Ozzy Osbourne Quotes (1948-2025)

“I wonder where that bat is now? Maybe he's sitting in Bat Heaven somewhere, with his own bat roadies...”

“My problem is that by the time I understood a little bit about life, I was well on the way to fucking burnout.”

“Howling in the shadows,
living in a lunar spell,
he finds his heaven,
spewing from the mouth of hell.”

“[on Kelly's drummer friend] Anyone that beats fucking skins for a living has got to be somewhat weird.”

“[while lighting a fire on the beach] Fuck! Go to Alaska! No, no, no, no. You fucking asshole ocean! No!”

“Well, its not that bad. I thought she was going to show me a picture of uhhhh...an eagle on her ass or something.”

“Weather in Afghanistan, 2000 degrees and cloudy. What the fuck am I doing? I'm stuck on the weather channel. AHHH!”

“I'm just a Rock and Roll Rebel,
I tell you no lies,
they say I worship the devil,
they must be stupid or blind”

“Dreams that men can be good,
Faith to live as we should and know we're all connected,
We give ourselves the power”

“There is something fucking unbelievable about seeing all of the fans go crazy and chanting 'Ozzy!' I would pay to see them..”

“We all must stand together now
A one by one we fall
For all these years you stood by me
God bless
I love you all”

“There Are No Unachievable Goals
There Are No Unsaveable Souls
No Legitimate Kings Or Queens,
Do You Know What I Mean?”

“[hugging Sharon] Merry xmas....now fuck off.”

“You've got to believe in yourself
Or no one will believe in you
Imagination like a bird on the wing
Flying free for you to use”

“Let me explain something to you - you have not been standing in front of thirty thousand decibals for thirty-five years - write me a note!”

“If only we could all just find serenity
It would be nice if we could live as one
When will all this anger, hate and bigotry...
Be gone?”

“When we did that album (Vol. 4) it was like one big Roman orgy-we'd be in the Jacuzzi all day doing coke, and every now and then we'd get up to do a song.”

“People look to me and say
Is the end near, when is the final day?
What's the future of mankind?
How do I know, I got left behind”

“If none of us believe in war
Then can you tell me what the weapon's for?
Listen to me everyone
If the button is pushed there'll be nowhere to run”

“I'm not going to get up there and do a half-hearted Ozzy looking for sympathy. What's the fucking point in that? I'm not going up there in a fucking wheelchair.”

“I know what's going to be on my tombstone, and there's no getting around it: "Here lies Ozzy Osbourne, the ex–Black Sabbath singer who bit the head off a bat."”

“Too many religions for only one god
I don't need another saviour
Don't try to change my mind
You know I'm one of a kind
Ain't gonna change my bad behaviour”

“I kept hearing that metal is dead and Ozzy's dead and people that like Ozzy are dead. I have never had an empty seat. I've always sold out, so who's saying it's all over?”

“[To Kelly, after he's become suspicious] You haven't been playing doctors and nurses have you?”

“I warned you then and I'm warning you now
If you mess with me you're playing with fire
Winds of change that are fanning the flames
Will carry you to your funeral pyre”

“People ask me, "Do you regret anything?" Sure, I have fucking regrets. But if I didn't have my life the way it's been or the way it's gonna be, I'd be fucking with the big guy in the sky.”

“I've had this TV for 7 years, this is how it works. Power on - it comes on. Simple clicker, volume control - piece of piss. Works every time.... what the fuck's this? What am I doing? JACK!!”

“I've been the king, I've been the clown,
now broken wings can't hold me down,
I'm free again.
The jester with the broken crown,
it won't be me this time around
to love in vain.”

“If you want to be fucking individual, don't get a tattoo. Every fucker's got one these days. https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/celebritynews/8631054/A-tattoo-doesnt-make-you-cool.html”

“If we're offensive and pose a threat
You fear what we represent is a mess
You've missed the message that says it all
And you'll never know why
Oh no, you'll never know why
We rock”

“Tell me I'm a sinner I got news for you
I spoke to God this morning and He don't like you
You telling all the people the original sin
He says He knows you better that you'll ever know Him”

“When I was a practicing alcoholic, I was unbelievable. One side effect was immense suspicion: I'd come off tour like Inspector Clouseau on acid. 'Where's this cornflake come from? It wasn't here before.'”

