CHRIS JERICHO Shares Hilarious OZZY OSBOURNE Stories: 'When Did You Ever Think OZZY Would Be The Voice Of Reason?'

In a new interview with Jon Mahon of Kerrang! Radio, FOZZY frontman and wrestling superstar Chris Jericho was asked to share stories about crossing paths with Ozzy Osbourne and his wife/manager Sharon Osbourne over the years. He said (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET): "[Ozzy] came and hosted WWE [World Wrestling Entertainment's flagship show] 'RAW' one year. And I'd seen him… At the time there was a lot of… There was these [heavy metal awards shows like] Golden Gods Awards that we had that Ozzy was at, or there'd be a roast of Sharon Osbourne. Ozzy would be there, and I would see him in different places. I was also very tight with Zakk [Wylde, Ozzy's longtime guitarist]. We did a bit backstage for the 'RAW' thing where whenever we had these guest GMs — every week we'd have a guest general manager; it was like a stunt —and I would always get put in with whoever the general manager was because they knew I would make the segment good. 'Cause a lot of these guys, like [American civil rights and social justice activist] Reverend Al Sharpton, sucked as an on-air guy, but put 'em with Jericho and they'll make it good. And Vince [McMahon, then-World Wrestling Entertainment chairman and CEO] would always put me with them. So finally Ozzy's there. And I was, like, 'Can I please just do something with Ozzy? For every Al Sharpton and [actor] Jeremy Piven, or whoever the else you put me with, can I just do something with Ozzy?' So Vince said, 'Yeah, you can do something with Ozzy.' So I do this thing where I talk that Ozzy's gone soft and I lost respect for him and all these different things. 'And it used to be 'The Ultimate Sin', but now you can't even stand up straight,' or whatever the hell I said. And at the end, Vince wanted Ozzy to call me a wanker. And Ozzy's, like, 'I can't call him a wanker.' And Vince is, like, 'Well, no one's gonna know that.' And he's, like, 'But your show airs in England and everyone knows what wanker means there. You can't show that in England. They'll edit it out.' And Vince was, like, 'Oh, wow. You're right.' When did you ever think Ozzy would be the voice of reason on when not to swear on TV?"

Chris went on to recount another hilarious story involving the Osbourne clan. He said: "Zakk and I, at one Ozzfest [Ozzy's traveling heavy metal festival], drank a lot of beer at the time, and we decided to play baseball in the parking lot where the buses were parked. Why not, right? So he had a bat and a glove. And so I'm pitching to him, and he's swinging, and I pitched this really bad throw and he's laughing, 'Ah, you terrible. You can't even throw a ball.' And I was, like, 'All right, fuck this. I'm gonna show him what I can do.' So there's people gathering, watching. So I throw this ball like straight down the middle. It's like Nolan Ryan [American former professional baseball pitcher], and Zakk connects with it, and it goes all the way out into the parking lot, over the fence of where the buses were into the actual general parking lot. And as he's running the non-existent bases, we hear this, 'What the fuck are you doing?' And we turn, and it's Sharon, and she's power walking towards us. She might have even been wearing a pants suit. That's what I just remember. And [I was fucking] terrified. This is Sharon: 'What the fuck are you doing?' And she's screaming at us. She's, like, 'If that ball hit somebody on the head, we could get sued and lose this entire festival.' She's, like, 'What were you thinking, Zakk?' And then she looks at me and goes, 'And who the fuck are you?' 'I'm nobody.' She says, 'You're right. You're nobody. Get outta my face.' So me and Zakk were almost running to the bus, his bus. And he's trying to put the key code in so we can get on. It was like a horror movie. We finally get on the bus and we start howling."

Chris continued: "When Sharon and Ozzy hosted ['RAW'], I told Sharon that story and reminded her of it. And Ozzy heard that and thought that was hilarious. 'Who the fuck are you, man? Who the fuck are you?' Sharon pinches me on the ass on the way out. I don't know why. And Ozzy's, like, 'All right, man. See you later. Who the fuck are you?' Just a couple of brushes with him."

Jericho added that was "a huge [Ozzy] fan," explaining that "where I grew up in Canada, in Winnipeg, everyone loved Ozzy — everyone loved Ozzy. He was just an everyman. And I think that's one of the reasons why he had such great appeal. He was just a guy. So when Ozzy passed, [FOZZY] had done a cover of 'Crazy Train', gosh, probably six years earlier, because the 'Judas' album was gonna get re-released with some bonus tracks. It never happened, so we had this version in the can. And I said when he passed away, 'Why don't we release this as a single, touch it up a bit and see how it goes?' And it ended up being a Top 10 song for us there."

Back in May 2022, Jericho was asked by PopCulture about the similarities between his singing voice and that of Ozzy. He responded: "I've always had that in me. It's not trying to sound like Ozzy; that's my vocal range — that really high-end… So there's always been elements of it. As a matter of fact, on [2012's] 'Sin And Bones' record, I said, 'Let's just fucking record a [BLACK] SABBATH song. Let me try and sound like Ozzy.' And we did 'Fairies Wear Boots'. And if you listen to it, it's, like, 'Okay, now that's Ozzy.' So we've always had some of those elements.

"But you're right — there's a couple of songs… I mean, 'Nowhere To Run', even when we play it, we play it live every night [sings song's chorus] — that one, singing it, I feel like, 'Oh, this is the Ozzy part,'" Chris added. "And I think one of the reasons for that is when Rich Ward writes the melody line, or Johnny Andrews, our producer, who co-writes all the songs with us, they know what my wheelhouse is, and they know that there's that high-end, I guess you'd say 'Ozzy-esque' style to it. Some people sound like Steve Perry; some people sound like Bruce Dickinson; some people sound like [Paul] McCartney — I sound like Ozzy. So that's kind of my wheelhouse. And [we're] not trying to write songs that sound like Ozzy, but there are definite parts that have that vibe to it, and even I can feel it and I know it. Which is cool — it's fun to know that if you're gonna be compared to somebody… Listen, people forget — Ozzy's one of the greatest rock and roll singers of all time, so I'll take that comparison any day of the week, man."