[jacksonplayer]

Cool interview. I'll be curious to read Pt. II.

From what I've read, Randy had to be talked into auditioning for Ozzy. He had little interest in it initially.

 

[jacksonplayer]

I was told Malmsteen was going to get the gig, and that Ozzy sent Randy tapes of what Malmsteen was doing and it turned on a :idea: in his head. I believe Ozzy didn't want to give the gig to Yngwie. :lol: But then I don't know if this is true.

No, that's not correct. Randy auditioned for Ozzy in 1979, at which time Yngwie was still an unknown in Sweden.

According to what I've read, the audition happened at the insistence of bassist Dana Strum, who was trying to help Ozzy put together a new band only a few months after Sabbath fired Ozzy. Strum convinced Randy to do the audition and told him to just play the unaccompanied solo he'd been doing with Quiet Riot--basically the same one you can hear on Ozzy's Tribute album.

Ozzy was in a drunken stupor when the audition happened and was about to give up on finding a guitarist. Randy was the last one to show up, and his playing so floored Ozzy that he got the gig after just a couple minutes of playing. Ozzy/Randy/Strum did a couple rehearsals in 1979 (can't remember who the drummer was) before Ozzy packed it in and went back to England. A few months later, after he'd hooked up with Bob Daisley, Ozzy called Randy out of the blue to come over to England, and that's how it all started.

 

[jacksonplayer]

No, Randy already had an interest in classical music long before he met Ozzy. Remember, his mother was a music teacher. Randy was a bluesier player, it's true, but then most of the soloing on both of his Ozzy albums is fairly bluesy. Only a few solos veer into neoclassical territory, even though Randy's writing chops showed a strong classical influence from the beginning.

I'm also pretty sure that Randy was an Uli Roth fan in the '70s just like Yngwie; that's really where the neoclassical thing came from.

Yngwie was a complete unknown until he sent that tape to Mike Varney in 1982. It's unlikely that he sent Ozzy a tape in 1979, considering that he was only about 16 at the time.

 

[jacksonplayer]

Now, I have no doubt that Malmsteen angled for the Ozzy gig at some point. Pretty much everyone in Los Angeles who owned a guitar did at some point. :lol:

Perhaps Yngwie inquired about the gig when Jake or Zakk were hired. I can imagine Yngwie and Sharon coexisting for, oh, about five minutes...

 

[jacksonplayer]

Another interesting point about the Yngwie thing is that Ozzy has never liked that type of playing. He prefers simpler, more song-oriented soloing. Randy had an uncanny ability to write solos that were complex but still as integral to the song as any of the vocal lines.