Bringing Metal To The Children: The Complete Berserker’s Guide to World Tour Domination. Rob Zombie
My buddy said there was dead silence, and then they broke out dying laughing. The girl handling the travel asked, “What the fuck is so funny?” Then she said, “When you find out where he likes to stay, let me fucking know because I have to book this shit.”
At least the Dallas Cowboys cheerleaders have to take a test on the history of the Cowboys’ players and its franchise history. That’s why the music business is so fucking awesome—you don’t even have to know the name of the deceased person you’re working for! Being involved in this shit truly is a gift that keeps on giving.
At the end of the day, play what you love and what moves you. Plain and simple. GIFD.
Gotta Promote the Record!
OVER THE YEARS, GOING TO RADIO AND PROMOTING WHATEVER ALBUM was out at the time has always been a blast. And I’ve met some great people who, whether they’re still in the business or not, when we run into each other again, we always have a great time catching up, laughing our asses off telling war stories. Now here’s another gem of radio fucking comedy.
The record company and their radio staff people are the absolute fucking best when they get all jacked up. Especially the radio people in their market or territory, when we are gonna pay them a visit with our cuddliness, compiled with the sheer adorableness of the fucking grand whatever-the-fuck-it-is that we bring to the table. Anyway, at one particular radio station we visited up in the Pacific Northwest, in walks the radio guy or gal from the label, and my brother-in-law and tour manager, and fearless field general, much akin to General George S. Patton—Father Mark Ferguson—along with the general of the Black Label guitar army, Moby. And then there’s the wonderful blond-bomber douchebag—me.
So basically the game plan is that I will tantalize them all with my unbelievable fucking greatness, push the album, and bless them with a Carnegie Hall–worthy performance, and in turn they will be so abso-fucking-lutely blown away that they just have to add the single to their playlist! Right? Oh, you sad, sad, pathetic little man.
Now, get this. I jam about three or four unplugged, un-Blackened fucking tunes on the acoustic guitar and piano, tell them a batch of funny fucking Ozzy and Black Label stories, tell them about how wonderful the new album is and how if you buy it, everything in your life is going to be peachy keen and all the other bullshit that makes life worth living! Mission accomplished, right?
Here’s the grand prize, kids.
While Moby was breaking down the gear, and I was taking a piss, Father Fergie was talking with the radio programmer (the guy who decides what does and what doesn’t get played on their radio station) and some of the gang at the station. The programmer guy told Mark, “We love when you Black Label guys come down to the station. Zakk tells the funniest stories and we love it when he performs for us. It’s just so awesome!”
Mark answered, “Yeah, Zakk’s a funny fucker. So listen, boss, are you guys going to spin the single?”
The guy looked Mark straight in the fucking eyes, everything went silent, and he said, “Ahhhhh . . . No. But anyway, it was really great seeing you guys. Take care.”
The only thing missing was, “Don’t let the door hit you in the fucking ass on your way out, you fucking idiots!” Once again, fucking priceless!
You’re Fucking Out!
REMEMBER HOW I WAS TELLING YOU ABOUT THE RECORD LABELS THAT I dealt with and how I told them, “I’ll do my end of the deal, you fucking do yours”? Well, here’s a perfect example of when you know they’re lying to you, and you just wish somehow you could prove it. None other than “Mom”—Sharon Osbourne—conceived this little plot of record label investigation during the release of the No More Tears album. Mom wanted to have the Boss get closer to the Ozzy Army so she rounded up a batch of in-stores and smaller gigs for us to play, instead of the enormodomes we were doing up to that point. It was her idea to give all the Ozzy-heads a chance to see the boss in a more intimate setting. As far as the gigs went, they were fucking awesome! Between the fucking energy coming off the stage and the insane asylum in the crowds, it was fucking killer. Thank the good Lord the gigs were a blast because the in-stores were a whole other fucking story.
On paper, it all looked fucking grand—Ozzy and the band would roll into the record store with the new album blasting throughout the fucking place. The Ozzy Army could come in, get the new record and whatever other Ozzy album they wanted, and have them signed by the boss and the band. With about fifteen hundred crazy Ozzy-heads at every in-store, you would figure they would sell fifteen hundred copies of the new record, and plenty of other Ozzy and Sabbath records. Then Ozzy and the band would sign everything and a good time would be had by all. How fucking complicated is that? Keep reading.
If I’m a manager at fucking McDonald’s and I realize that we are starting to run low on fucking hamburger patties, I am immediately blowing a phone call in for a massive shipment of patties so that we don’t lose out on a ton of burger sales. The music business is no different. If you’re a record company, your bands’ CDs and product are your burgers for sale. You don’t sell fucking burgers, you don’t pay the bills and you don’t eat. Common sense, right?
The boss and the rest of the band showed up at one particular record store and there was a massive line around the fucking building. As soon as we stepped foot in the store there was a Black Sabbath video cranked up on all of the TVs—STRIKE ONE!
Ozzy looked around and said, “Do these fucking assholes realize that I’ve been out of Sabbath longer than I was in it? Tell someone to put the new fucking record on!”
Once they got that sorted, we sat down at the signing tables. The doors opened and in came the Ozzy Army—all super-cool people, all super-pumped to meet the Boss. After Ozzy signed about five CDs the store completely ran out of the new record. The shelves were pillaged to find every last CD with Ozzy’s name on it—one copy of Blizzard of Oz, two copies of Diary of a Madman, one copy of Bark at the Moon, one copy of Master of Reality, and two copies of Paranoid—and that’s all, folks! They had booked a living legend to appear in their store, the Prince of fucking Darkness, and had a total of twelve fucking copies of any music with Ozzy on it—twelve fucking copies to span his entire career of music! The only problem is, we had fifteen hundred fucking people wanting to buy a record and have Ozzy sign it. If the store manager had pulled this horseshit at any other job he would have been fucking fired, killed by a death squad in some countries—STRIKE TWO!
It gets better.
Instead of signing flyers or posters or whatever promotional items might have been brought into the store to promote the fucking album (which, by the way, are supposed to be supplied by the fucking record company), the Boss and the band were signing fucking paper towels from the fucking bathrooms. Oz, being the super-cool guy that he is, just signed anything handed to him. He greeted everybody, right up to the last person waiting in line to meet him and the store employees as well. After we left, on the way back to the hotel, that’s when he laid it down.
“Fucking napkins? How many years have I been doing this shit and I’m signing fucking napkins from the bathroom at a record in-store? Are you fucking kidding me?”
After Mom got word of this fucking fiasco of doom, each day we rolled into any town to do a show, she had the assistant to the band (which really meant best friend and drinking partner)—Will “the Chill”—go out to every fucking store and take an inventory of every last Ozzy record in the place, the name of the store, the manager, contact numbers, addresses. That way when Mom called the record company as we were headed out to bring the doom, she could say, “We were in Miami yesterday and there were no fucking Ozzy records in the stores, assholes!”
The record company would fire back, “Yes there are! There are tons of Ozzy records out there!”
Mom would reply, “Listen, cocksuckers, don’t you fucking lie to me! I’ve got my assistant going out to every big chain and mom-and-pop record store out there! I’ve got a list of names, dates