I respect when people change their minds, but I strongly dislike it when it's done all the time. The one thing is development/progression of a human being, the other is simply lying and fooling people. Of course, there's the money and the carreer, but is it really needed to bash the old colleagues and later reunite nonetheless? I think it should suffice to tell the press how well the actual band works (even if it should have its flaws), that way you're much more credible - at least IMHO. So, with Tony Iommi (and most probably everybody else involved in the Sabbath bandwagon) we have a case where I'm annoyed enough to overhear statements 'bout the past and concentrate on the musical legacy. I despise wasting my time investigating people that enjoy fooling other people. Maybe Bill Ward's biography is the truest telling of the happenings? (Hm, I just checked the title of his book and didn't find anything. Am I wrong? No book by him?)
Only one person I knew at the time, back when it came out, had the Dehumanizer album. The thing had little fanfare, and Sabbath weren't a culturally relevant band at the time. There was always love for the classic period, S/T thru Sabotage, but the Dio lineup was a passe 80's thing at the time. You could say Sabbath was down and out, that Ozzy whom had maintained a steady level of career success held all the cards. This was still the case when the reunion actually happened in 97. The band needed Ozzy more than Ozzy needed them. That said, the bands legend from it's glory days continued to grow throughout the 90s, bolstered by bands playing Sabbath inspired music. Bottom line, by 97 Ozzy and Sabbath could both benefit greatly by a reunion, the time was right and they seized the day. They did a lot since the 97 reunion, making what a big deal that thing was, somewhat lost on people now. I guess you had to be there. As a side note, thinking this out reminds me what a great manager Sharon was for Ozzy. He had a relevant solo career well into the 90s, and they started a big successful cash cow annual tour.
Google Image Result for http://hafifmuzik.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/bs-Ozzy-Osbourne-1972.jpg Question #10 is posited (respectfully) on the Sabbath and marked as my return. I wanna go back a bit. The depiction above gives us an idea of how ripped off the first 4 were getting. Aside from the goregeous, and at that moment, quite earthy individual, this hotel room leaves much much much to be desired. It's the kind of place I would have stayed in when I was 18. Anyway. This may be a tough one but does anyone know about how much they were making? I imagine much of the records are to Timbuktu at this destination of query but nonetheless a hopeful enquirer here. BTW, thanks to all the geniuses and historians taking time from their busy days to busy nights to create this ouever (as my feeble mind sees it). Luv u all P PS. Sorry if this has been answered already. I'm doing my best still to catch up on reading.
For a metal album in 1992, made by a band that had already spent 23 (or 24, if you count the "Earth" era) years in the business, Dehumanizer wasn't exactly a flop: And while, as this table makes clear, Dehumanizer was significantly less successful in North America than in many European countries, the situation has been pretty much the opposite for the large majority of Ozzy's solo albums since 1983 (see here). Also, while reunion-line-up Sabbath toured extensively and successfully for years, it took them 16(!) years to finish and release just one studio album (without Bill) - an album that, despite being immensely more successful than Dehumanizer, wasn't exactly more inspired, let alone more memorable. In terms of studio output, the years from 1997 through 2006 were by far the least productive in the history of Black Sabbath - until then, Sabbath had ALWAYS released at least 1 album every 2nd year. I guess what I am trying to say is: while the Sabbath-Ozzy reunions were certainly successful in terms of popularity, they were a rather low point in terms of inspiration and musical productivity. Anyway, I fully agree that Ozzy has been very lucky to have Sharon as his manager. So good to see you back! Feeling better? I have no idea how much money they were making, but I am pretty sure that the only one of them who has ever been poor since the early 1970ies was Bill (assuming that his temporary homelessness meant that he actually didn't have any money for a while). The others may have had their problems for some time or other, but even the bad times were probably more like: "Oh damn, maybe I should stop buying ever more super-expensive cars for a while", rather than: "Oh damn, I cannot afford to buy me a meal".
I'm still mending, but ok. I had no idea about Bill. Ok, so, what a bunch of booty heads the other 3 were. How could they not help Bill at least enough to keep him in a house? As far as some of the antics of being mad at each other and the like, I've always thought of it as pure negative advertisement. Although, I can't help but get the feeling that Tony sees Ozzy as inferior and has never really appreciated his stage persona. That's just pure speculation, but in my gut.
That's not speculation. It's fact. Tony made excuses for it but it's plain to see that he wanted to make it clear to Ozzy, the rest of the band and the audience exactly who was in charge. Egotistical rock star 101. You hit that nail right on the head.
I believe Bill's homeless period was after Born Again. But that's pretty much all I have heard about it. I would be glad if anyone who knows more share their knowledge about his. I think you're making a very good point about the others' not helping Bill. If they knew anything about it, they should definitely have tried to take care of him. But again, we first need to find out more about this. Oh, I think some of their conflicts were very serious. Don't forget that Ozzy even sued Tony: Ozzy Osbourne sues Black Sabbath bandmate I am pretty sure it is true that Tony somehow saw Ozzy as inferior - maybe still does, not sure. I don't know if it was about Ozzy's stage presence. In "How Black was our Sabbath" it is more associated with their different roles and preferences in writing the music. According to the authors, in the TE and NSD eras Ozzy wanted them to go back to the heavier style of the early years, and apparently Tony didn't like most of Ozzy's ideas. Tony was reportedly feeling he had to come up with most ideas and riffs if anything was to happen at all. It sounds complicated and rather hard to judge, especially given the amount of drugs of all kinds involved - though the authors claim that the drugs weren't the main problem, but rather the band members' most convenient excuse, in hindsight, whenever something went wrong.
