In 1987, at just 19 years of age, Zakk Wylde’s life changed forever. Sharon Osbourne was on the phone – he had gotten the job as Ozzy Osbourne’s next guitarist. Like the plot of every rock and roll movie, Wylde was working at a New Jersey gas station at the time, playing in a metal band called Zyris where he heard on Howard Stern that Ozzy would be auditioning unknown guitarists to replace the departed Jake E. Lee. When he finally got in front of the godfather of metal, he immediately impressed him with his instantly recognizable guitar sound and distinctive pinch harmonic technique. Wylde soon started writing and recording with Ozzy, culminating with 1988’s No Rest For The Wicked, which would change heavy metal music forever. After many highly publicized ups and downs over the years after Ozzy left Black Sabbath, including the tragic death of guitarist Randy Rhodes in 1982, Wylde would prove to be the missing spark to ignite Ozzy’s creative fire in the late 80’s and throughout the 90’s.
Quickly regarded as one of rock’s most acrobatic and toughest guitarists, Wylde would later develop his “chicken pickin” southern rock influenced style and apply it to the band’s sound on their next album -1991’s No More Tears. During the No More Tears tour, Wylde continued to feed his southern rock appetite with Lynyrd Skynhead, which would later change their name to Pride and Glory and release one highly regarded album for Geffen Records before disbanding.
Off and on with Ozzy for the next few years gave Wylde the time to pursue a full time band of his own, Black Label Society. Although the music is primarily metal, there are plenty of noticeable influences ranging from Led Zeppelin and the Allman Brothers to even Elton John. Through seven very strong albums, including 2005’s Mafia, the Dimebag Darrell tribute “In This River,” and a pounding DVD, Black Label Society is one of the true non-corporate raw acts remaining today.
Glide’s Joe Adler recently caught up with Wylde while preparing for his current tour with Black Label Society. Through some rather humorous exchanges and plenty of candid responses, they spoke at length about the loss of Wylde’s good friend Dimebag, filling in for Dickey Betts in the Allman Brothers Band, spending the years with Ozzy, and just plan old ass whoopin rock and roll.
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Hey Zakk, whats going on?
Throwing down a cold one right about now. Just getting shit done for this God damn fucking tour. That’s about it.
Excellent. So I have some questions…
This is not about my sex change operation, is it? I’m really upset because this doctor really botched this thing up. It really scared me, man, as well.
No (laughs)…let’s start with the Katrina benefit show you’re doing in Nashville.
It’s amazing. I laugh because they go, “what are you doing it for?” And I go “what do you think you dumb mother fucker. People are dying down there. Are you out of your fucking mind?” You know what I’m saying? It’s a no brainer. If we could raise some fucking God damn cash to take care of the police, National Guard and military going down there. They’re busting their balls. Somebody’s gotta pay somebody. The least Black Label could do is a stupid fucking gig show.
Did you know anybody affected by the storm?
Yeah. A batch of fucking people. Craig-O (Craig Nunemacher, drums) Louisiana Lightning. He’s from New Orleans. He’s in Kentucky right now but he’s got family down there. And then fucking Dewey, he takes care of Craig’s drums. He’s an ass kicking singer too. Dewey’s from Mississippi. And we got a whole fucking ton of brothers and sisters down in fucking New Orleans, Alabama and Mississippi. Tons of fucking buddies that got family down there. It’s fucked up.
On a similarly depressing note, with losing Dimebag [Darrell] this year you have the single “In This River” and the video, which is a memorial to him.
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Without a doubt. [The Video] is fucking awesome. It’s all about Dime. When I wrote the song, it was before the good Lord took him. And then afterwards I looked at the lyrics and I go, “This is Dime’s tune.” It will always be in the set when we do a Black Label show. The whole crowd is just fucking chanting Dime for the whole fucking ten minutes, its fucking awesome. There won’t be any Crown Royal by the time we get up there, it will all be gone, there will be beer up there.
[It’s] fucked up, we ended up meeting Officer Niggemeyer, he is actually the guy that fuckin’ shot the guy that was shooting everyone else. It was a sad thing all over, he’s a young guy, like fucking 27 or 28 years old, fucking five years on the force and he was the first one to get the call to go down there. He was like “holy shit,” he had his 12 gauge with him and just went fucking in there and there was some fucking whack job shooting the fucking place up. So he went in there and he was like “holy shit,” he was right behind the amp and was trying to reload – he had an open shot and he was holding “Kat” at the same time (Damageplan drum tech John “Kat” Brooks) and shot another guy right in the back of the fucking head and the fucking dude went off the stage and then Kat took care of Vinny. Kat had the gun and the guy blew the other guy’s head off and Kat went on the stage and kept running.
