Ozzy Osbourne thought he'd drink until the day he died. His final years, something changed.
From the iconic "All Aboard!" to Black Sabbath’s heavy metal legacy, Ozzy Osbourne had one of the most recognizable voices in modern history.
The Grammy-winning "Prince of Darkness" and legendary rocker died July 22, just weeks after reuniting with Black Sabbath for a final show in England. He was 76.
Osbourne was one of the most iconic figures in rock, molding the sound and perception of heavy metal with his one-of-a-kind voice and shocking antics. He followed his rock zenith with a reality TV career, making him as well known for biting the head off a bat on stage and eating a live dove in a meeting with record executives as he was for his bemusing bickering at home with his wife and kids.
Fans also watched his well-documented journey overcoming addiction, and Osbourne ultimately achieved sobriety and released his penultimate 2020 album: “Ordinary Man.” Osbourne's journey is a pertinant reminder that "recovery isn’t linear or fast. It’s a long-term process with setbacks along the way," says psychologist Stephanie Sarkis.
"In society, we tend to want overnight transformations, but Osbourne’s experience shows that persistence, resilience and transparency can lead to long-term gains," Sarkis added.
After the first year of sobriety, he could 'start breathing again’
Osbourne, whose issues with alcoholism and drug addiction began in the 1970s and got him booted from Black Sabbath in 1979, grew serious about his sobriety around 2014 after numerous attempts at rehab and recovery dating back to 1984. In a recent interview, he told The Sun that he once drank 28 gallons of alcohol to get through the Christmas season.
“I thought I’d be drinking to the day I die,” Osbourne said in a 2021 interview with Variety. His wife and longtime manager, “The Talk” co-host Sharon Osbourne, and son Jack, who at the time had been sober for 17 years, also joined him for the sit-down.
“I’ve always been self-medicating because I’ve never liked the way I felt. I’ve had great success in my life, but I’ve never felt great about myself,” he said in the interview.
"Most of the people that I drank with are dead. And the ones that aren't, that still continue to drink, are going to be dead soon," Osbourne added. "It's not a happy ending.”
Osbourne’s son was also asked about his sobriety. “The first year is the worst, isn’t it Jack? After the first year it’s like you can start breathing again,” Osbourne told his son.
'We deserved to fire each other'
Osbourne was booted from Black Sabbath in 1979 after his bandmates, particularly Tony Iommi, found him difficult to work with.
“Ozzy was going to clubs and getting really out of it and not coming home,” Iommi said in the book "Louder Than Hell: The Definitive Oral History of Metal." “It got to a stage where nothing was happening with him. He came apart on us.”
In 2002, Osbourne opened up to Rolling Stone about the firing.
"We deserved to fire each other. There was no one worse than anybody else. If the others had been churchgoing Bible punchers and I was (expletive) their wives, I could have expected it. But they were doing booze and Quaaludes too," he said.
"In those days, we were well into cocaine. That turns you into a powder-seeking freak. The thing was, get the gig over with so we could get our bump of coke. We had a guy on tour with suitcases full of different strengths of coke," he added.
In his 2009 book, "I Am Ozzy," he said he felt "betrayed" by his band members.
"We were four blokes who’d grown up together a few streets apart. We were like family, like brothers. And firing me for being (expletive) up was hypocritical... We were all (expletive) up," he wrote. "If you’re stoned and I’m stoned and you’re telling me that I’m fired because I’m stoned, how can that be? Because I’m slightly more stoned than you are?”
‘Ordinary Man’ was the first album Osbourne recorded ‘completely sober’
“Ordinary Man” tapped into the darker side of addiction with "It's a Raid," an anti-drug song featuring rapper Post Malone that recalls a wild, 1972 moment of Osbourne's drug life with Black Sabbath.
While recording near Bel Air, California, police swarmed the band's rented house filled with cocaine and marijuana after Osbourne accidentally set off an alarm, thinking it was air conditioning.
In a 2020 interview with Apple Music, Osbourne said the album was the first project he's completed sober.
"I thought it was the drugs and the alcohol that made it all work," he said. "But it's not true. All I was doing for years was self-medicating because I didn't like the way I felt. But then this is the first album I've co-wrote and recorded (expletive) completely sober. The last album, I wrote some of it stoned."
Osbourne admitted, "I quite like being sober now. ‘Cause at least I can remember the (expletive) thing I did yesterday.'”
Through being open about his recovery journey, Sarkis says he "helped countless others come to terms with their addictions."
Ultimately, Osbourne had to commit to sobriety on his own terms and timeline — not just because he had been booted from a band or pressured by peers. Osbourne’s story "shows the power of reclaiming the right to choose how one approaches their sobriety," Sarkis says.
"When someone chooses recovery for themselves, it is not up to us to tell them the 'right' way to do it," Sarkis explains. "How someone approaches sobriety is a deeply personal choice. Having a sense of ownership over the recovery process is a powerful motivator that encourages success and reduces relapse."
Osbourne dies at 76, weeks after final Black Sabbath show
A family statement shared with Paste BN said Osbourne died in Birmingham, England, "surrounded by love."
"It is with more sadness than mere words can convey that we have to report that our beloved Ozzy has passed away this morning," the statement read. "He was with his family and surrounded by love. We ask everyone to respect our family privacy at this time."
Osbourne was diagnosed with a form of Parkinson's disease in 2019 after he suffered a bad fall that "screwed up all the vertebrae" in his neck, leading to the cancellation of a European tour. Osbourne kept his struggles private but eventually wanted to share with his fans.
He leaves behind Sharon Osbourne, his wife of more than 40 years, as well as daughters Jessica, Aimee and Kelly and sons Elliot, Louis and Jack.
Less than two weeks before his death, a new memoir from Osbourne called "Last Rites" was announced (releasing Oct. 7 from Grand Central Publishing Group). The publisher describes it as "the shocking, bitterly hilarious, never-before-told story of Osbourne's descent into hell."
In the book, Osbourne says, "Look, if it ends tomorrow, I can't complain. I've been all around the world. Seen a lot of things. I've done good… and I've done bad. But right now, I'm not ready to go anywhere."
Contributing: Melissa Ruggieri, Jim Sergent, Carlie Procell and Sara M. Moniuszko
This story has been updated because an earlier version included an inaccuracy.