Martin Kielty of Ultimate Classic Rock wrote a feature article on guitarist, Berne Tome, who played seven shows with Ozzy Osbourne, after Randy Rhoads was tragically killed in plane crash. Excerpts from the story appear, below.
Former Black Sabbath vocalist Ozzy was suffering on the road in 1982. The Diary of a Madman tour, supporting the release of his second album, had already featured his notorious bat-biting incident, his collapse on stage, his even more notorious Alamo scandal and a heated disagreement between him and guitarist Randy Rhoads. The singer would later go on to shave off his hair in an attempt to escape his personal torment, while several sets of dates were postponed as he struggled with addiction and depression.
On March 19th, Rhoads was killed during a flight on a small plane. The musicians had loved and respected each other – but they were in disagreement about their future directions when the tragedy struck. Ozzy’s manager and later wife, Sharon Arden, seemed to feel that if Osbourne stopped at that point, he might never return to music. So their thoughts turned to replacing Randy, and they quickly settled on Torme, who’d recently quit Deep Purple singer Ian Gillan’s solo band.
“I’d been on Jet, Don Arden’s label, and I kind of knew Sharon,” Torme told Ultimate Classic Rock. “I was on the periphery of the family, and I’d just left Ian. They thought, ‘He’s out of a job – he’ll jump at it!’” But he had his own album and tour to work on. “Big artists have a thing where it’s totally incomprehensible that anyone would say ‘no.’ When I was saying, ‘I can’t, I have all this going on,’ David Arden [Don’s son] was thinking, ‘He’s probably only saying that to up his price. Typical muso!’”
Bills need to be paid, and so when David offered Torme £2000 a week, and paid a week’s wages in advance, the guitarist agreed to step in – as long as it was only for a month. So he flew out to the U.S. to join a band that included keyboardist Don Airey, bassist Rudy Sarzo and drummer Tommy Aldridge. “When I got there Sharon told me it wasn’t 2,000 pounds a week… it was 200 dollars a week. She said, ‘David’s on drugs. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.’ I said, ‘But I’ve had two grand already!’ She said, ‘Well then, we ain’t going to pay you anything until it’s paid off.’ Start off on the best footing!…”
…“It was horrible,” he said of the emotional situation. “I was out there on the Thursday and Randy had died the previous Saturday. It wasn’t even a week. I don’t think anyone spoke to me the day I arrived, other than Don Airey. It was a really bad atmosphere, and understandably so. I suppose, on some level, Tommy and Don wanted to carry on. Ozzy had no desire and Rudy certainly hadn’t.”
An audition successfully passed, three days of rehearsals took place, and Torme began to realize the lose-lose position he’d got himself into. “Even if I played okay, even if I played a nice solo or whatever, if anyone looked at me on stage they thought, ‘Oh, s—. It isn’t Randy.’ The first show [April 1 in Bethlehem, Pa.] was appalling. I didn’t have my amps, my pedals and I had one guitar. There were three or four tracks where we re-tuned and I had to use a hire guitar that was a piece of s—. And apart from anything else, I did not know the songs.
“It was incredibly hard to hear anything on that stage – you had the castle and everything, and all I could hear was the snare drum and Ozzy. I was literally stood at the bottom of Tommy’s pyramid, staring up trying to see when he was hitting things. It was really terrifying.”
And Ozzy? “He was having a really bad time. I’d come off stage and he’d be standing at the back, crying his eyes out. Any day off he was out of his face. He wasn’t able to cope. I think he had a terror because his career has been in complete s— for years, and he’d had a kind of life again because of Randy. And again, I had this situation where Sharon and him thought I was just playing hard to get. I was saying, ‘I have to go home in a month – I have this tour booked,’ and they were going, ‘Yeah, yeah, yeah.’ Ozzy, underneath his persona, is really insecure, so Sharon was protecting him by saying, ‘Bernie really wants to do it, Ozzy.’”
