:58):
He worked at this play It's called Tube's Investments, which
was like he was. They made these great big sort
of anything to do with steel or metal, and he
used to pack all these big long scaffolding tubes and
stuff like that.
Speaker 1 (09:17):
Okay, your appearents came from Ireland.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
Why, I'm not sure why, but I don't think there
was much. There was no work in Ireland at the time.
My dad was in to try and get some money.
In the I think nineteen twenties, he joined the army,
the British Army, the Royal Scots Regiment and he was
(09:40):
in the army for twelve years and eventually when he
got demobed from from the army, he was looking for
work and there was none in Ireland. So that's how
they came to live in Birmingham, that's where the jobs were.
Speaker 1 (09:58):
Now there are seven kids in your family, yeah, yeah.
Was that common in your neighborhood for people to have
that many kids?
Speaker 2 (10:07):
Well, it was quite There's a lot of Irish where
we were living, a lot of Irish and Scottish. Eventually
a lot of Indians, Pakistanis and Jamaicans. But yeah, as
was a big Catholic area, so you know, it's a
(10:29):
lot of big, big families around there.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Well, in the book you describe a horrid scrabble living
in a small house with an outhouse in the back.
You know what was it like?
Speaker 2 (10:43):
It was freezing in winter time. I mean the tilet
used to freeze up, and everything you have to get
you have to buy all some water on the gas
stove to pour it over the ice in the toilet
and used that as to flush the toilet. You left
to bile water on this gas stove so you could
(11:05):
flush the toilet. Of course, there was no heating in
the house. There used to be frost on the insides
of the windows in winter. No bathroom, no hot water,
so any hot water you'd have to buile. And only
electricity in the living room, so you could only plug
(11:25):
anything in in the living room unless you unless you
plugged stuff into the light socket.
Speaker 1 (11:31):
At what age did you have plumbing in the house?
Speaker 2 (11:36):
We never did not until I left home. We used
to go to the local the local swimming baths was
a Victorian place and they used to have socialized bathing,
so you could go and have a bath the local
swimming baths. When my sister got married, she had a
(11:57):
bathroom in the house, so we all we used to
go down there once a week to have a bath
in her house.
Speaker 1 (12:04):
So how large was the house that you grew up in?
Speaker 2 (12:10):
It was two rooms downstairs a kitchen and then upstairs
three bedrooms and an attic. But it got quite a
battering during World War two, so there was that some
of the roof got blown off in the house, and
(12:30):
in England it didn't. England didn't really recover until the
late sixties from World War two, and Birmiham, because it
was so industrial, got an absolute battering by the luff Waffer.
So there was a bomb buildings, bomb building sites up
until like nineteen sixty five around where I lived. But
(12:52):
we used to go and play amongst all the rubble.
Speaker 1 (12:55):
And what about the availability, you know, in terms of
rationing in television, when did all that end or come about?
Speaker 2 (13:03):
Rationing wasn't finished until nineteen fifty five. So when I
used to go errands for me, mom and I used
to have to take the ration book and you'd show
them the ration book and she'd mark off like butter
potatos wherever, and then they like way the potatoes or
(13:25):
the butter mark it off in your ration book and
that a bit, and then you take it home and
as I say, that didn't finish until nineteen fifty five.
We didn't have a television until nineteen fifty seven because
the local football teams in the cup final. Here comes me.
Speaker 1 (13:47):
So when rationing ended as a practical matter as a
little kid, how did it affect you?
Speaker 2 (13:55):
It didn't really affect me. I mean we obviously I
saw an orange for the first time. Sure, you know,
finally got fruit. Him comes with cat. Uh, just just
got different food. I suppose a bit more more more
(14:16):
of it.
Speaker 1 (14:17):
And what about candy? You're a kid, we used to I.
Speaker 2 (14:24):
Used to buy candy with pocket money because because I
had three brothers and three sisters, my mom and dad,
I used to get quite a bit of pocket money
every week so I could go across to the sweet
shop and you know, stuck up on wherever sweets I
could have.
Speaker 1 (14:41):
Okay, there are seven kids in the family. Where are
you in the hierarchy?
Speaker 2 (14:45):
I was the seventh, so you were the youngest? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (14:51):
How did the other six kids? What are they? What
were their lives?
Speaker 3 (14:55):
Like?
Speaker 2 (14:56):
Boy? Maybe eldest sister got married when I I think
one years old. She got married in I think nineteen
fifty or nineteen fifty one, so I didn't really know
her a lot. I used to go into the house
because she lived just around the corner. Then there's another sister,
(15:16):
more than three brothers, and then another sister, and then
me and everybody used to go to work, except when
I was at school that me and my sister were
at school together and everybody else was working.
Speaker 1 (15:40):
So you have this big success as a rock store,
do your family do they ask for money? Do you
have to support them? Or what happened there?
Speaker 2 (15:51):
No fact, My family was so proud that never ever
ever asked me for money. And when I finally did
sees money coming in, I think after the second album
did well and the twos started doing well, and I
tried to buy my mom and dad a little house
(16:14):
away from Aston and my dad was like, really insulted
by it. This is what's married. Isn't this house good
enough for you anymore? And no, I didn't mean it
like that. I just wanted to see you getting barness.
Look on the head of this household. If I want
a new house, I'll buy it. I do own any
(16:35):
money from you. And that was the attitude of all family,
and we're they proud of your success. Yeah, but of
course nobody expected it to like last. Everybody thought it
was like a flash in the pan, which is why
my mom and dad would never take any money off me.
That obviously, keep your money, save it up for when,
(16:57):
you know, when this is all over, and then never
see it last very long.
Speaker 3 (17:06):
Now, were you good with the money when it came
in or not so good? I was very careful because
I knew what it was like to not have any money.
And I was a bit silly really, because everybody else
in the band were like found them the manager manager
sence the thousand dollars tomorrow and they'd be getting all
(17:29):
this money. And I'd say to the manager, or just
keep mine, you know, from when I'm older, so I've
got something to fall back on, And of course the
manager stole it all.
Speaker 1 (17:41):
Dislead. Do you get royalties?
Speaker 2 (17:45):
Do a depth get them now? Yeah? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (17:48):
And you know we're living in an era where a
lot of people are selling their royalties. Would you ever
do that?
Speaker 2 (17:55):
I think we've sold some of the cattle out, but
not all of it. It depends on what they're offering.
But at this point, you own everything. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1 (18:09):
Okay, Now you were a smart kid right at school?
Speaker 2 (18:14):
Yeah, yeah, I got enough qualifications to become an accountant,
or at least apply for the job of an accountancy,
which meant you had to have like certain educational qualifications
just to get the just to get an interview for
the job. And so that's what I thought, I was
going to be an accountant.
Speaker 1 (18:34):
Okay, when was it evident in school that you were
smarter than the average kid?
Speaker 2 (18:42):
Well, I did well in my exams. There was three tiers.
Each year had three tiers. There was Alpha, A, and B.
Alpha was the top stream, the most intelligent ones. And
I was always in the Alpha stream.
Speaker 1 (18:58):
And did the as the kids criticize you for doing well?
Speaker 2 (19:03):
No, because on my mates are in the same class.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
And then didn't you get some kind of scholarship to
go to a better school.
Speaker 2 (19:12):
No, you had to have a certain amount of qualifications
to be able to go to college or university, but
you had to spend an extra two years at school.
But I wanted to leave when I was sixteen, So
I left when I was sixteen, And because I applied
to be an account and I went to college like
(19:35):
twice a week, but I could never get there on time.
Speaker 1 (19:41):
Okay, but you're a pretty airly day guy. You're a
big reader, and you're a lyricist for Black Sabbath for
most of the songs. Where did you love of reading
come along?
Speaker 2 (19:54):
I think it was just like, because it's such a
big family, I used to like to get quiet time
away from everybody, and there was nothing really on television
or anything like that, so I used to hide in books.
I mean, I wasn't all sociable as well. Well, I
(20:16):
don't know. I just like reading.
Speaker 1 (20:18):
And are you're still a reader today?
Speaker 2 (20:22):
I'm addict.
Speaker 1 (20:24):
I have to.
Speaker 2 (20:25):
I have to be reading a book every day.
Speaker 1 (20:29):
So what are you reading now?
