Why Tony Iommi and Ozzy Osbourne initially hated each other
The sound of Black Sabbath was the perfect match made in hell. Even though the band’s penchant for thick grooves and foreboding lyrics were enticing enough in the 1970s, fans would take the sounds of Sabbath and turn them into the sounds of heavy metal, with artists like Judas Priest and Iron Maiden following in their footsteps. Although Tony Iommi and Ozzy Osbourne may be the twin faces of Sabbath, they initially started as far apart as possible.
When Iommi first started to hone his chops as a guitarist, he started by working in various blues bands around the Birmingham clubs. As much as he may have been paying the bills then, Iommi wouldn’t see his luck change until he started working with Geezer Butler and Bill Ward.
After a brief wilderness period working with the members of Jethro Tull, Iommi knew that he had something special with the early version of Sabbath, then called Earth. All that was left was finding a singer, but Iommi thought they would go nowhere with someone like Ozzy Osbourne.
Being enamoured with music from an early age, Osbourne had grown up wanting to be a Beatle before being drawn to the heavier sounds of bands like Led Zeppelin and Cream. While Osbourne got the call from Sabbath to start working with them, Iommi already had a history with Osbourne dating back to their school days.
As bassist Geezer Butler would recall to Louder, “Ozzy had been to school with Tony, and they hated each other. Tony had bullied him at school, so it was me one day and Tony the next day, so Ozzy decided he’d go with me because he didn’t want to play with Tony. That’s how we started.”
Even though the emotional chemistry may have been harsh initially, things took a significant turn when Osbourne opened his mouth to sing. While it wasn’t always clear what Osbourne was getting at in every song he sang, he put every piece of his soul into his delivery, making songs that felt like the soundtrack to the oncoming apocalypse on tracks like ‘War Pigs’.
Although Osbourne was more than happy to give a voice to Sabbath, he would eventually warm up to Iommi’s playing style. Whenever Osbourne couldn’t think of a melody to put over the top of the song, he would sing the riff, with every single musician hammering at the hook on songs like ‘Iron Man’ and ‘Hand of Doom’.
What Osbourne may have lacked in musical ability, though, he more than made up for when he took to the stage. Becoming ‘The Prince of Darkness’ in front of every crowd, Osbourne would change his persona to look like a raving madman onstage, like he had been let out of his cage to front a heavy metal band.
Although Osbourne would eventually fall out with Sabbath in the early 1980s, his work as a solo star was still informed by Iommi’s guitar work, including the massive versions of Sabbath tunes that he put on his live album Speak of the Devil. Even though Osbourne and Iommi may not be on the best terms when off the stage, they will forever be linked as the two founders of heavy metal grandeur.