On reflection, Torme feels it’s likely that he was Don Arden’s pawn in a political game that stretched across the Atlantic, between Jet Records in the U.K. and their U.S. distributors. “By the time we did Madison Square Garden I was fairly okay. I wasn’t by any means playing what Randy played; I wasn’t even able to try. When we got to MSG I kept saying, ‘When’s the sound check?’ They said, ‘Don’t worry about that.’ I didn’t get a sound check – they told me, ‘The record company demanded that we try out Earl Slick!’ I was pissed off about that. I’m here, I’ve carried off these shows, you keep asking me to stay… and then you do that?”
He only met Night Ranger guitarist Brad Gillis – who would go on to take over the guitar slot in Osbourne’s band on April 13, after Torme had played just seven shows – by accident…He said, ‘I’m here because the label think you’re going to f— off.’ Don Airey was the only person who had any interest in auditioning anyone, so I said, ‘Don, I want to go home. This guy is great. Give him an audition.’ I’d already told Ozzy and Sharon that I was leaving, but that I’d hang on until they found a replacement. Then I discovered they were carrying a replacement but they wouldn’t audition him!…”
…[Torme] went home the next day, believing that his frontman still had a low opinion of him. “When I’d gone to their hotel suite to say, ‘I’m going to leave,’ Ozzy had looked absolutely flummoxed. Sharon said, ‘It’s because he wants to play a completely different type of music, Ozzy.’ It was protective, and I understand it, so I’d just gawped and said, ‘Yeah!’
“I saw Oz when they did the U.K. tour. Rudy had left and they had Pete Way on bass, and I think Don had left too. We had a laugh, but it was very stressed because there was a massive row in the dressing room between Tommy and Pete. I came away thinking, ‘I’m glad I’m not doing this!…’”
“…For years I regretted that I hadn’t met Randy,” he said. “Five or six years ago I met his brother Kelly and had a long chat. There were a lot of things I didn’t know. He was half-Irish; I’d always thought he was pure Yank. That’s a small, tribal thing to say, but it made a difference to me. It helped with the emotional aspect.
“People just don’t understand what it was like. You get the most inane comments, and people are allowed to say anything, but it was emotionally a terribly hard thing for me. I still have nightmares about it.
“I’m glad I was able to keep people’s wages being paid, but at the same time I think, ‘Would you have done it if you hadn’t been offered two grand a week? You selfish bastard!’ But then I think, ‘Ah yes… but I did good.’”
Read More at Ultimate Classic Rock.
source: ultimateclassicrock.com
28 Responses
Bernie Torme had a tough gig trying to replace a hero like Randy Rhoads. I think it was a “no win” situation for him, even though he is a talented player. In my opinion, there was nobody that could replace Rhoads….not even the great Zakk Wylde.
Great article on undoubtedly the least known guitarist of Ozzy’s. I can’t imagine trying to fill Randy’s shoes less than a week after his passing (or at all for that matter).
“Rhoads was killed during a leisure flight on a small plane.” Leisure flight, not quite. It’s worth fact checking information before putting false information in print. Aside from the misinformation in this posting, it’s interesting to hear some of the stories from Berne.
JJ,
Please be aware that I do not get compensated for this position, I have been doing this for a better part of almost 18 years, gratis, because of my love of the music. I feel I have to keep explaining this fact, and quite frankly, do not want to have keep revisiting this topic, nor defending myself.
That being said (well, written technically), regarding the “misinformation” you are having issue with here, I suggest you complain to the originating source.
As a fan, as far as I know from all the source material that I have read over the years, Randy (who is my favorite guitar player) was afraid of flying, and was convinced, or pressured, by the band’s bus driver to go flying with him. The idea was that it was supposed to a be “fun/leisure” flight, that turned horribly tragic when the pilot/band’s bus driver, was trying to show off, clipped the tour bus and crashed into barn, or some structure.
Obviously, the initial intent was for it to be a leisurely flight, but due to one man’s inflated sense of self, and ego, turned into disaster. I will take the word “leisure” out now, but to call into task “fact” checking is a bit overwrought.