Speaker 2 (20:32):
Right at this moment, I'm reading? Oh gosh, so I
keep forgetting them. That's all a lot. I'm reading a
Lucy Fowley book. I love. It's like light crime stuff tomorrow.
(20:52):
I like The Midnight Feast by Lucy Fowley.
Speaker 1 (20:58):
Okay, okay, and we were her first book. So the
Beatles cover long. You buy the guitar with two strings
for fifty peens, then what's the next step?
Speaker 2 (21:15):
I got really good at My brother used to bring
his mates around to watch me play the Beatles melodies
on these two strings. Of course, they loved it. So
my brother eventually gave me enough money to go and
buy an eight six string guitar, like a proper guitar,
(21:36):
which was at eight pounds, which was about twelve dollars.
And that's when I started really taking it seriously and
started learning chords, learning all the Beatles songs. Then eventually
some salts when Tamla Motow and stuff all sold, stuff
(22:01):
things like that, and then when the Cream came out,
I got really serious. Then that's when I bought an
electric guitar Fender and started by taking it really seriously.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
Okay, so you say you're learning these Beatles songs, do
you own the records or you just hearing them on
the radio.
Speaker 2 (22:24):
Now, when we brother used to love the Beatles as well,
so he used to give me the money to go
and buy the Beatles records and we listened to them together,
and then when he was at work, I'd like sit
down and learn the cords.
Speaker 1 (22:39):
And how many records did you? Did you own a
lot of records or was money limited?
Speaker 2 (22:44):
Oh? Money was very limited, very scarce, sort of sort
of limited to each Beatle single. Every time an album
of the Beatles came out, we'd have that. I bought
Stone albums, so it's mainly the top three, the Stones,
(23:06):
Beatles and Kinks. And then eventually when I when I
went to work, I loved the Mothers of Invention and
bought their stuff. Then the Cream came along, Hendrix and
so on and so forth. Then Miss Sister used to like
Jerry and the Pacemakers, those kind of bands swinging blue jeans,
(23:31):
Billy J. Kramer.
Speaker 1 (23:33):
So you say you were really influenced by Queen? How
did your first year a Queen?
Speaker 2 (23:40):
Funnily enough, there was a poster right opposite where I
used to live saying the new supergroup from Eric Clapton,
because Eric Clapton is from John Male's Blues Breakers, And
there was this big post saying it's like the first
time I'd ever heard the the expression of supergroup. And
(24:02):
they had Eric Clapton, who heard of Jack Bruce, who
I hadn't heard of, Ginger Baker, who had never heard
of and they were playing at one of the local gigs.
So I went to see him and I just loved it,
love what I was hearing.
Speaker 1 (24:17):
So did you buy the album Fresh Queen?
Speaker 2 (24:19):
Yeah? Yeah?
Speaker 1 (24:22):
And uh, what are some of your favorite songs? On
that album. If you remember Oh.
Speaker 2 (24:27):
God, Sunshine of Your Lovers on that.
Speaker 1 (24:32):
Now that was on the second first one was I
Feel Free a NSU.
Speaker 2 (24:37):
Yeah, I feel Free of that because that there, that
was a single in England, they were on top of
the pops. Wow.
Speaker 1 (24:45):
And so you knew clapt In from the Bluesbreakers.
Speaker 2 (24:52):
Yeah, from John Miles Bluesbreakers, which is I mean, that's
my first band. It was a mixture of John Myles,
was the Blues Breakers, songs, Beat All Stones, Eddie flyd
Sam and Dave, just a mixture of everything that was
going on at the time.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
So you heard Queen and you started taking it seriously.
What did that look like?
Speaker 2 (25:20):
It meant buying a better guitar, which is what I did.
I bought himself a Fender tally Cast and started really
getting down to it, proper amp and just really taking
everything seriously and desperately wanting to turn professional and do
(25:41):
that for a living.
Speaker 1 (25:43):
And what did you what was your first ear?
Speaker 2 (25:46):
It was a bird golden eagle and I've never seen
one since, and I've never heard of one since.
Speaker 1 (25:54):
I never heard of that. And where did you get
the money for the stratocaster in the air with the telecaster.
Speaker 2 (26:01):
From the money I saved up from work going to work,
and I think my mom helped me out with some
of her savings. And from there.
Speaker 1 (26:11):
Okay, so you have the telecaster, you had the you're
working on it. What is the next step, You try
to form the band?
Speaker 2 (26:19):
No, I was in the band. The first band was
called the Rooms, which is after some science fiction person.
I can't remember his name. There it was a book
by It's a book called The Rooms science fiction. We
took the name from that, and then eventually we changed
(26:42):
the name. The drummer and the bass player left, so
it got formed another band and call that the Rare Breed.
Speaker 1 (26:51):
Okay, okay, you got your fifty pence guitar, your brother
buys you a better guitar. Where along the line do
you form a band?
Speaker 2 (27:00):
Nineteen sixty five, Oh, I bought at Huffma, Colorado. That
was my first electric guitar and it was like, I
think it's about thirty dollars or something. That was my
first real guitar that you could plug in. And so
in nineteen sixty five, who formed the best mate from school?
(27:25):
It was band called the Rooms. Then the drummer left.
Basically left.
Speaker 1 (27:32):
So where where you formed that band? Where did you rehearse?
Speaker 2 (27:36):
There was this a school hall that we used to
rehearse at the local school hall.
Speaker 1 (27:44):
And then did you have any kids?
Speaker 2 (27:48):
We've got one of this girl that fancied me had
a birthday party and she wanted us to play at
her birthday party. So that was that was very for
the ski. I think we were all about sixteen at
the time.
Speaker 1 (28:04):
And did you have any peeing gigs with this band?
And how often did you play?
Speaker 2 (28:08):
I get paid? I think eventually we did, but we
get like, I think five ten pounds at the most,
just enough to put petrol in the car to get there.
Speaker 1 (28:22):
Oh and how often would you play?
Speaker 2 (28:25):
Just weekends at that particular time because we all had jobs.
Speaker 1 (28:29):
Okay, So the two members of the band quit and
then the next step is.
Speaker 2 (28:35):
Got another a singer, and we started doing more heavier
stuff like the cream and stuff like that. When we
became the rare Breed and we started building up a
bit of a following, and I really wanted to I
hated going to work, couldn't stand it. Eventually fired from
(29:01):
work for turning up at four o'clock in the afternoon,
and I just says, that's him. I'm just going to
lost my job, so I'm just going to do this
professionally or as much as I could do. And the
rest of the band didn't want to do it professionally.
So the singer got a job on a ship going
(29:26):
to Australia. So who he left And that's when I
got into Ozzie And that's when Ozzie joined the band.
Speaker 1 (29:35):
So how did you know Arsie? How did you meet ars.
Speaker 2 (29:38):
I used to see him. He used to be a
skinhead and he used to go to all the salt clubs.
There was two major clubs in Bermiham at the time
and used to have all these all nighters. There was
the salt place called Midnight City. I used to have
all the salt bends. I'm not mid Gino Washington people
(29:59):
like that. And then there's the surf side, the Penthouse,
which is the blues people with long hair used to go.
That's where I used to go. And then every Sunday
they used to finish at about five o'clock of a
Sunday morning both places, and I'd see I was walking
at home on one side of the road and I'd
(30:20):
be on the other side. Never the twain should meet
because he was the skinhead and hippie. And then when
we were looking for a singer for the Rare Breed,
I went to the local music shop to see if
they knew any singers, and I saw this advert saying
(30:43):
Ossy Zig needs a gig and he had his address
on it large road, which was right around the corner
from where I lived. So I thought that looks promising.
So I went round to his house, not knowing that
it was the uh, the skinhead that I used to see.
(31:03):
And his sister said, I was not in at the
moment watching your address. I said Victoria Road and she said,
that's only two streets away. I'll be he'll come rent
tonight when he comes home. So then that night there
was a knock on the door. My brother went to
open the door. He came. My brother came and said, hey,
there's there's something at the door for you. I said,
(31:26):
what do you mean something?
Speaker 1 (31:27):
It is?
Speaker 2 (31:27):
You'll see when I went to see who it was,
and there was Ossie Skinhead with his dad's work gown on,
chimney brush over his shoulder, a sneaker on, a dog leash,
and no shoes on. And I said, yeah, what do
you want? She is on Ossie the singer. I said,
(31:51):
what kind of stuff are you into? And this is
whatever you're into, I mean and and he says, and
I've got my MPa and you're in. And that was it.
