In a new interview with the Los Angeles Times, legendary guitarist Zakk Wylde has offered a powerful insight into the final years of his friend and bandleader, Ozzy Osbourne. He revealed that he always viewed Ozzy‘s severe health setbacks as mere “speed bumps” and that there was “no quit” in the rock icon, a resilience that made his death just two weeks after his final concert a complete shock.
Speaking with the newspaper, Wylde detailed the unwavering optimism that defined their relationship. He explained that he never saw the historic “Back To The Beginning” concert on July 5 as a final farewell.
“The way I always felt, all the things that I’ve gone through with them, it was always — if it was a setback or anything like that — it was more of a speed bump and it was just like, ‘All right, we’ll fix the flat tire on the truck and then we’ll just keep moving,'” Wylde said.
This belief in Ozzy‘s legendary toughness meant that even during that final performance, his focus was on the immediate present, not the end.
“Even when we were doing that show, I didn’t go, ‘Oh, this is the last time I’m ever going to play ‘Mama, I’m Coming Home‘ with him or ‘Crazy Train‘ with him’ or anything,” he explained. “You’re in the moment anyways. You’re playing, so my concern was making sure he was okay… You never think it’s your last Super Bowl; you’re playing and you’re playing to win.”
Wylde saw his own role as a constant motivator, always encouraging Ozzy to keep fighting through his health struggles.
“I would always tell him, no matter how bummed he got, ‘Just keep doing therapy and keep doing everything you’ve got to do because what’s the option? Then you just quit in the corner, and you whine about it. Or you could do something about it, with therapy and hitting the weights and doing everything you got to do.’ There was no quit in him,” Wylde reiterated. “So, that’s where we were at. I didn’t think after we did the show, two weeks from now, he was gonna be gone. I wasn’t thinking that at all.”
His new reflections echo similar sentiments he shared in an August interview with Waste Some Time With Jason Green, where he compared his friend to a famous stunt performer. “It’d be like Ozzy being Evel Knievel… he survives, he makes a jump, or even if he gets into an accident, we get him to the hospital, [and] he’ll be fine… You never think, like, ‘This is the end,'” he said at the time.