Finally, the introductory sentences were written by me, and not included in the original article. If you happen to notice, I clearly referred to the incident as a tragedy, not a “leisurely flight.”
D
I’ve been an Ozzy fan for over 2/3 of my lifespan and I was always under the impression that it was a “leisure flight” as well.
Thank you, Nathan,
I didn’t even write the sentence in question, but you know the old sayings, “kill the messenger” and “no good deed goes unpunished.”
Have a great day,
D 🙂
Many of the great articles posted by Dana were originally reported on by separate news sources. Dana is always very clear where the news information has originated when she posts it on this website. In my opinion, it is not her responsibility to “fact check” this information when she is RELAYING this reported information to us. To expect her to “fact check” is not only ridiculous, but it would also mean it would take a very long time for news information to be timely posted…and then we are reading “old news” and nobody would care.
In this case, it was indeed supposed to be a “leisure flight” that ended in tragedy when the pilot tried to perform stupid stunts. It is not “false information”, but it is difficult and sad to comprehend how an experience that should have been “leisure” could end so tragic.
March 19, 1982….hard to believe it’s been 35 years since Rhoads’ death. It’s incredible knowing that Rhoads is still an influential guitar hero, considering his brief music catalog and untimely passing a long time ago. I always wonder where Rhoads would be today if not for that fateful day 35 years ago…probably teaching the joy of guitar to students at his mom’s music shop and keeping the spirit of him mom alive, I think…..
Thank you, Rattle,
I think it is difficult for others to comprehend that along with researching the content, I am also responsible for formatting, editing as much as possible (hence using hyperlinks when necessary), finding photos, cropping them, etc. To expect me to fact check (and when I attended Journalism school in the dinosaur age, you needed three corroborating sources), is just a bit much.
Thank you for comprehending that the news is agrigated from other sources, and not original content, unless specified. The only time I do not source, is when it is a press release, which is written by the firm representing the artist.
It just seems some people are not happy unless they are picking on others shortcomings in a smug manner. In light of all the troubles going on the world, it just seems so petty.
All my best to you.
So u don’t get paid/that explains it????w t f??? U seem like a snowflake!if your gunna write it,take the heat or stop writing!!!
Gregg,
I guess expecting a level of decorum, from someone whom I didn’t even address, was asking too much. Oh, well.
Also, I am no snowflake, my friend. You have no idea the level of verbal, sexist, and racist comments I have had to endure over the years, for no reason. If you think you could do better, by all means, create your own site and see. BTW, did you even know that at one time in this site’s past, Eddie had to have the comments section suspended, because the posters were so nasty, hence the decision for registration? Therefore, it’s easy to be a keyboard quarterback.
Additionally, I could have easily deleted both of your comments, and went on my merry way. However, I chose to address it head on. At this point, I will no longer engage in this conversation.
Finally, before you insult me, I suggest you get your ducks in a row. I didn’t even write the sentence in question, it was the writer at Ultimate Classic Rock. Therefore, criticizing me for something I didn’t even write, seems well,…silly.
Dana,
I obviously hit a nerve. Sorry you are such a literal individual. Thx for taking what I mentioned, stretched it so far and twisting it so far to make me seem like you can walk on water. Obviously your five paragraph response shows that you clearly routinely report partial facts and you are easily offended. Maybe it’s time to “volunteer” your services somewhere else if you feel like you’re always on the defense.
J J,
I have no problem with criticism, but I find that people can be nit picky, and overly hostile, for no reason. Pointing out a mistake in a mature manner is perfectly acceptable, but being smug and pretentious, is unnecessary. It’s ironic that you seem to think I can walk on water, considering, I found your comment to be lacking objectivity and preachy.
Also, this is not the Wall Street Journal, nor hard news, whom many times distort the facts and disseminate false information. If anyone should be held to a higher standard, it is them.
Finally, I am not going to engage in this discourse anymore. If you find what I do here so offensive, it’s simple, don’t read it. Most of the sites, where the source news is generated from, is just a click away.
Have a great day,
Dana