At the same time, you got to look at the other guy’s family. Can you imagine going, “look, I can’t believe my son murdered a bunch of people.” So you’re fucked up! You know what I mean? I didn’t raise my kid to fucking to do crazy shit like that, you know what I’m saying? People are saying, “yeah the cop that killed him fucked that mother fucker-up.” Yeah, but you know what that dude was somebody else’s son though. I got three kids and if my fucking kid did something like that, I would go, “where did I go wrong?” I didn’t raise my kid to do something like that. So that family has to deal with it and Dime’s family. No one is winning out on this one.
And everybody that Dime touched…
Without a doubt, he was the goofiest, funniest, fucking.. sweetest, he was all about hugs and kisses.
How did you get to know Dime?
I probably met Dime in ‘93 when we were doing Donnington over in York. It was Aerosmith, Extreme, and then Pantera. And then we opened the show and there were 65,000 fuckin’ people. And Dime was like “hey Zakk, what’s going on?” And I heard his playing, and he knew me from Ozzy, we knew each other but hadn’t met. Ever since then we were always shooting the shit on the phone and just solving the problems of the world, you know? Whenever me and him would hang out, you had better pack a fucking spare liver and a fucking pancreas or kidney. Oh God, we got fucking blitzkrieged all the fucking time. Obviously, it was just pure bedlam all the time, just having pure fun.
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Moving on…
We’re not going to the sex change operation are we? (laughs) I should tell my wife, “you call this a labia, how come mine looks different than yours?” (laughs)
(laughs) Moving on to touring…So this is the fourth year you’ve done Ozzfest right?
I think we’ve done it more than that. It’s the tenth year but we started playing 98’ or ’99.. something like that. Every time we do it, I always have a fucking great time.
How do you think it’ll go next year without Ozzy playing?
Well I told Ozz, “Ozz, now it’s just a festival. It doesn’t matter whether you are there. People know that they are going to see the best bands in all of rock.” Put it this way. The Daytona 500. If Dale Earnhardt isn’t there anymore, God bless his soul, the race is still going to go on because it’s a great time.
It would be great to see Ozzy out there again.
Without a doubt. Like I told Ozz, “if you want to take a year off, at this juncture, forget James Brown, you’re the hardest working guy in show biz.” If anyone deserves to fucking take a rest, it’s him. What the fuck more does he got to do, start juggling chainsaws?
That MTV show must have taken a lot out of him?
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When the show started he was like, “we’ll probably do two or three shows and then they’ll can this shit because it’s going to suck.” Next thing I know it started a whole fucking trend of all these other shows. These reality fucking shows…The Surreal Life, this and that. Ozzy was like,” you got to be fucking kidding me.” I remember going over to the house and he’s like “ I can’t go into the music room, I can’t go into the bedroom. He goes, “Zakk, I got to get away from this fuckin’ shit.” There are just people in your house 24-7! It’s not even your house, it’s a movie set.
So does Ozzy have a studio in his house or just a music room?
Yeah he has a studio and a music room – it’s like mine. A room with guitars and all my shit where nobody can bother me. Like I told Ozz, “look at this way bro, next year you’ll come out and play some select dates.” He wants to do New York, Chi-town, Seattle, Dallas. I’m like, “if you want to take a break, take a fucking break. Nobody is putting a gun to your head to do this shit.” I go “people are still going to show up at Ozzfest because it’s a cool festival, it’s an event, not a concert. If me and you were 16 years old, Led Zeppelin was going to be there, Black Sabbath, Jethro Tull, Elton John, Neil Young, The Eagles, Skynyrd would be playing, we’d be hanging out all day seeing the bands we want to see. Just because Led Zeppelin isn’t playing at the Zep Fest, it’s the Zep Fest.” But bottom line is who is headlining this year – Black Sabbath. It’s like the carnival that come around – you know we’re going to have a blast.
Have you been doing anything with Ozzy lately?
We did that football game. The fucking Raiders and the fucking Patriots. [Ozzy Osborne took part in pre-game festivities for opening night of the NFL with acts Green Day and Santana at Gillette Field]
How was that?
