Ozzy Osbourne: I wish I was a hero to myself

BLACK Sabbath’s Ozzy Osbourne reflects on being a “hero” to fans– and recalls moment he nearly fell off the wagon while shooting latest TV show
Ozzy Osbourne says it’s “kind of nice” to be thought of as a hero by many people – but he wishes he could feel like a hero to himself.
He admits he gives himself a hard time for his human failings, illustrated by his constant battle against returning to drink and drugs.
And the Black Sabbath frontman, who’s been been three years sober, has recalled a moment during the making of his new TV series where he felt sorely tempted to start drinking again.
Told that he’s “a hero to many people,” Ozzy tells Goldmine: “That’s kind of nice. I wish I was a hero to me, sometimes. I do a good job of beating myself up.
“The thing is, I don’t like to treat people any less than I would like to be treated myself. I suppose I have an ego but I don’t like to go, ‘Do you know who the fuck you’re talking to?’
“If I’m walking down the street and someone goes,’ Hey, it’s Ozzy!’ I’ll go, ‘Oh my, here we go.’
“But if they don’t recognise me then I’m like, ‘Am I losing it?’ I like to be recognised. I said it on the last album: ‘I don’t want to live for ever but I don’t want to die.’”
He reports that he’s been attending Alcoholics Anonymous meetings regularly since he put drink and drugs behind him in 2013.
But he nearly suffered a relapse during the shooting of reality show Ozzy And Jack’s World Detour, which he made with his son. “I was in Cuba and I hadn’t been doing meetings for a while,” says the vocalist. “We were in this restaurant and this guy goes, ‘Do you want to go upstairs and have a cigar?’
“We go into this private room and there are these bottles of fucking rum everywhere. I thought to myself, ‘It wouldn’t be that bad.’
“Then I go to myself, ‘Fuck off – you’d start with the puff of a cigar and then a shot of booze.’ I said to my son, ‘I have to leave here.’”
Since then he’s been attending meetings every day. “I hear all the time, people say they have another drink in them, but they may not have another sobriety in them. I don’t want to put myself in that situation.”
Reflecting that everyone from religious people to world leaders make mistakes because they’re human, Ozzy adds: “I’ve said the wrong things and I’ve done the wrong things, but I’m human.
“These days I just try not to make the same mistake twice.”
Black Sabbath’s farewell tour continues until February.