RUDY SARZO On Coping With RANDY RHOADS' Tragic Death: We All Deal With Grief In Different Ways

April 29, 2011

Mark Voger of The Star-Ledger recently conducted an interview with legendary hard rock and heavy metal bassist Rudy Sarzo (OZZY OSBOURNE, QUIET RIOT, WHITESNAKE, DIO, BLUE ÖYSTER CULT).

When asked about the tragic 1982 airplane accident — a morning joy ride gone horribly wrong in Florida — that took the life of OZZY OSBOURNE/ex-QUIET RIOT guitarist Randy Rhoads, Sarzo said, "We all deal with grief in different ways. You're grieving and you learn to live with the passing of your friend — somebody who I owe my career to, someone who saved our lives by turning the plane from actually completely crashing into the bus where we were sleeping, and just clipping the bus instead."

On rejoining his and Rhoads' pre-Osbourne band, then a relatively unknown Los Angeles bar band by the name of QUIET RIOT:

"I left the biggest band in the world to join total uncertainty. I just needed some peace of mind. Thank God it turned out how it did. When we got to be No. 1 in 1983, we were competing with 'Thriller', we were competing with 'Synchronicity' — all great albums of that era. That was quite an honor. It was more than just selling records. It was what it meant to achieve that in the company of artists like Michael Jackson and Sting."

On immersing himself in American rock 'n' roll after his family left Cuba for Miami in 1961, when he was 10:

"After Miami, in 1964, we relocated to New Jersey. I grew up in West New York. I went to Public School No. 5 and Memorial High.

"People ask me why I don't play Latin music. To me, rock 'n' roll — people are born to play it. To me, it's music about longing for freedom; it's music about hope. You know, rock 'n' roll is outlawed in any communist country, any fascist country. It's the ultimate form of expression."

Comments Disclaimer And Information

BLABBERMOUTH.NET uses the Facebook Comments plugin to let people comment on content on the site using their Facebook account. The comments reside on Facebook servers and are not stored on BLABBERMOUTH.NET. To comment on a BLABBERMOUTH.NET story or review, you must be logged in to an active personal account on Facebook. Once you're logged in, you will be able to comment. User comments or postings do not reflect the viewpoint of BLABBERMOUTH.NET and BLABBERMOUTH.NET does not endorse, or guarantee the accuracy of, any user comment. To report spam or any abusive, obscene, defamatory, racist, homophobic or threatening comments, or anything that may violate any applicable laws, use the "Report to Facebook" and "Mark as spam" links that appear next to the comments themselves. To do so, click the downward arrow on the top-right corner of the Facebook comment (the arrow is invisible until you roll over it) and select the appropriate action. You can also send an e-mail to blabbermouthinbox(@)gmail.com with pertinent details. BLABBERMOUTH.NET reserves the right to "hide" comments that may be considered offensive, illegal or inappropriate and to "ban" users that violate the site's Terms Of Service. Hidden comments will still appear to the user and to the user's Facebook friends. If a new comment is published from a "banned" user or contains a blacklisted word, this comment will automatically have limited visibility (the "banned" user's comments will only be visible to the user and the user's Facebook friends).