“War is just another game
Tailor made for the insane
But make a threat of their annihilation
And nobody wants to play
If that's the only thing that keeps the peace
Then thank God for the bomb”

“I grew up in Aston, a neighborhood in Birmingham, right at the poverty line. I always felt shitty and intimidated by everyone. So my whole thing was to act crazy and make people laugh so they wouldn't jump on me.”

“A Devil with a crucifix
Brimstone and fire
He needs another carnal fix
To take him higher and higher
Now Jimmy, he got busted
With his pants down
Repent ye wretched sinner
Self righteous clown”

“Nobody ever told me,
I found out for myself,
You gotta believe in foolish miracles,
it's not how you play the game,
it's if you win or lose,
you can choose, don't confuse
Win or lose, it's up to you.”

“Back in the day, it was, "If you're going to San Francisco, be sure to wear some flowers in your hair." Where in the fuck was San Francisco? And the only flowers we ever saw in Aston were on a coffin going to a cemetery.”

“I've had every known chemical--cocaine, booze--and tobacco is the hardest one in the world for me to quit. You watch old flicks? It's suggestion by looking at something: You see a cigarette, and it makes you want to smoke!”

“I've been dictating to my son, who's helping me on his computer. I'm spending a lot of time doing research--I've just got up to 1971, when I went crazy and dived through the window. My life is so full of interesting stories...”

“I've listened to preachers,
I've listened to fools
I've watched all the dropouts
Who make their own rules
We're pushed and conditioned to rule and control
The media sells it and you live the role”

“The idea of a band nowadays is 5 pretty boys, one with a tattoo, one with a shaved head, and on and on. What the fuck is that? I mean, I like Britney Spears, I think she's pretty, but I'm not from the Mickey Mouse Club-I'm from the Godzilla Club!”

“Ozzy Osbourne: My son, Jack Osbourne, gets pissed off sometimes. He said to me one day, “Dad, the difference is whether people are laughing with you or at you.” I said, “As long as they’re laughing, it doesn’t matter.””

“Bubbles! Oh come on Sharon! I'm fucking Ozzy Osbourne, the Prince of fucking Darkness. Evil! Evil! What's fucking evil about a buttload of fucking bubbles!?http://www.mirror.co.uk/3am/celebrity-news/ozzy-osbourne-maddest-moments-10-1837387”

“When you're young, you're stupid. You do silly things. I did it (the O-Z-Z-Y tattoo across his knuckles) when I was 14. I was in jail for something. I could have had it removed, but why? It's my trademark. People stop me and say, 'Let me have a look at your hand.'”

“When I heard "She Loves You," my world went up like a shooting star. It was a divine experience. The planets changed. I used to fantasize that Paul McCartney would marry my sister. Sorry, folks, it's John, Paul, George, and Ringo, not Paul, John, George, and Ringo.”

“I had a vision, l saw the world burn
And the seas had turned red
The sun had fallen, the final curtain
In the land of the dead
Mother, please show the children
Before it's too late
To fight each other, there's no one winning
We must fight all the hate”

“They live a life of fear and insecurity
And all you do is pay for their prosperity
The ministry of fear that won't let you live
The ministry of grace that doesn't forgive
Do what you will to try and make me conform
I'll make you wish that you had never been born”

“...as you'll know, the word 'fuck' sort of is used quite a lot in my house. Now, that's not to say, I think to say 'fuck this' or 'fuck you' a lot more, so it should be entered into the English language, because it has a lot more impact when you say, 'I fucking hate this thing.'”

“It took a lot of water to down just that fucking bat's head, let me tell you. It's still stuck in my fucking throat, after all these years. People all over the world say, 'You're the guy who kills creatures? You still do it? You do it every night?' It happened fucking once, for Christ's sake.”

