Emily Mack
By this point, Ozzy Osbourne is as famous for his out-of-control rock star lifestyle as he is for the metal music that powered it. The Black Sabbath singer’s personal life, specifically his abuse of drugs and alcohol, has been salacious tabloid fodder since the 1970s.
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So is it really any surprise that Osbourne once communed with a horse — for an hour — off 10 tabs of acid?
Ozzy Osbourne’s Drug Abuse
Beginning in the early ’70s, Ozzy Osbourne’s life was defined by his drug use, causing friction within his bands and his marriages, first to Thelma Riley, then to Sharon Osbourne. Though all the members of Black Sabbath were getting high, it was Osbourne who went fully out of control. From cocaine to quaaludes to Vicodin to psychedelics to glue to heroin to rampant drinking, Ozzy did it all! And he did it a lot.
Osbourne lived up to his nickname: The Prince of Darkness. But his behavior became unacceptable in 1989 when, in a drugged-out haze, he attempted to strangle his wife Sharon. Soon after, Osbourne sought treatment and went to rehab, and Sharon remained by his side, refusing to press charges. Since then, Osbourne has remained sober, on and off, and is currently about eight years clean.
But that doesn’t mean we can’t still enjoy some of the star’s most out-there drug stories.
The Horse Story
Ozzy Osbourne walks into a field…
Ozzy Osbourne, now 73, always speaks about his drag-addled past with a colorful candor. Just recently, he sat down with the Daily Star and shared an especially wild detail about doing acid back in his party days.
“At that time in America, people were very fond of lacing your drinks with acid,” Osbourne said — and he didn’t care.“I used to swallow handfuls of tabs at a time,” he said. But the habit was cut short once he returned to England, roughly around 1972. It was that then Osbourne took 10 tabs and went on a walk in a field. In that field, he came face-to-face with a horse.
“I ended up standing there talking to this horse for about an hour,” Osbourne said. “[And] In the end the horse turned round and told me to f*** off. That was it for me.” Osbourne said the ridiculous animal experience made him reconsider using the drug for some time.
This is what happens when you use LSD to avoid pain and suffering rather than to confront it. Your pain and suffering manifest as scary images because they come from scary images you have in your unconscious mind. I’m looking forward to legalized clinical psychotherapeutic use of psychedelics, because in a clinical environment, with proper “set and setting” (intentions and environment) and professional integration therapy after the session, you can confront the sources of your suffering and transcend them. I’m sorry Ozzy was in so much pain that he had to constantly find ways to escape it, and that our society stigmatized and made illegal the healing use of the same substances that frightened him.