Half Prince of Darkness and half Jeremy Beadle

The former slaughterhouse worker was one of the funniest rock stars I ever met — and indisputably the most dangerous.

- By Garry Bushell

He was half Prince Of Darkness and half a devilish version of Jeremy Beadle.

I was with Ozzy in Florida when a roadie approached him with a problem. It was the last day of the tour and he’d caught something unmentionable.

Ozzy thought for a moment, stroked his chin sagely and then advised the poor gullible fellow to bathe his bits in Domestos.

“Really Oz?” said the roadie.

“Yes,” replied Ozzy. “Because Domestos kills 99% of all known germs. Isn’t that right, Garry?” - making me complicit to his evil.

The roadie went away happy and we knew he’d done what Ozzy had advised because, half an hour later, we heard the agonised screams from the floor below.

Ozzy thought nothing of piddling in people's pockets or setting fire to roadies. He'd pass around a hip-flask full of aftershave and once shaved off a keyboard-player's hair.

He was open about his drug consumption.

When I asked him how often he’d dropped acid, he replied: “Only about 900 times. I used to swallow handfuls at a time.

“The worst trip I ever had was after I took four tabs of acid and two tabs of mescaline.

“I wandered into this field totally out of it and started talking to this horse. I talked to this bloody horse for hours and in the end the horse told me to f*** off. That’s when I knew things were getting out of hand.”