“And they don't really know even what they're talkin' about
And I can't image what empty heads can achieve
Leave me alone, don't want your promises no more
'Cos rock & roll is my religion and my law
Won't ever change, may think it's strange
You can't kill rock & roll, it's here to stay”

“All that stuff about heavy metal and hard rock, I don't subscribe to any of that. It's all just music. I mean, the heavy metal from the Seventies sounds nothing like the stuff from the Eighties, and that sounds nothing like the stuff from the Nineties. Who's to say what is and isn't a certain type of music?”

“Taught by the powers that preach over me
I can hear their empty reasons
I wouldn't listen, I learned how to fight
I opened up my mind to treason
But just like the wounded, and when it's too late
They'll remember, they'll surrender
Never a care for the people who hate
Underestimate me now”

“I can honestly say, all the bad things that ever happened to me were directly, directly attributed to drugs and alcohol. I mean, I would never piss on a piece of stone at the fucking Alamo at nine o'clock in the morning dressed in a woman's evening dress sober. I mean I know I'm a fucking crazy-ass but still.”

“The downside of being outrageous is that you have to go around explaining your fucking self to people. If you're too cocky, somebody might just pull out a fucking gun and cock it and blow your fucking face off. You gotta be really careful what you bite off. Don't bite off more than you can chew. It's a dangerous world.”

“It's a new day
For the faceless,
Take the torches
From the useless,
First amendment,
Second guesses,
All dependent,
I'll do anything to help you

Fallen crosses,
New alliance,
Deeper thinkers,
Modern science,
Open guest list,
All inclusive,
No one loses,
Everything you've always wanted”

“I miss the lack of melody [in current music] as well. I mean, a lot of people think I'm crazy for liking Creed and I like them purely because they sing! I mean, the singer of Creed sings like the guy from Pearl Jam, very close kind of voice. But I like the fact that Creed sing. I don't care if they're a Bible band, Satan band...”

“[after one of his dogs urinated in the bedroom] Who pissed!!? Who pissed on my fucking carpet!?! That bastard fucking dog man. I'm going to throw you in the pool! Get the fuck out of my house! Why do they do it Sharon? Whats the deal man? It's a fucking terrorist man! It's fucking part of Bin Laden's gang! Fucking Ali Baba used to go work on this rug.”

“...the other day, I went to a chiropractor. He's just a regular chiropractor. Whenever I meet someone who doesn't know me, they say, 'Oh you're the guy who bites the heads off everything.' I get kind of cheesed off with it, but at least they remember. The thing that pisses me off is that that's not what I'm about. If that's what you think Ozzy Osbourne's about, then you're way off.”

“Sharon's father was a gangster manager, so she's a great businesswoman. I remember saying to her once, "What's always amazed me is that you've been in the music business most of your life, but when you sing, you sound like a fucking dying wildebeest." She said, "What's always amazed me is how you've been in the music business most of your life and you don't know the ass end of a contract."”

“Somebody said to me this morning, 'To what do you attribute your longevity?' I don't know. I mean, I couldn't have planned my life out better. By all accounts I should be dead! The abuse I put my body through: the drugs, the alcohol, the lifestyle I've lived the last 30 years! Now, some rare fly will fly over me, crap on my shoulder, and I'll drop dead, you know? My life story is a real-life story.”

“I'm about caring, I'm about people, and I'm about entertaining people. I'm a family man. A husband. A father. I've been a lot of other things over the years, which we don't really want to talk about. I'm always working on trying to better myself, you know? I think that that is an ongoing thing with me. I think I'll do that for the rest of my life. I'm always thinking of what I can do today to better my life.”

“Dimebag was a dear friend of mine, I'm absolutely beside myself with grief. I can't for the life of me understand why someone would do this. Pantera toured with me many, many times. I'll always remember the signed guitar that he gave me at my 50th birthday party. My heart goes out to Dime's family, his fans and the other innocent victims who were killed in this senseless tragedy. It's just terribly, terribly sad.”

“David Fricke: Given your own history of substance abuse, what have you said to your children about drugs and alcohol?
Ozzy Osbourne: I don’t have to have discussions. They’ve seen me come home in police vans, and not come home at all. Which I’m not proud of. I’m the most dysfunctional kid in the family.”

