BLACK SABBATH's BILL WARD Remembers His Friend COZY POWELL: He 'Was An Angel'

During BLACK SABBATH drummer Bill Ward's April show on LA Radio Sessions, he played RAINBOW's "Stargazer" which featured Cozy Powell on drums. After the show, Bill discussed knowing Powell as a fellow drummer and a friend. He said  (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "Well, Cozy Powell was somebody that I first met when we were still kids. Great drummer. Tight. Well, first of all, I was attracted to his personality. He was a nice man — very nice man. My last phone call with Cozy, actually, was about two weeks before he passed away. And I am so glad that I was able to talk to Cozy on really meaningful meaningful topics and [we had a] heartfelt conversation. I hadn't spoken to him for a while, and then, of course, two weeks later, he passed away, which was heartbreaking, of course. But when we first met, when we were still quite young, I liked his already well-defined historic… I could tell where he'd learnt [how to play]. I come from a jazz background, so [Gene] Krupa was my guy. Everybody says it was somebody else, but actually it was Krupa. But that's okay, what everybody else wants to say; they can say whatever they wanna say. But Cozy was well defined. His chops were — I think his chops were from [the BUDDY RICH] BIG BAND and were maybe from Rich. It fitted in so well. It fitted really well into rock. It's almost like his body and the way that he played was designed for that era. And he had the chops and the licks that fitted into that."

Bill continued: "He had a lot of hit records by himself as a single artist, and I don't know if you know that — where he would do a drum solo, and that would be the record, and they got into the charts. He was always available, always listening. I think he was a drummer's drummer."

Reflecting on Powell's passing nearly three decades ago at the age of 50, Ward added: "It's so sad — very sad — now when I'm thinking about it. For me, I'm gonna be 78 in two months, so for me, at 78 years old, when I go back and digress and go back into the unbelievable amount of people that I've met, known and grew up with, and we all went through the same things, it's an incredible journey, but there's also a price to pay for the regrets that could have happened. And just the memories alone are often sad as well as brilliant opportunities. It's a mixed bag.

"So, yeah, Cozy was an angel," Bill concluded. "That's what Cozy Powell was."

This episode of LA Radio Sessions premieres on Saturday, April 18 at noon (Pacific Time),with "encores" on Monday, April 20 at 4 p.m., Saturday, April 25 at noon and Monday, April 27 at 4 p.m., exclusively on 99.1FM KLBP in Long Beach or worldwide at KLBP.org.

Powell died on April 5, 1998 following a car crash while driving his Saab 9000 at 104 mph (167 kmh) in bad weather on the M4 motorway near Bristol, England. According to a BBC report, Powell's blood-alcohol reading at the time of the crash was over the legal limit, he was not wearing a seatbelt, and he was talking to his girlfriend on his mobile phone. He was living at Lambourn in Berkshire at the time and had returned to the studio shortly before his death to record with FLEETWOOD MAC co-founder Peter Green. By that time, he had been the drummer on at least 66 albums with minor contributions on many other recordings. It was generally felt that Powell's death was a great loss to the world of popular music. Countless rock-based drummers have cited Cozy Powell as an influence.

Powell's resume reads like a classic rock bible: COZY POWELL'S HAMMER, THE JEFF BECK GROUP, RAINBOW, MICHAEL SCHENKER GROUP, WHITESNAKE, EMERSON, LAKE & POWELL, BLACK SABBATH and many, many more.