Speaker 1 (32:11):
Okay, certainly those of us were fans aware of Assi,
but Ozzie had his MTV show. You know, we see
different sizes of Assie. Some level, he's like a cartoon,
but there's an artistic sense inside when you meet him
back then, what is ours like.
Speaker 2 (32:30):
A complete lunatic. It just got out of prison and
he was up for anything. He'd do anything for a
laugh or it been to anything, and it was just
really great to get on with, great to be around.
(32:51):
He lasted two gigs in the Radberry and he says,
this isn't for me. I own to sing this stuff.
So he left and I'll just say to the rest
of the band, okay, I'm leaving as well. So eventually
me and Ozzie got together and we were looking for
a drummer.
Speaker 1 (33:09):
Right wait wait wait wait wait wait wait wait a
little bit slower. So you do the two gigs with Ozzie.
You're playing blues Insvilo and stuff you're playing? What are
you actually playing that he doesn't agree with.
Speaker 2 (33:22):
He liked what we were doing, but we weren't very good.
He thought, you know, that he could do better. He
didn't like the fact that the guitarist and the bass
player didn't want to know about going professional.
Speaker 1 (33:40):
And why did Ozzie have his own pa?
Speaker 2 (33:45):
Do you know? I've absolutely no idea. I think he
must have been in a band before I knew him.
Speaker 1 (33:51):
Okay, so he leaves the band. You leave the band.
You don't have your job as an accountant anymore. What
gone to your head.
Speaker 2 (34:04):
That I need to make some money somehow? And somewhere
at the time I was getting I was on benefits,
getting doll like every week, which only lasted six weeks
in those days, and then they'd throw you off. So
I just I was desperate to find get some money.
(34:25):
And I got a little bit saved up, which kept
me afloat for a while. And me and obviously got together,
and he had he'd got a band together with this
rhythm guitarist who used to play slide slide guitar and
(34:48):
this bass plan so the bass player, this black kid
on bass. So I said, okay, let's have a go,
and the Black kids said, I don't be in this band,
so I'm leaving. So I said, okay, I'll switch to
bass then, and that's how we got together, and then
(35:10):
we needed a drama.
Speaker 1 (35:12):
Well where before you get to the drummer? How did
you learn how to play bass?
Speaker 2 (35:17):
I just picked it up. I think a lot of
it was from when I when I had my first
two string guitar and I used to play the melodies
just on the two strings, So I got used to
playing melodies on just melodies on strings. So when I
got the bass, it sort of lent itself to that
(35:41):
the way you know, the two strings thing became a
four string thing, and I went from there.
Speaker 1 (35:48):
Okay, are you the type of prits on? People are
a musical They can pick up any instrument play. Other
people have to really work at it. Where are you
on the spectrum?
Speaker 2 (35:58):
Bass? Is like I was born into play bass. I
just knew what to do since I picked the base up.
Speaker 1 (36:06):
And did you ever take any lessons?
Speaker 2 (36:09):
Nope, nope, nobody took lessons about them.
Speaker 1 (36:13):
So you've got as you need a drummer, So tell
me about getting the drummer.
Speaker 2 (36:19):
Well, Tony Iomi and Bill Ward had just been busted.
They had a band up in the north of England
in Carlisle. They'd been busted for drugs and they were
back home in Birmingham, and they just so happened to
live literally two streets away from where I lived. And
(36:43):
so Ozzie knew Tony used to go to school with him,
and Ozzie said, told me about Tony and Bill being
busted and coming back home to Aston in Birmingham, and
he says, let's go and see if if Bill if
Tony can give us the address of Bill Ward, the drummer.
So we went around to Tony's house and it just
(37:05):
so happened Bill was there. We said, speak to Bill Ward.
Billboard came out and he says, yeah, what do you want.
He says, we're looking for a drummer for our band.
And he says, what kind of stuff you're doing? This
is cream Hendrix, that kind of thing, blues, a lot
(37:26):
of blues stuff, and he says, we all give it
a go, but on one condition, Tony Iomi comes with
me and we went okay, and that's the way we've formed.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
And what happened to the original guitarist.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
We did a gig with We went back up north
to where Tony and Bill had built up the reputation,
but we couldn't use We couldn't let them know that
it was Tony and Bill. The police would have arrested them.
So we just made up a name of the for
a band, and we called it the Polka Talk Blues Band,
(38:04):
and we went back up to Carlisle and did two gigs.
The rhythm guitarists, I mean, the slide guitarist just didn't
fit in whatsoever. He kept playing the slide guitar over
absolutely everything that we were doing. And we had a
sax player as well. I forgot about him, and he
(38:24):
used to keep The only thing he knew how to
play was Take five by what's his name, Dave brew Becker.
So every time he came to a sax alo, he'd
played Take five. So we knew that wasn't going to last.
So we got back to birmiham Tony m He says,
(38:45):
I'm not playing with them too, they're out the band.
So he says, yeah, okay, fine, So that the four
of us got together. I played them I quite a
few records blue stuff, and I said this is what
we should be playing, and John Mail all this blue stuff,
(39:09):
bb King, Albert King, all that kind of muddy waters,
Howling Wolf say let's play this stuff, and I tell
you and yes it's good, sounds good, but we need
another name. So we changed the name to Earth. Billboard
came up with the name Earth and became a blues band.
(39:32):
And what do you do for gigs? We used to
go still go back up north of Scotland and Carlisle
play all these really really rough places. You used to
have to dodge the bottles and everything every night and
(39:56):
be careful that somebody didn't break your arm. And we
built up a really big following up there. And we
came back to Birmingham and there's this guy in Birmingham
called Jim Simpson and he used to manage a lot
of the Birmingham bands and he had this club called
(40:18):
Henry's Blues House and it was in a pub in
the middle of Birmingham and we just we said, let's
go an audition for Jim Simpson, so if he's interested
in getting us gigs, because he was quite a big
night it was nim around Birmingham and we auditioned for him.
This is yeah, you can play here every week at
(40:42):
Blues House and I'll get you some gigs. So he
used to get us like all these little club gigs
around around England and eventually we built up a big following.
Speaker 1 (40:54):
Then why do you think you built up there far?
What was special about the Beard?
Speaker 2 (40:59):
Because we were good. We were really good Ozzie singing
Tommy and we're one of the best guitarists ever, Bill
Ward one of the best drummers ever, and me on
bass one of the worst bass players. It just worked.
We were really good.
Speaker 1 (41:20):
And at what point do you start writing original macterial.
Speaker 2 (41:24):
We got booked at this place in Derbyshire and we
turned up and everybody was like in like wedding again,
wedding attire suits and the women had these long dresses on. God,
this is a strange gig. So we started playing and
the promoter came out, what are you doing? What are
(41:46):
you playing that stuff for? This is what you mean?
She plays played some of your singles. I mean, we
haven't got any singles. And it was a completely different
earth it was. It was a total band that used
to play weddings and stuff. So we got booked the
wrong place, so we just says, right, that's it. We've
(42:11):
got to start writing our own stuff. And like we
just you know, we can't keep playing these same places
all the time getting mis booked. And so that's when
we used to play this place in Literfield in just
outside Birmiham called the Pokey Hole Club and it was
the Blues Club. And the morning of the gig, we
(42:36):
wrote the song Black Sabbath and we said, we did
the usual gig that night and two like people were
used to hearing, you know, the usual twelve bar blue stuff,
and we just said, I said, let's do that song
that we wrote today, and so we tried it and
(42:59):
the crowd went absolutely mental and we realized that, you know,
we were on the right track. So what hey to,
what we were doing was good enough to keep writing,
and that was it. Never looked back.
Speaker 1 (43:16):
How did you literally write there are four guys in
a room. How did it come to be?
Speaker 2 (43:22):
We used to have this rehearsal room swimming baths in
Aston and it was owned by the council and so
from nine o'clock to twelve o'clock before the swimming baths opened,
the dlarrus rehearsing there for free. And this one day,
(43:43):
I just bought this that LP called the Holts this
Planet Suite, and I loved the Mars that was on it.
When we were rehearsing, I was playing that on the
base and Tony went, oh, that sounds good and he
(44:03):
goes down. That's that's how Black Sabbath came about the song.