“I have a message for anyone coming to the Ozzfest this summer (Summer, 2000): If you're planning to jump up onstage during my set, please do not give me any bear hugs, because they fucking hurt. Listen to me, I'm dead serious. On the first night of last year's tour, this enormous guy jumped up onstage and gave me a huge bear hug. He crushed 3 of my ribs and I had to do the whole tour in absolute agony. I couldn't believe it, the first fucking show!”

“Survival is my legacy … I mean, I'm 73. People go, "Well, you're 70… why don't I throw the towel in?" … Why should I? People still want to buy my records. People still want to see me, so why should I? It motivates me to get off my backside and do something. I mean, if my career had gone down the toilet and I knew it was the end, I'd be pretty miserable. … Never give up. If you've got a passion for something, you've got to find a way around it to carry on the passion.”

“I never did this black-magic stuff. The reason I did “Mr.Crowley” on my first solo album Blizzard of Ozz, 1980 was that everybody was talking about Aleister Crowley. Jimmy Page bought his house, and one of my roadies worked with one of his roadies. I thought, “Mr. Crowley, who are you? Where are you from?” But people would hear the song and go, “He’s definitely into witchcraft.””

“Here's the thing. I always hear that whole 'metal is dead' crap. The truth of the matter is that when we started the Ozzfest, media-wise, yes, metal was dead. But as far as the kids went, it was still huge. It was just that radio and MTV decided it wasn't in vogue with what they wanted to do at the time, so the average person didn't hear too much about it. That's why when it comes to picking the new acts each summer, we have people out there on the internet and in the clubs looking for good music and finding bands that people are excited about. I want to know what the kids are into, because I don't trust the industry.”

“I don't consider myself a great singer--but I have a connection with the audience. There's the artist, and then a void and the audience; but I like to be part of the audience. I'd like to be them, and I'd like them to be me for an hour and a half. I get criticized for being the antichrist, causing kids to commit suicide, but that's total bullsh-t. My intentions are not that. Every year they have Halloween, and all I do is take Halloween night out on the road every night. It's like a Halloween party every night. If that was the case on Halloween night, the police cells would be full--everyone would have turned Satanic for the night!”

“The biggest thing has been realizing how much people really do love the early Sabbath music. People have said it in the past but I've never really believed them before. I remember years ago when Metallica opened up for me, I went backstage and they were playing old Black Sabbath albums and I thought they were taking the piss! They said, 'No, we really love Sabbath.' I couldn't see that at the time--because towards the end of my time with Sabbath 20 years ago I thought what we were doing was boring and stupid, because we were boring and stupid, totally sick of what we were doing and totally out of our brains with drink or drugs when we were playing it.”

“My assistant showed me a video called Forks and Knives (sic) or something, about (cutting out) meat and dairy products, so I thought, 'I'll give this a shot!' ... I feel OK actually, I feel better about myself, you know? I go on binges... That's the reason why I decided to cut out meat out and dairy because I've limited what I can have because when you're on the road and you're travelling, you grab buns and... burgers are everywhere... so now I've just narrowed the margin. ... I'm not saying I'm gonna do it forever; I might go back - when my wife learns to cook, so that'll be never!”

“I have a saying. 'Never judge a book by its cover'. I say that because I don't even know who Ozzy is. I wake up a new person every day. But if you've got a fantasy of Ozzy, who am I to say? I mean, if you think I sleep upside-down in the rafters and fly around at night and bite people's throats out, then that's your thing. But I can tell you now, all I ever wanted was for people to come to my concerts and have a good time. I don't want anyone to harm themselves in any way, shape or form-and my intentions are good whether people want to believe it or not. I'm not going to suddenly become a Jesus freak or anything. But I do have my beliefs and my beliefs are certainly not satanic.”

“David Fricke: You were arrested in 1989 for trying to kill her in a drunken rage.
Ozzy Osbourne: It has not always been bliss. But when I was doing the Queen’s Jubilee, there wasn’t one rock star there, not one, with a wife who was the same age. They were all 12 or 32 or whatever. I know to get a young piece of skirt is one thing. But what the fuck do you talk about? “Oh, that was bad news about India and Pakistan.” And it’s so common. I wouldn’t trade my Sharon for anything.”

