STRYPER Guitarist OZ FOX Defends GoFundMe Campaign: 'We're Not Millionaires'

STRYPER guitarist Oz Fox recently appeared on "The Big Hair Show With Mel", a program on the Las Vegas radio station 97.1 The Point. The full conversation can be streamed below. A few excerpts follow (as transcribed by BLABBERMOUTH.NET).

On his recent seizure, which led to the discovery of multiple brain tumors:

Oz: "They did the scans — MRIs, cat scans, all that good stuff — and found a one-inch spot on the right side towards the back of my brain. It's toward the outside of the brain, but it's still in far enough where they can't really take it out without having some problems, some complications. They also found another one behind my left ear. Not sure what that's all about. They want to keep an eye on them, so at this point, they're going to do regular MRIs in however many months they need to check and see whether there's any progression with any of this."

On whether he's suffered any additional medical setbacks:

Oz: "Nothing's affected [me], except for the medication. I can travel. I've done an EEG, and because of the EEG, they actually put, like, a strobe light on you, and they flash it at different speeds for up to a minute to see if any reaction happens. I think they had, like, four or five different speeds that they did on me, maybe six, and apparently my EEG was normal. There was no problem. There can be a lot of other reasons why the seizure can happen. The last neurologist I talked to said that most of the time, it's because of stress or lack of sleep, and both of those things happen in my life. [Laughs] That particular day, I was tired, and it was kind of hot that day. STRYPER's easy. There's a lot more stress doing these [other] gigs here in town, because I have to load my own gear and make sure everything's working. I'm absolutely not a celebrity in town."

On the GoFundMe donations he's received:

Oz: "That was really amazing, and I have to say thank you to everybody that helped out with that. I'm very honored and humbled by it, and it just blew my mind that so many people came to help. The bills have racked up, and we're going to have to go talk to them and try to negotiate everything and make sure that we have everything covered."

On whether he has medical insurance:

Oz: "No, and there's a lot of people that have speculated about us. We're not millionaires. Regardless of what the web sites say, I've seen it online, where people say, 'Look, this web site says said Oz is worth this much.' It's not true. Why would I do gigs in town, sometimes three or four nights a week, to make a living [during] the years that STRYPER's not touring? Why would I need to do that if I had that kind of money? I don't... The whole thing about income, that has something to do with why I didn't have health care. It had to do with on and off years of touring and not really making a big salary every year. With guys like us, we have to save our money so that we can have money in case we don't tour the next year. It could be a year and a half that we're not touring."

On whether any fans have been hit with Bibles during STRYPER concerts:

Oz: "Plenty of times. We've almost gotten sued — which I'm not going to talk about. [Laughs]"

Fox suffered a seizure on August 11 while performing with SIN CITY SINNERS at Harrah's in Las Vegas. STRYPER subsequently toured Australia and Japan as a three-piece, and later recruited Howie Simon (JEFF SCOTT SOTO, GRAHAM BONNET) to fill in during four American concerts in September.

Fox plans to rejoin STRYPER for their remaining fall and winter tour dates, beginning with an October 12 performance in Indianapolis, Indiana.