Speaker 1 (44:10):
And Okay, at this point, was the being still called
Black Earth or was it now Black Saba.
Speaker 2 (44:19):
Because that song went down so well, which was called
Black Sabbath because we've been mistaken for the other Earth,
I said, let's just let's just call the band Black
Sabbath then. So that's what happened.
Speaker 1 (44:33):
Okay, you wrote that song, you got a good response.
How did you end up breaking the rest of the songs?
Speaker 2 (44:41):
Well, that gave us the confidence to start writing, and
we still hated to do these really crap gigs. It
was one in Switzerland that we had to play for
two weeks and we had to do like eight forty
five minutes spots every day, but we only had enough
material for one hour. So the only thing we could
(45:05):
do is start writing our own stuff to fill in
the time. And we used to play at the Star
Club in Hamburg, which is the same kind of thing.
You'd have to play eight forty five minute spots. So
to fill in all the time, we used to write
our own stuff, use it as writing because there's never
any audience the place. In Switzerland, I think we've got
(45:29):
two people in every day, and Hamburg, you Star club
in Hamburg, you'd only get people in of the weekend
when there was a headliner that act on. The people knew,
so we had all this time to ourselves, but we
still had to play. So we used to just jam
and eventually write most of the first album most of
(45:53):
the second album.
Speaker 1 (45:55):
Okay, you're saying you're playing in these clubs it's today,
and literally nobody.
Speaker 2 (46:02):
Is there, Nobody whatsoever was maybe the one in Zurich
was a couple of prostitutes and an occasional lunatic would
come in and do these really stupid things to try
and put us off playing. I mean, one guy used
to stand on his head in front of the stage
(46:24):
while we were playing. Another guy came in playing a
flute all the way through our set, just things like
and another guy came in clapping and laughing all the
way through our set. And that's only get two prostitutes
and three lunatics.
Speaker 1 (46:43):
Okay, why were these clubs ping you at all if
there was no one there?
Speaker 2 (46:47):
Well, the guy the one in Switzerland, he was nuts.
He thought he was a doctor, the guy that owned it,
and he used to have to call him doctor and
completely mental. He used to come in with his doctor's bag,
nothing in it. And it was quite a big club,
but we had to play opposite the bar. He wouldn't
(47:09):
let us plan on the stage. So yeah, it's just
like these Star club used to play. I mean we'd
only get like ten quid a week, which is nothing,
maybe twenty pounds a week, which is like thirty dollars
a week. But we didn't have any money, so we'd
(47:32):
do anything to you know, you'd have to survive.
Speaker 1 (47:42):
So what late lessons did you learn in Zurich and
at the Star Club? And we read all about the
Beatles and the people they met in town and drugs
and women. What was it late for you guys? Well?
Speaker 2 (47:59):
Very garcity of women. The Star Club was okay because
that was like on the Big Barn, which was there
all prostitutes and brothels and h gay bars. Everything was there,
and any kind of life was there. And I used
to get like transvest i to grapy beards. We're being
(48:25):
the club next door to ours, and it used to
be you just suddenly went from a very closed Irish
Catholic upbringing just seeing all kinds of things going on.
Because there was no money and I was a vegetarian.
(48:47):
I practically staff to death. Only had I only ever
could do once a week and that was usually fries
pomfrets is the gall and then so yeah, it was
tough going. But what we realized, if we could survive that,
(49:07):
then we could survive anything that was like the lowest
of the low that you could get, and anything.
Speaker 1 (49:13):
Else was like heaven. Okay, so you left Hamburg, you
came back to Birmingham. What was the next step after that?
Speaker 2 (49:25):
Well, just at that particular time, just before we went
to the Germany, we'd recorded the first album.
Speaker 1 (49:35):
When you went to Zurich, Did you have a record deal?
Speaker 2 (49:42):
Not at that particular time, but between Zurich because we
played Hamburg three times the Star Club, So we did
Zurich and when we can't got back to England, the
manager had got us a record deal and we literally
went into the studio for one day. Did the album
(50:07):
that we'd sort of perfected while we were in Zurich
and then straight back to Germany to the Star Club.
Speaker 1 (50:16):
Okay, was this the scene manager who was booking the gigs.
Speaker 2 (50:20):
Yeah, yeah, the ones where it's a you can get
the when you do the gig, they'll give you the
money on the night, and then you go and get
the money and go to try and get the money,
and I know we sent it to your manager. So
it's like we were literally when we got to Zurich,
we were starving. We went to try and get the
(50:41):
money off this bloody lunatic doctor and it's oh no,
it's sent it to your manager. So we didn't have anything,
any money. We had to borrow some money off these
prostitutes to try and get some food. Uh yeah, that's
the way.
Speaker 1 (51:00):
Was Okay, So was this your big dream to get
a record deal? Did you think you were going to
be successful?
Speaker 2 (51:08):
Oh? Yeah, that's what you're in a band for, to
go a record deal. That's like the pinnacle of your
all you could ever hope for. And we didn't know
anything about record deals. We didn't know. We didn't know
you got paid to upfront or things like our We
didn't know anything about publishing. You didn't. We didn't realize
(51:28):
you got paid for writing songs. We were totally green,
real ultra thicicos, and we were just happy to go
in the studio and be able to listen to what
we were doing for the first time in our lives.
And we were only in the studio for two days.
Speaker 1 (51:46):
Okay, you were in the studio the record was cut.
When you heard the record, were you happy with the record?
Speaker 2 (51:53):
I loved it, Yeah, But we didn't hear it until
the week before it came out, so we didn't have
a clue it was going to sound like. The only
thing that we heard was there was a single called
Evil Woman on it, and that's the only thing that
we heard before the album. We never heard the album.
We heard the single and literally not until a week
(52:15):
before the album was released.
Speaker 1 (52:18):
And the album comes out. How long does it take
do you realize it's catching.
Speaker 2 (52:25):
Har It went in the charts straight away. We did.
We were going up to it. We had a gig
in Manchester and we were in the van going up
to this gig and there used to be there used
to be a countdown of the album charts every Saturday
(52:46):
that count down the top thirty albums on the radio,
and we always used to listen to the album charts
and we had the radio on in the van and
the guy at number twenty seven what we couldn't believe it.
We nearly crashed the van and we're all like celebrating
(53:09):
in the van. We never thought it was going to.
Speaker 1 (53:11):
Be what was driving adoption? How did people know about
it to buy it?
Speaker 2 (53:17):
Because of the we built up this whole following around
England and we didn't realize how loyle these fans were
going to be. You know, it's one thing building up
people coming to see you in clubs, and it's another
thing for those people to go and actually buy your album.
And of course we used to say, you know, after
(53:41):
all the gig gigs we we do, so this is
from our new album which will be out in February,
and you don't really think anything much of it, and
then eventually people take notice of what you're saying and
they went out and bought it.
Speaker 1 (54:02):
Okay, the first black sat with the album. At that time.
In terms of heavy hard rock music, Zeppelin was about
at the extreme and then Sabbath comes out and it's
heavier than that. Were you conscious of the fact that
the music got a certainly heavy quality. Were you just saying, hey,
(54:23):
this is just what we're doing.
Speaker 2 (54:25):
It was just what we were doing. I mean we
were obviously we were aware of led Zeppelin because they
were from to Plenty and Bonham were from Birmiham, just
outside Bermiam, and we knew them. We used to see
him at the clubs all the time, and so you
know that gave us confidence when we heard the first
(54:45):
Zeppelin album that what we were doing could be successful
as well. And we didn't think, oh, let's get heavier
than led Zeppelin or anything like that. It was just
a lot of the fact was Tony's. A lot of
it was down to Tony's having to wear thimbles on
his fingers because he had two of the ends of
(55:08):
his fingers were cut off, so he had to wear
these thimbles, and eventually he had to tune the guitar
down so he could feel the strings through the thimbles.
Wouldn't because if he kept it up to pitch, he'd
play with these thimbles and it had knocked the thimbles
off and he couldn't play. So he tuned the guitar
(55:30):
down three semitones and that let him get more grip
on the strings, and that's how the whole sound came about.
Speaker 1 (55:42):
Okay, so you're driving in the band to Liverpool. You
hear the album's number twenty seven. What changes.