Fucking hysterical. I laughed my fucking balls off before we did it. But anyway, right before the fucking helmet opened up, me and Ozzy looked at each other like “here we go again.” Fucking hysterical. We knocked that out and right after we got done with the game we flew back home. I got to get ready for this fucking tour. It never ends…I got rehearsals coming up.
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Is the band rehearsing at your home or are they spread all over the place?
The band is all over the fucking place. Jamie (James Lomenzo) just came out here, he plays bass. All the rest of the guys are spread out – Boston, L.A., New Orleans, Kentucky, Mississippi, Seattle. Everybody is all over the fucking place. Then we get back together – back at the “Hall of Justice.”
When are you going to start rehearsals?
Hmm. I think the third. You know start going through the fucking thing and start getting drunk and fucked up again.
What do you have planned for the tour?
We’re just bouncing stuff around- I’m going to bring the piano out on this one, it’s going to be cool. You know, pure fucking Black Label, fucking brutal fucking painting fucking insanity – painting all the chaos all the time. Don’t even bother fighting it, just roll with it, it’s like water. You know what I’m saying? If water is going downstream, where is Joe and Zakk going? They are going down. They don’t go against the water, they go with it.
Any place you’re looking forward to hitting on the upcoming tour?
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Well obviously, we have McSorley’s we want to hit in New York. We’re doing the fucking Nokia theater or whatever the fuck it is. Yeah, if I can live anywhere in the world it would be there, but I tell my wife we can’t be fucking raising children in New York City, it’s not going to happen. It’s like “where did Zakk and Joe go?” “They went down to McSorleys.” The oldest pub in fucking Manhattan. Next time you go to Manhattan you got to fucking hit McSorleys. It’s an Irish pub that’s been around since the Civil War. They have not changed anything in the fucking pub since then. So they got cheese plates and liverwurst and the beers- they’ll bring you like twenty fucking beers in the mugs. So you go like, “I’ll have twenty of those and twenty of those.” That is the fucking pub!
So how would you perceive your latest album, Mafia, compared to your first album with Black Label Society?
It’s just a different thing. Obviously every fucking album you make you want to make it better than the last one you did. If you can bench 500 pounds, the next time you go to the gym you want to bench 501 or five and a quarter. It’s the same thing – the bottom line is if you’re a sprinter and you do a hundred-yard dash in 9.8 seconds, you want to do 9.7 if you want to break your fucking record.
With music, it’s not sports. As far as I’m concerned it’s like “what’s your favorite Zeppelin record, ”you know I mean? Led Zeppelin IV sold the most because of “Stairway” and everything like that and it’s probably their best-produced album that they ever did and Physical Graffiti kicks ass too. You know what I’m saying? Look at the Zeppelin catalog, Sabbath, all your favorite bands, it’s just like a snapshot of time, like a high school year book, like a photo. It’s like what’s your favorite year of high school? Was it your freshman year or your senior year? For me, it was my senior year cause I knew I was getting the fuck out of there. It was like a fucking jail sentence.
Well every year, you have your high points and low points.
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Without a doubt, I look back on all these records and even Ozzy says he looks back at all these records and what he says is, “from what I remember from all these records Zakk, and I don’t care which one sold the most.” He goes, “I just remember whether I had a good time making those records or if I had a fucking miserable time.” And he goes “if I had a miserable time I’ll never play that record.”
Like The Ultimate Sin album, he never plays it. He hates it because he had a miserable time making it. When he made Diary of a Madman and Blizzard of Ozz he just had fun. It was so brand new and it was fun. He said it was like dating a girl for the first time, it was magical, it was awesome, we had so much fun making those records. ‘Cause nobody gave a fuck, because as far as everybody was concerned, “I was finished and washed up and nobody gave a fuck.” So we were like, ‘we don’t give a fuck here, lets get wasted and make some tunes.” So Ozzy was like, “ Zakk, I don’t remember making half the shit.” He was like “because we were having so much fun and fucked up that it was one gigantic party.” But we loved hanging out together and having a good time. Opposed to having a day job where you are fucking miserable. So its like “Joe what the hell are you doing this for? If you’re that fucking miserable than don’t fucking do it.” Put it this way, if you’re a boxer, it’s like you getting back into the ring just because you need dough. But you’re like “Zakk, I hate waking up in the morning, running fucking eight/ten miles. I hate sparring now.” And I’m like “ why you fucking doing it? I’m the corner guy, I’ll be here for you, but if you don’t want to do it, don’t do it. If you hate it, then promote the fights.”
