OZZY OSBOURNE Sued By BOB DAISLEY For Unpaid Royalties

Former OZZY OSBOURNE bassist Bob Daisley is suing the singer for unpaid royalties.

According to NME.com, Daisley filed a suit against Osbourne and his company Blizzard Music Limited, seeking $2 million in unpaid royalties.

The dispute centers around the royalties for the song "Crazy Train", which was originally released in 1980. Daisley has a songwriting credit on the track, along with the late guitarist Randy Rhoads.

Daisley's complaint alleges that "although royalties have been paid to Daisley over the years, an audit conducted in 2014 showed that Osbourne and his company had been improperly deducting undisclosed fees before distributing royalties to Daisley and improperly withholding Daisley's rightful share of royalties owed under the publishing agreements for the commercial exploitations of the songs.

"While Mr. Osbourne was benefiting from the songs co-authored by our client, the audit shows that he was systematically short-changing Mr. Daisley," said Daisley's lawyer Alan Howard. "Mr. Daisley had no choice but to bring this action to secure his fair share of the proceeds those songs have generated."

Daisley, who played bass on the first two solo albums by Ozzy Osbourne, previously that he was "devastated" and "flabbergasted" by the August 2002 ruling by the Los Angeles Federal Court dismissing the lawsuit over unpaid performance royalties brought by Daisley and ex-Osbourne drummer Lee Kerslake against Ozzy and the singer's wife and manager, Sharon Osbourne.

Daisley continues to get paid his songwriting royalties for the songs he wrote on Ozzy's "Blizzard Of Ozz" album and the follow-up, "Diary Of A Madman". The issue is, and always has been, about performance royalties.

Daisley, whose "For Facts Sake" autobiography came out in 2013, told Australia's Guitar magazine about his legal battle with the Osbournes: "I started working with Ozzy in 1979, putting the band together with Randy, and then we got [drummer] Lee Kerslake. When 'Diary Of A Madman' came out, Lee and I were ousted, and 'Diary Of A Madman' came out without our credits on it, and they credited someone else that was going on the road with them. So there was a lawsuit developed out of that, which was settled in court against Don Arden, who was Sharon's father and the owner of Jet Records. But later, sort of late '90s, Lee and I found out that Sharon and Ozzy were receiving our royalties from those albums, so we sued them. And that went on for a while. And Don Arden was going to help Lee and me fighting the case for our royalties. But when Sharon found out that her father was helping us — I mean, she hadn't spoken to him for something like eighteen years or something — all of a sudden she made up with him. And he stopped helping us and went against us and that was the end of our case. But it's way more complicated than that. That's a simplified version of it."

He continued: "We were sort of devastated, flabbergasted [when our lawsuit was dismissed by the judge]. [We] just couldn't believe it.

"I remember when our lawyer took on the case, and he took it on a contingency basis, which means no win, no fee. So he was very sure that he had a good case. And he used to say to us, 'It's not if you're gonna win, it's how much.'"

In a 2012 interview with Rock Cellar Magazine, Daisley revealed that the 30th-anniversary remastered reissues of Osbourne's classic early albums, 1980's "Blizzard Of Ozz" and 1981's "Diary Of A Madman", which came with a box set of previously unreleased live recordings, a coffee table book and other goodies, could have packed much more material than what actually made the release.

"There'd been talk about it during 2010, and it was then that I offered to supply tapes of our rehearsals and writing sessions, to go as proper bonus material," Daisley said. "And I just said that I wanted a royalty out of it, because it's my stuff. But they wouldn't do it because they didn't want to give me a royalty — they just wanted to buy it.

"So no agreement was made, and as a result the bonus material in the box set is minimal, which is unfortunate because I know the fans want to hear the stuff that I've got — recordings of the writing sessions, rehearsals and the songs taking shape. But the Osbournes wouldn't come to the table, y'know. I didn't even ask for an equal royalty, it was just a small royalty I wanted because it's my stuff…"

Daisley added that he had "literally hours and hours of tapes I've got from us writing those albums and rehearsing it" that could have been included in the package. "You can hear the songs changing, the different parts taking shape, and all this stuff would have been perfect bonus material for the box set," he said. "Sadly, the Osbournes are just too greedy and self-absorbed."

Bob Daisley said in a 2010 interview with his web site that he had not been contacted about the 30th-anniversary editions of "Blizzard Of Ozz" and "Diary Of A Madman". The tracks played by Daisley and drummer Lee Kerslake on both albums were replaced on a previous reissue after Daisley and Kerslake sued Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne over royalties.

Daisley told the web site, "Neither Lee nor I have been contacted, considered or consulted in the decision to re-release the original recordings. As for royalties, we have not been approached for a reconciliation and have been offered and promised nothing."

Ozzy told The Pulse of Radio he was against the idea of replacing the original tracks when he found out about it. "Believe me, it wasn't my doing," he said. "I mean, I didn't know that was being done, 'cause Sharon was fighting all the legal things that were going down at the time. I said, 'What did you do that for?' And she said, 'The only way I could stop everything was if it went to that level.' And I said, 'You know what, whatever the circumstances were, I want the original thing back.' I mean, I wouldn't have done that."

The replacement tracks were played by current METALLICA bassist Robert Trujillo and FAITH NO MORE drummer Mike Bordin.

Daisley says that he and Kerslake were fired because of disagreements with Sharon over a number of things, including refusing to do two shows in one day out of worry that Ozzy would blow out his voice.