Speaker 2 (55:53):
Not a lot at that time, because it was still
getting like thirty dollars a night. We'd been booked for
them solidly for six months. It didn't matter that the
album was in the charts. We were still like getting
thirty dollars a night. But it gave us the confidence
to realize that what we were doing, we were on
(56:16):
the right path. And more importantly, the record company wanted
it wanted to give us a follow up deal, and
by the success of the first album, we were able
to record a second album. So that's the main thing
about it.
Speaker 1 (56:37):
Okay, so the first album comes out, you're not starting
to play larger rules, you're not making any more money.
It's like nothing has changed.
Speaker 2 (56:50):
Not live now, because you know, we were contracted for
like six months worth of gigs before the album came out,
so it's like for pittance every night. But we were
just happy to play and build up the following and
eventually the venues were getting bigger, and promoters would say, Okay,
(57:14):
we're going to put them in a bigger venue and
give them more money. And that's the way we just
built it all up.
Speaker 1 (57:21):
And we're along the line. You recorded the second album.
Speaker 2 (57:26):
I think it was gosh, we were given five days
to do the second album, so I think it must
have been about May. I think May of nineteen seventy
something like that.
Speaker 1 (57:45):
And where did those songs come from from?
Speaker 2 (57:49):
Mainly from jamming. We had a lot of it from
the long sessions that we had to play at the
start and Zurich, so things like war Pigs. We already
had written for the second album and just jamming, just
(58:11):
rehearsing and coming up with new songs. We had everything
written except for Paranoid.
Speaker 1 (58:18):
And how do you read panoid?
Speaker 2 (58:21):
By accident? It was we went in to record the
second album and the producer said, you've got to come
up with another three minutes. Because in those days, an
album wasn't class as an album unless it was I
think it was over forty minutes or something. You had
to have forty minutes worth of material for it to
(58:42):
be classed as an LP. And this is just short
of like three minutes, you've got to come up with
something quick. So we're mean, I think me and Ozzie
and Bill went out to get a sandwich. We came
back in and Tony. Tony had come up with the
riff to Paranoid. Oh that's that's good. And as he
(59:06):
came up with the vocal lines straight away, I scribbled
down the lyrics and we wrote and recorded it in
about two or three hours.
Speaker 1 (59:16):
Okay, how did you end up writing the lyrics for
the sots?
Speaker 2 (59:23):
As he hated writing lyrics so and I mean, if
you ever hear some of the rough demos of stuff,
his lyrics left Quorral a lot to be desired, and
he didn't in those days. He didn't have the patience
to finish off. He come up with his one line
that'd be a good, really good idea, but he'd never
(59:43):
finish it up. So he's left to me to finish
everything or come up with something from scratch.
Speaker 1 (59:52):
Well, like you're talking about Paranoid, the whole thing was done.
Did you literally just say, okay, I'm going to scribble
down lyrics And it was the.
Speaker 2 (59:59):
Easy Yeah, wrote them down, showed them to as he
he literally was reading them as he was singing, singing
the song in the studio anyway, but does mean anyway?
I explained what paranoid meant and he was all okay
(01:00:20):
with it.
Speaker 1 (01:00:22):
But since you wrote a lot of the lyrics, what
was your process? And you scribbled them down? But other
times you'd go home and think about it. How did
you do it?
Speaker 2 (01:00:32):
Well? I had to wait for Arsie to come up
with the vocal melody. He'd always come up with a
vocal melody and then maybe either on the spot or
when I'm at home. We didn't have anything to record
things on back then, so he used to have to
stick in my mind his vocal melody, and then I'd
(01:00:55):
write the lyrics to what I thought was the vocal melody,
and then he say, no, that's too many words there,
so I'd have to change that. Too many syllables on that,
so I'd have to change the syllables. And that's the
way we worked. But you go home with the melody
in your mind. How long does it take to write
(01:01:16):
the lyrics? Well, in those days, straight away, because I
was young and the world was my eyester. I just
had lots of ideas and there was lots of things
going on in the world that were new to me.
And the one thing I wouldn't do is write the
(01:01:38):
usual love song I just broke up with my girlfriend
kind of thing. It had to be something, uh, political
or mental depression, anything like that, anti religion.
Speaker 1 (01:01:57):
Did you have any idea when you recorded there we
wrote up that Iron Man and Paranoid I would become
such classics.
Speaker 2 (01:02:08):
No, you never do, because it was like the second album.
You don't know whether it's going to be a total
flop or do better than the first album. And it
just really took off. I mean, Paramoid was like the
first proper single that we'd written as a single and
(01:02:28):
it just took off in England.
Speaker 1 (01:02:30):
Mental So since you played off the gigs had been
booked before the first album came out. Second album comes out,
how does your life change?
Speaker 2 (01:02:41):
Well, by that time we were getting other managed, other
managers coming in saying, look, if you keep it, if
you keep this guy that you've got managing, you're not
going to go anywhere. The guy just doesn't know how
to manage it. Professor, a successful band, you're always going
(01:03:05):
to be like on the roaming around England trying to
get giegs, and we said that to our manager, you know,
he's still capable of managing us, and yeah, I've just
booked you an American tour, so oh that's good. Great,
I've got you a deal in America for your albums,
(01:03:29):
and which turned out to be like one of the
worst deals of all time. I think two weeks before
we're supposed to go to America, he said, there's a
big anti satanic thing going on in America, so I've
canceled your tour. We found out that it never He
didn't realize you had to have visas to get to
(01:03:53):
work in America. So the guy was like hopeless, and
so all these other managers piled in then trying to
get us to sign with them, which eventually we did.
Speaker 1 (01:04:13):
Okay, a couple of things, especially the first album, but
all of the early albums get literally terrible reviews.
Speaker 2 (01:04:23):
Did you know that?
Speaker 1 (01:04:24):
Did you care about that or just say they're not right? Well,
the first album, I mean.
Speaker 2 (01:04:33):
We read that. You know, you always have to read
your review just to make sure that people knew that
your album was out. And I always remember this one
review saying this is like people that can't play their
instruments can't write lyrics. Trying to be a third rate
(01:04:54):
cream and the guy couldn't even lick Eric Clapton's boots
their guitar. It was like the worst review you could,
really bad personal stuff, and and most of the reviews
were like that. The Rolling Stone review is the same,
say how awfully arts and everything. But we didn't care
(01:05:15):
because we've been through the stuff that we've been through
to get to do those albums. We didn't care what
anybody thought about us because as long as we we
survived what we survived, and you know, you could we
were Uh, you couldn't bring us down.
Speaker 1 (01:05:35):
So how do you end up making a deal with Donald?
Speaker 2 (01:05:39):
Yeah, he was one of the he's He sent up
one of his heavies to Birmingham. It came up in
a rolls Rice and Don had this big reputation at
the time. He was I think he was managing the
small faces, Roger Stewart and all those kind of people.
(01:06:04):
And he says, Don Arden wants to meet you. Who's
Don Arden? You know he told us who was managing
and everything is really this guy that you've got now
can't manager. So took us down to London, picked us
up in his rolls Rice in London. He's heavy and
(01:06:25):
sat down with Don He said, told us exactly what
we should be doing, how much we should be getting,
how all kinds of things like everything that you'd want
to hear, and how it's going to make us massive
worldwide touring band sold millions of albums so that sounds great,
(01:06:47):
and he went, okay, sign this then what sign this
paper to say that you're I'm your manager, And well,
we've got to think about it first. You are to
sign now with the duels off the table and said,
well you can't sign now how much commission you're going
(01:07:08):
to get and we'll talk about that later after you've
signed the thing. So we just went, well, we're going
to see somebody else, so we left. We went to Chrystalis,
who managed ten years after in Jeth Roads All and
they were really interested. The fixed up a gig for
(01:07:31):
us at the Marquee Club in London, which is like
the big club that he in London to play at,
and people from Chrystalis came to see us and as
we started playing incomes Don Arden with all his heavies
and everything, and we go oh no and missus, no,
(01:07:54):
we can't, we can't sign with him and he says,
we're going to sign me Chrystalis, and god knows what
Don Harden said to Chrystalis, but they went, sorry, we
can't sign we can't sign you.
Speaker 1 (01:08:05):
So it's.