What tracks on Mafia are you most proud of?
Ahhh, “Fire It Up,” “Suicide Messiah” came out great and obviously “In This River” and fucking “Dirt on the Grave” came out good too. When I end up writing all the songs, I just go down to the studio that day and write. I don’t do like a Def Leppard record where they actually work on an album for like nine months. I don’t write like sixty songs and then we pick twelve. I think it’s easy to pick out what’s good and what sucks and what’s ok. I don’t need anybody else in there telling me what’s good and bad. That’s why the Zeppelin albums are so great, you just let the band be the band. Like a great basketball coach, like Phil Jackson. When you have Michael Jordan and all these fucking guys like Shaquille O’Neil – just let these guys play. I think at this juncture they know what the fuck they are doing, they aren’t fucking three-year olds. You got a bunch of grown men who know what they are doing, just let them fucking play. I mean actually telling the drummer how to play? “Can you hit this cymbal here?” Are you out of your fucking mind, does it matter at this fucking point. I mean you’re going to tell John Bonham what to fucking play? Ohhh God!! I go, “dude forget about taking a drum stick and throwing it sideways up your ass, I’m going to take a kick drum and shove it up your ass backwards.” Telling John Bonham what the fuck to play? Let Led Zeppelin be Led Zeppelin and everybody else just stay out of the fucking way, before anyone gets hurt.
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Yeah, too many producers just ruin too many good bands?
Well, I mean how hard is it to produce like Chris Cornell? Just let Chris sing. To prove God exists, just listen to his voice. I mean how hard would it be for me or you to produce an Audioslave record? Let Tom [Morello] play and let the guy fucking do it and all me or you has to do is press record and we got a new Audioslave record. Do me or you have to sit there and tell Chris he’s sharp or flat? Chris will be the first one to go,”that sucks, let me do it one more time.” Am I right or wrong?
You’re dead on
I don’t need anybody telling me if I’m playing sharp or flat. It’s like “that fucking sucks Joe, do it one more time bro.” You go “Zakk, just keep that Keith Richards shit going.” And I go “you like it that way, well you’re the fucking ears, you like it that way?” And you go ”Zakk, it’s fucking fine, don’t worry about.” You know what I mean? That’s all you need to be a producer.
How did the classical sounding intro come about in “In This River?”
Well, I was just dicking around on playing the piano. Actually that is a mini Moog. Like Zeppelin and Sabbath used to use that shit. But it’s an original Moog because we have all these instruments and we just have fun with it. It’s the same shit that Zeppelin used. The cool thing about those bands back in the day, was they’d get an instrument and be like “ let’s see how we can fit this in.”
Lets talk about Pride & Glory, that didn’t last long?
Yeah, we ran out of beer funds. You can’t have a rock band without beer funds.
You guys did some touring with that right?
Yeah, we had some fun. It was like The Allman Brothers on fucking steroids. We would take a four-minute song and make it thirty minutes, it was like an all out jam. We just starting fucking jamming and that’s what it turned into. Then it was Pride & Glory and we got the record deal with Geffen and it was just a full out fucking assault of jamming.
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Where did the Southern rock influence come from?
Dude, I’m from fucking Jersey, I’m not from the fucking south. There was a running joke with me – “yeah I’m from the south man, south Jersey.” (laughs) Yeah I was born in Jersey City and grew up down near Asbury Park and shit like that. I love Springsteen now, but being a kid I was into Sabbath. I couldn’t stand Springsteen back then, you know what I mean? Being in Jersey you got to love Springsteen, Southside Johnny and all that shit. My buddy Scott, next door neighbor, they had eleven kids – six boys and five girls. How fucking insane is that? They used to have the most insane parties. I always used to hear The Eagles cranking, you know Hotel California, you know Skynyrd, Allman Brothers and The Grateful Dead too. I like the Grateful Dead, I always thought they had an ass kicking band name. I always thought it was going to be as heavy as Sabbath. Grateful Dead. And I’m like this is a folk band – it’s a folk country band. The Grateful Dead what a following they had and they had killer merchandise with the skulls and the roses. It’s like Guns N Roses on steroids. So Gregg Allman, I love Gregs’s voice. My favorite singers are fucking Ozzy, Gregg Allman, Ronnie Van Zandt, Ray Charles – those are my guys. I love Axl [Rose] too, he’s fucking awesome – I like the modern guys.
