kabuki curtains that dropped down from above the stage in two parts, instead of parting in the middle like normal theatrical curtains do. The curtains would go down halfway through the show, and then when they were pulled up again, this mechanical arm with a giant God-like hand on the end of it would come out from under the drum riser and soar above the audience, with me crouching down in the palm. When the arm was fully extended, flames would shoot out of one of the fingers, and I’d stomp on this pedal by my foot, which would activate a catapult behind me, and about fifty pounds of raw meat would be flung into the audience.
Then I’d stand up and shout, ‘ROCK ’N’ ROLL!’
It was fucking awesome.
But, of course, what can go wrong will go wrong—and pretty much everything went wrong on the second night of the US tour. It was New Year’s Eve, and we were at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum and Sports Arena, playing to a crowd of tens of thousands. First the smoke machine went on the blink. It was coughing out so much dry ice that no one could see what the fuck they were doing. Then, for some reason, one of the kabuki curtains wouldn’t come down, so we couldn’t get the giant God-like hand ready for its entrance. I remember standing there in my chain-mail suit, watching as Sharon literally swung from this curtain, trying to get it to fall. ‘Drop, you bastard, drop!’ she was screaming.
Eventually, after a couple of roadies joined in, they got the thing unstuck. But then the mechanical arm for the hand got caught up in the carpet on the floor of the stage and started to pull it from under the giant speaker cabinets behind the band, making them wobble like crazy. ‘TIMBER!’ one of the roadies shouted. For what might have been the longest thirty seconds of all our lives, Sharon, my assistant Tony and a bunch of roadies were wrestling with this carpet, trying to untangle it from the mechanical arm, to stop the whole fucking set collapsing.
Finally the carpet was pulled free, someone gave me a shove from behind, the kabuki curtains went up again, and before I knew it I was crouching down in the hand as it rose into the air, with this ocean of screaming kids below me. By that time I was convinced that something else was going to go wrong. So when the arm was fully extended, I covered my eyes and prepared to get my nuts blown off by the pyro, but the flames shot out of the finger without a problem. I was so relieved I almost wept. Then it was time for the final gimmick, so I stomped on the pedal beside my foot to activate the catapult. But what I didn’t know was that some dip-shit from the stage crew had set the catapult the previous night rather than just before the show, so the elastic had gone all limp. When I pressed the button, it just went phut, and instead of this massive payload of pigs’ bollocks and cows’ entrails flying into the audience, it smacked me at 20 mph in the back of the head. The last thing I remember is screaming
‘Aaaarrgh!’ and feeling all this blood and innards dribbling down the back of my neck.
The crowd thought it was all part of the show and went fucking wild.
It became one of our trademarks, throwing butchers’ off-cuts into the audience. As well as the catapult, we used to get the midget to come on stage with buckets of innards and throw them into the audience before he was hung. It was our version of the custard-pie fights I used to love seeing on telly when I was a kid. But then the audience got involved, and the fans started to bring their own meat, and throw it at us. When we finished a gig, it looked like the Trail of fucking Tears. You’d never get that kind of shit past health and safety today.
And it was amazing how quickly it got out of control.
One time this cop came up to me after a show and said, ‘Have you any idea what you’re doing to the youth of America?’
Then he showed me this Polaroid photograph of a kid in the queue outside the gig with an ox’s head on his shoulders.
‘Holy crap,’ I said. ‘Where did he get that from?’
‘He killed it on his way to the gig.’
‘Well, I hope he was hungry.’
It was insane what the kids would bring. It started with just cuts of meat, but then it moved on to entire animals. We had dead cats, birds, lizards, all kinds of stuff. One time, someone threw this huge bullfrog on to the stage, and it landed on its back. The fucking thing was so big, I thought it was someone’s baby. I got a terrible fright. I started screaming, ‘WHAT’S THAT? WHAT’S THAT? WHAT’S THAT?’ Then it rolled over and hopped away.
With every gig, it just got crazier and crazier. Eventually people started to throw things on stage with nails and razor blades embedded in them—joke shop stuff, mainly, like rubber snakes and plastic spiders. Some of the crew started to get freaked out about it, especially after a real snake ended up on stage one night. It was well and truly pissed off about being on stage with Ozzy Osbourne, that snake was. One of the roadies caught it with one of those big nets on a stick you use to clean swimming pools.
Tony—who had a small walk-on part in the show—was the jumpiest when it came to the creepy-crawlies. Basically, all he had to do was put on this suit of armour and bring me a drink on stage during a break while the scenery was changed. But it took the poor bloke about half an hour to get the suit on and off, and he spent the whole time shitting himself about something being thrown at him. So one night, just to wind him up, I threw a rubber snake in his direction, and when he jumped backwards, one of the roadies dropped a piece of string down his back. Tony went mental. He had that suit of armour off in about three seconds, until he was standing there with nothing on but these grey tights. He was so freaked out I swear his voice went up by three octaves.
It brought the house down.
I’m telling you: something crazy happened on every night of that tour.
And then on January 20, 1982 we played the Veterans Auditorium in Des Moines, Iowa. I’ll never forget the name of that place, that’s for sure. Or how to pronounce it: ‘DEE-Moyn’.
The gig was going great. The God-like hand was working without any hitches. We’d already hung the midget.
Then, from out of the audience came this bat.
Obviously a toy, I thought.
So I held it up to the lights and bared my teeth while Randy played one of his solos. The crowd went mental.
Then I did what I always did when we got a rubber toy on stage.
CHOMP.
Immediately though, something felt wrong. Very wrong.
For a start, my mouth was instantly full of this warm, gloopy liquid, with the worst aftertaste you could ever imagine. I could feel it staining my teeth and running down my chin.
Then the head in my mouth twitched.
Oh, fuck me I thought. I didn’t just go and eat a fucking bat, did I?
So I spat out the head, looked over into the wings, and saw Sharon with her eyes bulging, waving her hands, screaming, ‘NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IT’S REAL, OZZY, IT’S REAL!’
Next thing I knew I was in a wheelchair, being rushed into an emergency room. Meanwhile, a doctor was saying to Sharon, ‘Yes, Miss Arden, the bat was alive. It was probably stunned from being at a rock concert, but it was definitely alive. There’s a good chance Mr Osbourne now has rabies. Symptoms? Oh, y’know, malaise, headache, fever, violent twitches, uncontrollable excitement, depression, a pathological fear of liquids…’
‘Not much chance of that,’ muttered Sharon.
‘Mania is usually one of the final symptoms. Then the patient gets very lethargic, falls into a coma, and stops breathing.’
‘Oh my God.’
‘That’s why eating a bat is generally a bad idea, from a medical standpoint.’
‘Isn’t there a vaccine?’
‘It’s usually best administered beforehand, but, yes, we can give him a shot. A few shots, actually.’
Then the doctor went to get a syringe the size of a grenade launcher.
‘OK, Mr Osbourne,’ he said. ‘You’ll need to take off your pants and bend over.’
I did as he said.
‘This might sting a bit.’
That was the last thing I heard.
Every night for the rest of the tour I had to find a doctor and get more rabies shots: one in each arse cheek,