Speaker 2 (01:08:07):
Been got at. So a couple of weeks later, his
body is heavy. It comes to see us. This is
I've left Don Arden and with this other guy called
Patrick Muon there and he's great. He's a young guy,
he can do like everything. He's not going to rip
you off for anything. We didn't know that the the
(01:08:32):
heavy guy was like one of the biggest criminals in
England and eventually he was the only Englishman to ever
join the mafia. And so we went to see Patrick Moune.
He promised us to the earth, got us out that
Jim Simpson contract and took us to America and everything
(01:08:54):
went great after that.
Speaker 1 (01:08:57):
Okay, so told me about the first tour of an Aerica.
Speaker 2 (01:09:02):
Well, we started off because we've been doing quite well
because Paranoid just such a big hit in England. We've
been playing like the big theaters and stuff like that,
and some outdoor festivals, so everything was coming up in
the world. We got to America, we had to play
this tiny little club on Staten Island. I mean, what
(01:09:26):
the houses. We were always like to think America, America,
Madison Square Garden. And here we were in this tiny, little,
horrible little club on Staten Island called Anganos. But the
night before that, we'd played this university end of term
(01:09:49):
gig in New Jersey. We plugged all our gear in,
and of course all our gear blew up because we
didn't know the American electricity. It was different from me
English electricity. Everything was blowing up, blown to bits. So
our very first appearance in America lasted about five seconds.
(01:10:10):
So we end up at this tiny little club Staten Island,
and you know, we're signed to that manager, the new manager.
What the hell's this come?
Speaker 1 (01:10:19):
All the way here?
Speaker 2 (01:10:20):
You're blown up. America's supposed to be all this great,
big place and everything. We're going to be really successful.
We're playing this little club and this is yes. But
everybody in the club are all the top agents and
promoters in America. I mean, we did the gig and
(01:10:41):
suddenly all the whole of America opened up for us.
Speaker 1 (01:10:46):
Then you remember who the agent was that you signed with?
Speaker 2 (01:10:50):
Oh gosh, I can't remember it now. I can't remember
off the top of my head.
Speaker 1 (01:10:57):
Okay, it was one of the big ones. So now
you have success across America, you have success in England.
Things are finally kind of working or there are still
any spots where there are holes in the game.
Speaker 2 (01:11:13):
Everything was incredible, more than you could ever imagine. America
had taken us. You know, I loved us and that's
the pinnacle of success. It's like, because all you've ever
heard it since we started was, you know, you nobody
(01:11:34):
unless you make it in America. Everybody used to say
that to us. No matter what you're do in England,
if you're not big in America, you're nothing. And we
were big in America, and it's like it's sort of
pinch yourself kind of thing. It didn't seem real. And
(01:11:56):
then the hard work began. It was like, because we
had to do we were in Europe, do America just
took months to you just spend all the time either
on the road or writing or in the studio. As
soon as you're finished in the studio, you're back on
(01:12:17):
the road and then you'd be over to the States
and keep building euro Upe in America, keep at tour
after two after two, and it was great until we
sort of wondered where our money was. And it was
not until what the mid seventies when we kept asking
(01:12:41):
for our accountants somebody to you know, show us what
was coming in and what was going out. And I
managed to kept saying, I'll have a word at the
accountant and he'll send you the accounts so you can look.
The next thing, We're got a massive, big tax build
from the inland revenue in England. We got the how
(01:13:05):
is this we haven't earned this money tax people, Oh,
yes you have. It's like we've seen about a tenth
of what we were being taxed on. And we realized
then that the manager has like ripped us off.
Speaker 1 (01:13:23):
Okay, then what.
Speaker 2 (01:13:27):
Then spent a year trying to get out of that contract.
Warner Brothers were involved in it. We've had to eventually
we had to buy him out, buy the manager out
for a million dollars, which is like ridiculous amount back
in the mid seventies, and we had to borrow it
(01:13:51):
from the record companies like against future albums just to
pay him off. We were in court for about three
months with all these lawyers involved, and I think the
lawyers ripped us off more than the management did, and
(01:14:12):
so we were left with no manager, absolutely no money.
We just had to start all over again.
Speaker 1 (01:14:21):
So what did you do for a manager?
Speaker 2 (01:14:25):
We had to manage ourselves very badly and we got
this the tour tour manager then became looked after the
like the agencies booking tours and stuff like her, and
just had to go like that.
Speaker 1 (01:14:46):
But you eventually ended up with Donnardon anyway, right.
Speaker 2 (01:14:50):
At the end of the seventies.
Speaker 1 (01:14:52):
Yeah, yeah, So how did that happen?
Speaker 2 (01:14:56):
We needed somebody to take the lift all the stuff
off us because it was just like the music was suffering.
We would you'd like, we'd start, we'd go into a
studio and then you get a summons to appear in court.
And eventually what used to take is five days or
(01:15:17):
two weeks in the studio I became like six months.
We shoul have to keep appearing in court all the
time against all these people that were suing us. And
Don Arden said that he could get us out of it,
and that was unfortunately when the end of the Aussie
era came about.
Speaker 1 (01:15:39):
Okay, did Don Arden give you a percentage? Did he
tell you what it was going to be? Did he
rip you off?
Speaker 2 (01:15:47):
He didn't actually book any sus because Ozzi was fired
from the band and Don wasn't interested in managing Black
Sabbath without Ozzi.
Speaker 1 (01:15:58):
Okay, so Don Arden all the will he never even
managed to Black.
Speaker 2 (01:16:05):
Not Know England. No, I think he started on that.
I think it was the Never Say Die tour. We
just were like, we need a manager, and we went
like halfway through the Never Say Diet got done involved.
He agreed to manage us. He had incredible success with
(01:16:25):
the l built them like one of the major bands
on the Earth at the time, and then we found
out that Jeff Lynn sued him for thirty five million
dollars but neither so he agreed to manage us. We've
(01:16:48):
done a tour with Van Halen and Warner Brothers were
putting all the publicity into Van Halen and completely ignoring us.
So we thought, you know, we've got to get a manager.
We went back to Darn and that was going okay,
and so as he got fired in the band, Don
(01:17:09):
Arden says, well, I'm not managing with that, and that
was the end of Don Arden.
Speaker 1 (01:17:16):
And okay, a couple of things as he left the
band came back and then got fired. How hard was
it to decide to fire them?
Speaker 2 (01:17:27):
It was heartbreaking because you know, we're all growing up together,
we forward against the odds together, we built we perform
miracles from getting making the band successful, and it was heartbreaking.
It's like you know, cutting your arm off.
Speaker 1 (01:17:48):
Well, how bad was it? Did you have to fire them?
Speaker 2 (01:17:53):
Yeah, he definitely needed a change of lifestyle. At the
time he was we were all into we were all
doing drugs and getting boozing and stuff like that, but
we could still function. Whereas Ossie it's sort of it
wasn't functioning anymore. And we got this house in bel
(01:18:16):
Air to write an album. Ozzie just wasn't interested in
the music that we were doing. And eventually Tony says,
Ozzi's got to go. It's just not interesting in the
band's not going to go anywhere. Keep on like this
and this isn't Actually I was a party the other
(01:18:39):
night and I got talking to this guy called Ronnie
James Doer, and he's got an absolutely brilliant voice, and
I think we should give him a go. H. So
Tony made came to the decision to get rid of
Ossie and we we hated doing it, but it had
to happen for our sake and his sake, and and
(01:19:02):
it all worked out great in the end. And Ronnie
James Doo came along and we'd written he sang to
some of the stuff that we'd written and it was brilliant,
absolutely just exactly what he needed. And that was the
end of the Aussie era.
Speaker 1 (01:19:28):
What did as he see when he got fired?
Speaker 2 (01:19:32):
But he couldn't believe it. I mean, it's like a
ton of bricks coming down on him on his own.
I mean, we had each other, but Ozzie didn't have anybody.
And luckily that's when Sharon came along and saved him.
Speaker 1 (01:19:49):
And when he ultimately had success as a solo career
pretty much right away. Did that surprise you?
Speaker 2 (01:19:58):
It surprised me how fast it too himself around? Yeah. Yeah,
And we were like totally really glad that he was
successful and he turned his whole life around. It was
great because he was successful and we were successful. We
were had one of the biggest selling albums ever of
(01:20:21):
Sabbath era, and he probably became bigger than Sabbath.
Speaker 1 (01:20:27):
And how was it working with Riley James Deal.
