Former Ozzy Osbourne guitarist Jake E. Lee spoke in an interview with Eddie Trunk Podcast and talked about why he did not get credit for writing the music on “Bark At the Moon”.
He said that he refused to perform Ozzy Osbourne songs during live shows and here’s the statement:
“I haven’t played any Ozzy songs in 30 years, I thought it would be fun so we threw some of that in there. It quickly, for me, became uncomfortable to play the Ozzy songs. I know I was the guitar player on those songs, and I wrote the music but it just didn’t feel honest to me.
They are Ozzy songs, despite my contribution to them, they pretty much belong to Ozzy as far as I’m concerned.
So it became uncomfortable for me to do Ozzy songs live, and now that we have enough songs that we can really concentrate on the Red Dragon Cartel stuff, I decided we won’t be doing any more Ozzy songs.
We might throw a couple of Badlands songs in there, they’re still fun for me to play, but the new record [‘Patina’] is really going to make up most of the set.”
Interviewer said:
“It’s fascinating that you say that because as you said, regardless of what credits have read over the years, you did write those songs, and you did a huge part on those two albums with Ozzy. Was there anything else that went on? Was it the way they treated you so you felt uncomfortable? Was that a factor in all of this?”
Jake responded:
“No, not a factor at all. It just felt dishonest – maybe that’s too harsh of a word. They are Ozzy songs, and I will play them again if, you know, Ozzy sings. Here’s my open invitation – Ozzy, come to my show in one of these clubs – tell me you want to sing ‘Bark at the Moon’ and I will play ‘Bark at the Moon.’
It doesn’t feel right for me to play those songs, that’s all there is to it. There’s nothing on my part that feels like I haven’t gotten my due. It is what it is. But yeah, no more Ozzy songs.”
You can listen to entire interview from here. Click here to source of the statement.