So you played with the Allman Brothers, while filling in for Dickey Betts and you played one show right?
Yeah I did the one show and I’m sitting right next to him (Gregg Allman) and he’s singing “Melissa” it was fucking awesome dude. We opened up with “Statesboro Blues.” Actually I got that fucking thing on film, it’s fucking awesome. It sounded like Frank Marino playing with the Allman Brothers. The Mahogany Rush live CD. It’s hysterical, all the Allman Brothers kids that were there, like “oh, Zakk Wylde from Ozzy Osbourne.” But I was like “yeah but this is the fucking Allman Brothers.” But they were like, “fuck the Allman Brothers, you play with Ozzy.” The weirdest thing with the southern rock bands is they all hate each other. The Allman Brothers can’t stand Lynyrd Skynyrd, Skynyrd fucking hates Molly Hatchet. Hates them! I remember Ed King ( Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist) saying, “ that was the downfall of Southern rock.” I go “what the fuck did Molly Hatchet do?” I remember when we were kids they were more rock and roll than all of them. It was heavier. Dude they had great songs, killer guitar playing and all that. I remember Ed King goes, “ah they fucking ruined it for everybody.” But they all hate each other. Hate each other! And you figure it’s a small little community and they are all like “fuck him, fuck Joe, fuck Zakk.” They don’t get along at all, I was completely blown away. So we were doing “Dreams” and I told Gregg, “oh that Molly Hatchet song,” and he goes, “you keep talking like that and we’re going to have to fucking send you home.” (laughs). You know I was just being a dick and I knew Gregg wrote it, but everybody was laughing their fucking balls off though and the band and the crew. They were like “holy shit, he’s mentioning the Molly Hatchet word around here,” and the Allmans started the whole thing, what in ’69 or ’68. They were the first ones, you had them, and then you had Skynyrd, Marshall Tucker, and all the shit. The Outlaws and everything.
So besides Southern rock, what other music are you into?
Elton John. Elton is the first one and obviously Sabbath and then the Allmans and Skynyrd, anything that’s good. I listen to fucking Coldplay, that album is fucking ass kicking, Travis, you know anything that’s good man. Radiohead, fucking when it comes to the heavy shit.. Ministry, when it’s good, it’s good.
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So you have your own Les Paul coming out?
Yeah the bullseye and all that shit, I got a buzzsaw one.
That must be a big honor?
Yeah without a doubt, me and Slash are the only ones that have a Marshall right next to Jim Marshall’s name. Without a doubt it’s fucking humbling.
Can you talk a little about your own style – the pinch harmonic style and what influenced you?
You know you can’t choose your own style, you get it from different things…Eddie Van Halen, Randy Rhodes, Tony Lommi. No matter how much I try and sing like Gregg Allman or Ronnie Van Zandt or Ozzy or Ray Charles, you end up sounding like yourself anyways. I mean you can probably do a Rich Little and do a real good impersonation of Ray Charles, but when you do your own thing, you’re going to sound like you. So, did like Eddie Van Halen or Randy Rhodes pick up the guitar one day and sound exactly how Randy Rhodes sounds? No, it took years man, you know what I’m saying? Gregg Allman obviously got it from Ray and a lot of blues artists imitated him and then he got his own thing, that’s just the way it goes. Gregg Allman didn’t just wake up one day and it sounded exactly like that. Looking at that picture of Arnold Schwarzenegger and he was Mr. Olympia in ’74 and he didn’t end up with that body in three weeks, it took fucking years. You know what I’m saying?
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I remember as a kid when your first albums came out with Ozzy, it’s real distinctive.
Yeah, like David Gilmour, he’s not as fast as Yngwie [Malmsteen] but the minute you hear Yngwie you know it’s him. The thing with great musicians, you don’t hear them, you feel them. Like Yngwie, and like David Gilmour comes on and plays “Comfortably Numb,” it’s just mind blowing. When I listen to Coldplay, I get chills when I hear that one song, it’s good shit you know what I mean?
I read an interview that your dad was an influence for Black Label Society. How did his influence affect you?
His work ethic was out of control. He’s eighty five years old, a World War II vet, he’s got a heart of gold, that’s where that comes from. The thing with the Black Label Society is they can pound on us but we’ll still get right back up. Because anybody can get knocked down, but it takes a set of balls to get the fuck back up though.