Speaker 2 (01:20:31):
It's fantastic for the first two albums, it's great. He
was the ultra professional. He'd just get down to everything.
The pressure was taken off me because he could write
his own lyrics, so I could concentrate on the music
part and you know, the bass parts and everything. He
(01:20:51):
was great for the first two albums, and then by
the time he came for the live album, he got
his own solodeal unbeknownst to us, which didn't get down
very well with us.
Speaker 1 (01:21:07):
Okay, let's go back to earlier era. At one point,
Bill Ward says, they're kicking.
Speaker 2 (01:21:13):
You out of the bear. When I'm there, I have
no idea. You have to ask Tony and Bill. And
because Bill came to the house one day and she's
got some bad news, You're out of the band. Great.
I think I was just like losing interest basically, and
(01:21:37):
we've just we've been through so much. We got rid
of the management. We had no money to show for
selling zillions of albums and millions of tours, successful tours
and everything, and we had, like I think I had
about five thousand dollars in the bank or something, and
(01:21:59):
massive tax bills, and I was just disillusion with the
whole thing. And I think I just that rubbed off
and everybody else in the band they just thought I
wasn't interested anymore, which is probably true. At the time,
I just needed a break from everything.
Speaker 1 (01:22:16):
So you were okay with it getting kicked out?
Speaker 2 (01:22:20):
Yeah, it was like, oh, thank God for that. I
don't have to make the decision myself. They made it
for me, and yeah, I was just like, I think
I had the most relaxing three weeks I've had in
the nineteen seventies.
Speaker 1 (01:22:36):
So how did you end up back in the bit?
Speaker 2 (01:22:40):
The phone me says where are you? Do you mean?
Where am I rehearsal? Where are do you kick me? At?
The band who kicked you out? Nobody would admit that
they were the ones that kicked me out, So I
just turned up rehearsal as if nothing had ever happened.
Speaker 1 (01:22:58):
And to what degree did that affect you going forward?
Speaker 2 (01:23:05):
Well, I realized that the band was it wasn't like
four school kids all having a laugh together. It was
like serious, and it sort of lost the friendship part.
It became more of a business than four blokes just
having a laugh together, and just I don't know, I
(01:23:28):
think the friendship suffered a little bit because you. You
never think that you people that close to it are
gonna stab you in the back, which is what I
felt like when they said I was fired. But so
a little bit of that, a little bit of the
brotherhood sort of it was diminished.
Speaker 1 (01:23:48):
So you had this run with the deal, which was
very successful. Then he gets a solo deal that ends
with Sabbath. You end up working with a bunch of
different people, including Ian Gillen. We've been in deep purple.
You know what was it like, constantly cycling through different people.
Speaker 2 (01:24:09):
It was horrible by this time after Ronnie left, because
we'd got Sandy Perlman managers for Heaven and Hell and
Mob Rules. He came in and managed us after Don
refused to manage us because obviously wasn't in the band,
and Sandy got all our business affairs sorted out. It
(01:24:32):
was not the best thing ever happened to us. We
got all our royalties properly sorted everything, all that tax
sorted everything, just put us on a different level so
we didn't have to worry about finances anymore. And then
uh that there is like a big thing with because
(01:24:58):
Sandy Ploman managed Blue Icycles as well, and that came
to an end because he says, it's like you are
the manager. So he managed Blue Icacle because it is
too it's too much of a conflict. And he says,
what I've made my sort of name managing Blue Icycle,
(01:25:19):
so I've gotten to staying with them. So incomes Don
Arden again. He says, I've got the proposition for you. Says,
how about having Ian Gillan in the band. He says,
he's left Deep Purple and he's looking for a band
and he's he's approached his manager's approached me and asked
(01:25:43):
about join in Sabbath. So he says, well, yeah, we'll
give it a try. And this is what we did
well that ended up having a short run. Why the
whole thing was a fiasco. I mean the Stonehenge but
it was ridiculous. Everybody thought spinal tap and copied. So
(01:26:07):
because of the whole Stonehenge fiasco.
Speaker 1 (01:26:12):
For those people who are tell us about the Stonehenge fiasco.
Speaker 2 (01:26:16):
Well, because Don Arden had this, we put on spectacular
shows like with E l O had E l O
had a flying saucer landing on stage at their gigs.
It's like heap are on the most spectacular shows you
could imagine and and he was doing with Ossie as well.
But Ozzie was going out with these incredible shows, and
(01:26:42):
Don Harden came up with this idea of having Stonehenges
the backdrop and the sun gradually as we were playing,
the sun would gradually rise behind the Stonehenge like normal
Stone Enge. And of course they got all the dimensions
(01:27:05):
ron So when we finally went on tour with it,
it was too big to put it in any of
the gigs, so we had to leave it on the
docks in New York. So that was a total fiasco.
Then Ian Gillan, halfway through the tour heard from Deep
(01:27:28):
Purple they were getting wanted him back in the Deep
Purple band, so he wanted to go back to Deep Purple.
And that was the end of that.
Speaker 1 (01:27:38):
So when did the original Sabbath, you know, when did
you all basically say this is all?
Speaker 2 (01:27:48):
Well I did. Then it was like I never I
just didn't agree with the girl and singing in Sabbath.
I agreed with it, thinking that it was going to
be a Gil and Iomi, but that kind of thing,
not Black Sabbath. But the record company insisted that it
(01:28:09):
comes out as a black Sabbath album, and I never
really never believed in it really, and so nineteen eighty
four came around were me and Tony and Bill are
auditioning different singers and it's just like I just had
(01:28:31):
enough of this. I'm out of here, and I left.
Speaker 1 (01:28:36):
Okay, and tell me about the solo album.
Speaker 2 (01:28:39):
For me, Well, I've been writing lots of different stuff
and I decided I'm just going to do go on
my own so on my own boss, and I'll do
what I want musically, which is what I do it
(01:29:00):
just for the pleasure of writing my own stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:29:04):
To what degree was that fulfilling and successful? Because it
wasn't as commercially successful as certainly the peak of Black Service. Oh,
the solo stuff didn't do anything. I think it hardly
sold anything.
Speaker 2 (01:29:22):
It was just nice to be able to play, to
do exactly what I wanted to do instead of having
to listen to everybody everybody else's opinions or wherever. So
it was very fulfilling for me. So I didn't need
the money at the time. It was more like a
hobby and something that I'd always always wanted to do,
(01:29:44):
and it's up to me to be able to do it.
And that's what happened.
Speaker 1 (01:29:47):
You end up working with Osi and Asthmosis. How does
that happen?
Speaker 2 (01:29:52):
Well, me and I and our kids were very very close.
He'd come up to my house, him and Sharon with
the kids to play with my kids, and we got
into his action. We got on holidays together as families,
and so we were really close. And he was having
(01:30:15):
problems with Bob Daisley's bass player at the time, and
he tried other bass players and he just wasn't getting
along with them, and he just asked me one day
if I'd do a tour with him. Yeah, fine, you know,
just as friends. And that's what I did, just out
(01:30:36):
of friendship.
Speaker 1 (01:30:37):
And how did Black Sabbath end up informing?
Speaker 2 (01:30:48):
I think Sharon had the idea of having Sabbath and
Ozzie doing a gig together, and that's how the Ozfest
thing came about, and we did that. It all came
from his He did a farewell gig in custom Maser
(01:31:09):
in California, and the original Sabbath got finished off his
show and it's supposed to be his like final farewell
and all that kind of stuff, and we just got
together from then on.
Speaker 1 (01:31:24):
How did you end up playing that gig. Find me.
Speaker 2 (01:31:29):
Well, we were on tour with Ozzie with Ronnie James
Doo at the time, and Ozzie and Sharon had got
in touch with us and says, we'd love you to
as he's finishing his career at custom Maser and he'd
love you to come and do the final Uncle with
(01:31:51):
me Tony and Bill and the original Sabbath just going
on stage and finishing his career off. And went, oh yeah, great,
we're up for it. We mentioned it to run and
he went ballistic, I'm not doing that. I'm not supporting
that clown and all this kind of stuff, and so
(01:32:11):
we start, okay, well we're doing it, so running, Okay,
Well that's it finished. That's the way that that finished.
Something really stupid, pathetic.
Speaker 1 (01:32:24):
Okay, needless to say, it's not ours's last gig, and
then you continue to work with ours. He is Black Sabbath.
