“I wanted Ozzy on Lollapalooza, and the response back was ‘He’s not relevant.’ So I said, ‘F**k off, we’ll do our own’”: Sharon Osbourne on the origins of Ozzfest
Few metal festivals hold quite the same legendary status as Ozzfest. First launched in 1996 by Ozzy Osbourne and his wife Sharon, the touring festival played host to scores of the genre’s biggest names in its time, including Black Sabbath, Slipknot, Pantera, System Of A Down, Linkin Park, Avenged Sevenfold and many more.
But while it bloomed into a force which quite literally shaped the destiny of the genre, Ozzfest was once just an idea, and one which sprung from a rejection of Ozzy Osbourne by another established festival.
READ MORE: Sammy Hagar reveals how many songs Ozzy Osbourne is likely to sing at final Black Sabbath show
In a new interview with Metal Hammer, Sharon Osbourne recalls the time she tried to get Ozzy Osbourne on the bill for Lollapalooza, but her request was denied.
“I wanted Ozzy on Lollapalooza,” she explains. “And the response back was, ‘He’s not relevant.’ Because Lollapalooza, when it started, was all very grand and all very Seattle – they were musical snobs. So I said, ‘Fuck off, we’ll do our own and it will be a metal festival.’”
And that decision turned out to be one of the greatest business decisions she and her husband ever made. “It was brilliant,” she says. “For 23 years, it was like summer camp. There was one band in particular who I just always adored, and I got the honour of working with them for a while, which was Motörhead [who played Ozzfest in 1998]. I just loved Lemmy to death.”
Sharon Osbourne has had an illustrious career, to say the least, but she counts Ozzfest as her proudest achievement. “It passed the torch,” she says. “So many great bands came out of Ozzfest that are still going today and still so relevant.”
Ozzfest wasn’t without drama in its time, though. Elsewhere in the interview, Sharon remembers the time she orchestrated fans to throw open cans of baked beans at Iron Maiden frontman Bruce Dickinson for disrespecting her husband Ozzy.
“I love Iron Maiden, it’s just the singer because he was so horribly disrespectful,” she says. “But if you’re going to take Ozzy’s money, and play before him every night of a festival, and you’re bad-mouthing him to the crowd, you’ve got to pay. So I had him pelted with cans of baked beans that were open, and cut his sound.”
Ozzy Osbourne is due to perform at Black Sabbath’s massive Back to the Beginning farewell show this July, supported by a who’s who of metal greatness, including Metallica, Slayer, Pantera, Alice in Chains and more.
Tickets are sold out, but you can find out more information at ozzy.com.
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