“I tried out that Buckethead guy. I met with him and asked him to work with me but only if he got rid of the fucking bucket. So I came back a bit later and he's wearing this green fucking Martian's-hat thing. I said, 'Look, just be yourself!' He told me his name was Brian, so I said that's what I'd call him. He says, 'No one calls me Brian except my mother.' So I said, 'Pretend I'm your mum then!' I haven't even got out of the room and I'm already playing fucking mind games with the guy. What happens if one day he's gone and there's a note saying, 'I've been beamed up?' [Laughs] Don't get me wrong, he's a great player. He plays like a motherfucker!”

“We rehearsed at a community center near Tony Iommi’s house, across the road from a movie theater. One morning, Tony says to us, “It’s interesting. I was looking over at the theater.” It was showing something like The Vampire Returns. “Don’t you think it’s weird that people pay money to be scared? Maybe we should write scary music.” That's when we came up with “Black Sabbath” [hums the guitar riff]. That was the fucking change of my life.”

“There's not a stupidest thing--I've dressed in women's clothes, I've dressed as a Nazi. I've gone onstage naked. I've gone on so drunk I didn't even know I did a show. I've done so many stupid things, but it's all part of Ozzy. I never pre-planned 99.9% of the things I've done. Some were drastically wrong, some were drastically right. I don't know if you saw the VH1 thing [VH1's Behind The Music Ozzy documentary] recently. In one hour, it's impossible to write my life down. I come from a rather large family, three older sisters and two younger brothers. On the documentary, they interviewed my sister and it was the first time I'd seen her in years. I've had a very, very unique life. I often sit back and remember when I had no money--when you're in the middle of it, you get depressed thinking it's going to last forever. All of a sudden, out of nowhere--a bolt of lightning--here I am! I'm very well-off; I've got property all over the place, I've had a very fruitful career. But I've never had a No.1 album in America. But I've lasted several generations and somebody says to me, "Do you notice any difference in the audience?" I've been doing it now for 30 years. Some of the fans are older, but I've picked up new fans along the way.”

“Ozzy Osbourne: My home was very poor. My father worked nights as a toolmaker. He was the English Archie Bunker; he wouldn't change with the times. He would never buy my mom a washing machine. We had a boiler house in the garden — you'd put a fire under this copper boiler, where you would boil the clothes to death. I used to sleep in a bed with one of my brothers. We had no sheets. We had to use old coats.
When I was a young kid, my father would take me on Sunday mornings with my Uncle Jim to the pub, the Golden Cross. Since I wasn't allowed in, I'd sit on the step, and they'd bring me a shandy, which is half lemonade, half beer. I remember thinking, “Beer must be the best lemonade in the world. I can’t wait until the age when I can drink it.” When I had my first beer, I spat it out: “That can’t be the fucking stuff. It’s like dishwater.” But then I got the glow. I didn't drink for the taste — I did it for the feeling.”

“David Fricke: You've been married to Sharon for 20 years. What was it that first attracted you to her?
Ozzy Osbourne: Her laugh. She has the best laugh. She was so infectious, the way she laughed and cursed. I fancied her from a distance for quite a while. We’d pass in hotels, airports. Her father, Don Arden, managed Black Sabbath, and she worked in the office.
Then I got fired from Black Sabbath. I went to a hotel in L.A., locked myself in this room, ordered cases of beer and had a dealer bring me coke every day. I thought, “I’m on my last fling. I’m going to get well fucked up for a few months, then go home and call it a day.” My idea was to open a bar — which is a brilliant idea for an alcoholic.
One day, there is a knock at the door. Someone in the band’s organization had given me an envelope of cash I was supposed to give to Sharon. I blew it on coke. So she came ’round to tear me off a stripe. She comes in — I think she felt sorry for me. She goes, “If you straighten your act up, I want to manage you.”
Everybody up to that point was going, “You dummy, you idiot, you can’t do fuck-all.” All my life, I used to be called a dummy. She was the one who didn’t. She encouraged me. She got my ass in gear. We’re the greatest team on earth.”