Is there any kind of plan or is it just
organic or is it just when ours? He calls what
what's going on there?
Speaker 2 (01:32:44):
It's just we had such a good time at the
the quote unquote farewell gig that he says, you know,
if we ever want to do this again and one
off thing or festival or just a tour whatever that
to do it. Nothing stopping us, and that's the way
we've always treated it ever since.
Speaker 1 (01:33:04):
Well, eventually you're king to an end? Is would you
ever do it again?
Speaker 2 (01:33:12):
If I was capable, if the rest of the band
were capable. But there's absolutely no way we'd gone tour
again because we're not not capable of it anymore physically.
Speaker 1 (01:33:23):
And how come Bill Ward? Wasn't I the end run
of service?
Speaker 2 (01:33:32):
That's something you should ask, not me, because I would.
We started doing the the last album together, thirteen album,
and it was the original band, and that's that's what
we all agreed to h It was supposed to be
(01:33:55):
like the final album of the original band. And everything
was going great in rehearsals right in the album. Then
we had a break. I went to Hawaii, came back
from Hawaii and Bill found me, I've been fired. What
do you mean, what's why you fired? I have no idea.
(01:34:19):
I just come back from Hawaii. I don't know what's
gone on, and so I've still I never did get
a proper answer why Bill was out the band and
what was.
Speaker 1 (01:34:29):
It like working with Sharing?
Speaker 2 (01:34:33):
It was great, it's always been great for working with her.
She had to overcome being one of the few women
managements in this horrendous music industry. She was very, very tough,
but she had to be to be a successful woman
even now in this industry on the management side.
Speaker 1 (01:34:58):
When do you get married the first time?
Speaker 2 (01:35:00):
When? Did what?
Speaker 1 (01:35:00):
When did you get married the first time?
Speaker 2 (01:35:04):
Married?
Speaker 1 (01:35:05):
Yes?
Speaker 2 (01:35:06):
No, yeah, you god? First marriage is nineteen I think
nineteen seventy one and you were in the band.
Speaker 1 (01:35:18):
Why did you decide to get married?
Speaker 2 (01:35:23):
Because I've been going with my girlfriend from school days
on and off for since I was like fifteen, and
it's one of those silly things that you do.
Speaker 1 (01:35:39):
And why did that mirror a gend?
Speaker 2 (01:35:48):
Probably mainly due to being away on the road all
the time, and she was seeing other people and I
was seeing other people. Just didn't come to a natural end.
And then when I met Gloria with me forever wife,
it was just like the lover felt for her was
(01:36:10):
like just beyond everything I'd ever felt.
Speaker 1 (01:36:12):
So how did you meet Gloria?
Speaker 2 (01:36:16):
At the airport in Saint Louis of all places? She
was waiting for her friend to come off the plane
from Canada. I just landed in Saint Louis. Come out.
I saw her there and it's like love at first sight.
And there was the limo driver was waiting for me,
(01:36:38):
and I sit to the limo driver, wait till she,
wait till she leaves, and follow her. It sounds really corny.
And she went outside. In those days, she could part
right outside the airport and her port. She had a
red Porsche which is part right next to the limo.
(01:37:01):
So she got in the red Porsche. I said to
the limo driver, if she stops for a red light,
I want to speak to her, and luckily enough stopped
at a red light when the window down and invited
her to the gig and she was like what. I
don't think she'd ever heard of Black Zibberth at the time,
and I said, come to the gig tonight and she
(01:37:25):
did love ever since.
Speaker 1 (01:37:28):
Okay, so you were into her first sight? Was she
into you?
Speaker 2 (01:37:34):
I think she was sort of the hell, who's this
kind of thing? She didn't know anything, who was or anything.
I think it was just she was just intrigued by
by this English bloke with long hair and in her band.
Speaker 1 (01:37:57):
You end up living in Saint Louis, what's that.
Speaker 2 (01:38:01):
Well, her family lived in Saint Louis, so we got
a house there. We had I still had a house
in England, so it was great for being on the
road because you know, it's just Central America in America USA,
and her family was there, and eventually we had our
(01:38:24):
first baby, who was born in Saint Louis hospital, and
it's just convenience to live in Saint Louis.
Speaker 1 (01:38:34):
So, okay, do you ever play the bass anymore?
Speaker 2 (01:38:39):
I played the bass three weeks ago with the Foo
Fighters at aston Villa Football Stadium.
Speaker 1 (01:38:50):
Is it the type of thing if someone calls you
up to play, do you have to rehearse or you
just you can say, okay, I'll pick up my basin
on there.
Speaker 2 (01:38:58):
Well, they said I just wanted to do Paranoid, so
you know, I know that sort of backwards, so I
didn't have to rehearse that.
Speaker 1 (01:39:07):
And the other three original members of the Sabbath do
you have contact with them? With Osie practically every day
now Tony occasionally we email and Bill Ward isn't on
the internet and I hate the phone, so I have
(01:39:31):
to if I want to speak to Bill Ward, I
have to send an email to his wife, who passes
it on to him.
Speaker 2 (01:39:38):
Then he gives her the reply and she she sends
it to me.
Speaker 1 (01:39:44):
And what do you talk about with Tony and ours
in these days?
Speaker 2 (01:39:52):
Just use your friendship things obviously, because we've just been
did this custom for are a local football club in
England has just come out with that and Adidas a
new football kit. So me and Assi did an Addi
Das commercial back in England for the Aston Villa's new kid.
(01:40:18):
Tony talked to him about what hotels he likes, stuff
like that, And.
Speaker 1 (01:40:26):
Do you listen to new music?
Speaker 2 (01:40:30):
Not really, I'd rather listen to an audio book because
when I'm driving from here in Nevada to Utah, which
is a seven hour drive, which I love doing, I
always listen to audio books. Occasionally listen to new music,
but I don't know. Some of it's totally above way
(01:40:52):
over my head. But the grandkids love like things like
Taylor Swift. I took the grandkids to Tyler Swift concert,
which was incredible. So yeah, things like do you listen
to the old music? What Sabbath stuff, Sabath stuff or
even the other stuff. I listened to loads of sixties stuff,
(01:41:17):
things that I used to hate back then the same
great now it's like nostalgic. Give me an example, like
Tamla motown stuff and things that are pretended that I
didn't like because it was a bit too girly. Noah,
love like Motown, stacked otis reading, all that kind of stuff.
(01:41:43):
I love that, all soul stuff.
Speaker 1 (01:41:47):
How olden do you recognize these days? Not a lot.
Speaker 2 (01:41:53):
I've never been sort of the one to be recognized.
Speaker 1 (01:41:57):
Hum.
Speaker 2 (01:41:58):
But then it's always like when I'm in an awkward
position that somebody will recognized me. When I've had the
shower for a week or something and just go out
to put the bins out to something, somebody be passed it.
Speaker 1 (01:42:13):
And do you care about legacy? Do you care if
people in younger generations know about Black Sabbath and the
music you made, or you say, well I did that.
I'm doing something different now.
Speaker 2 (01:42:27):
Oh, it's fantastic to you know, still be recognized by musically.
Still people look up to the stuff that Sabbath did.
It's it's always seemed to be cool to like Sabbath,
no matter how old you are. That's a good thing.
(01:42:48):
And how was it playing paranoid with It's fantastic I
mean there's like fifty thousand people there at the football
ground and that I came on and the place is
spent wild, especially being back in Aston where Sabbath was born.
And you missed the stage at all, and I don't
(01:43:12):
until I'm on it. Then I thought, I just go
on it and like something takes completely takes over me.
I'm like throwing me base up in there and all
this kind of thing. Then I come off like, oh, Gord,
me back.
Speaker 1 (01:43:28):
So any specific plans anything you want to do in
the next coming years.
Speaker 2 (01:43:34):
I would love to write a novel. That's sort of
my ultimate ambition, but I've started it. Every time I started,
I get to about page eighty and completely run out
of ideas. So I'm just gradually building all these ideas
up one by one and hopefully within a year or
(01:43:57):
two I'm going to get down to it finally do it.
Speaker 1 (01:44:03):
Okay, Geezer, thanks a lot for talking to me and
my audience telling your story. Thank you, Bob, and maybe
see on stage somewhere down the road. Yeah, throwing your
base in the air. That teos until next time. This
is Bob Love six