Ozzy sueding Tony was something I took as a business thing, not something personal - besides, one should not forget the others gave Tony the permission to own the Sabbath trademark, and he also payed them to do that. It was only after the public eye got re-interested in Sabbath that Ozzy regretted his opinion. And yes, count me in on the "Tony doesn't dig Ozzy" side of things. As for the money they made, I'm also curious to know how much they made and when. Bill Ward being homeless is weird, but then, he's the only one without songwriting credits (yes , I know, he's got some, but no hits). If you take a "normal" contract, money goes always to the songwriter and not to the player, meaning once you stop playing, there's no money coming in.
I just had a quick look at Paranoid and Sabotage. Paranoid reads: "All compositions by Iommi/Osbourne/Butler/Ward". Sabotage reads: "All songs written/arranged by Black Sabbath". For which album did Bill not get songwriting credits?
I am not aware of a biography on Bill. It would certainly be interesting, but if it were written by himself, I am not sure if it would be the most accurate account. I really like Bill, but I think he tends to deny certain aspects of reality.
My post is mostly anecdotal of my personal experience and in part opinion, not definitive, I should of made that more clear. Even bad sellers back then, would be great sellers today. While I personally like Dehumanizer and have my criticisms of 13, IMO the latter is superior, and yes we had to wait way too long for it.
You know what? That's exactly what I had in mind, that Sabbath shared royalties! I didn't check and just wrote my post, thinking I must have been wrong about that! But if that's the situation, then why was he homeless? Did he choose to, or did he sell his royalties, or was he totally in debt? But let's not take the topic too far away, Paulette's question still wasn't answered!
My guess is that the back catalog wasn't selling too well at the time and Bill had debt, but selling off his shares would certainly stand to reason, and is likely. If at the time the back catalog wasn't lucrative, the selling price wouldn't sustain a blacked out Bill for long. I'm always interested to learn of the finances myself, but I doubt we get very far. I hope to be wrong on that.
My hope is that your thread stays open long term as a useful Q & A data base. It could end up exceeding 100 pages.
I don't know about a random early hotel room photo, but by '73 they were soaked in mansions, cars and everything else. Filthy rich except Meehan had cunningly structured it all so that all of these things were owned by his own holding company. Sabbath were printing money for Meehan. Just after he took over in mid 1970 he had one of his companies on the London Stock Exchange. This was a company largely making money from Sabbath. Sabbath were a worldwide phenomenon. In the US, Master Of Reality was one of the first albums (if not the first) to ever to have pre-orders of 500,000, which made it Gold the day it was released. I'll never believe for a second that it should have only debuted at #8 instead of #1, but in those days the charts were so controlled by payola that who knows.... I don't even know what else was released that week. When Sabbath dumped Meehan & Meehan Jr. during Sabotage, it was in large part because they started to realize that while they wanted for nothing, they didn't actually own anything. That's how these crooked business people managed things in those days. "Oh, you need a new car? Go get that Rolls you liked the other day and have them send the bill round to me." "Oh, you like that mansion? Get it then. I'll handle the details." After firing Meehan, Sabbath actually were going to manage themselves. For a group at their level of success, this was of course very rare, but some bands had started doing it. For example, ELP had started Manticore Records and were handling their own affairs. Sabbath even penned a deal with Manticore to handle their US tour management for the Sabotage tour. Bill was apparently "Mr. Businessman" for a while during this phase. Carrying a briefcase and handling phone calls about business. They were fed up and wanted to just do it themselves. But eventually Don Arden got involved at an even higher level than they had allowed before, and by the time of TE, he was managing them.
There's a link to that pic. Did it not work? I just thought it to be an example of how they were treated. The pic is from '72. Why were they staying in such a dump? Poor guys deserved better across the board. "Innocent Villian" by Meehan may shed some light in that. I think I will have to buy it. It is not at any library within a 50 mile radius from where I live. More to the some points you made; When they began managing themselves did they lose a lot of money?
I saw the pic but I don't know that it says much. They played all over the world so I doubt every city had accommodations akin to The Ritz or that this kind of thing was even much of a concern during their early days when they were first and foremost about music. Keep in mind that they had their own private plane by '71. One of the first rock acts to have one. So let's not feel sorry for these guys in anything but their very earliest days (67-70). I don't know that book but I'd like to read it. I don't think they lost any money during their self-management so much as just realized it's hard to do both music and management. I suspect Don Arden encouraged that notion very strongly as well. He wanted to manage them as far back as 1970 but they went with Meehan. Arden was given a somewhat smaller role but that changed in '76. Then Arden was not in agreement with bringing in Ronnie James Dio so they were with Sandy Pearlman for a while. Then back to Arden who encouraged bringing in Ian Gillan. After that it gets even more confusing........
Tony felt the band was out of touch with then current hit-making rock trends. "We need to sound like Queen", "We need to sound like Foreigner" he has been quoted (by others) as saying. Ozzy didn't want any of that. Hence musical clashes on top of ego clashes. Typical in the high-stakes high-testosterone world of rock at that time.
