Sharon Osbourne said that Ronnie James Dio could never replace Ozzy Osbourne on Black Sabbath. She talked about that on Steve-O’s podcast, saying that the singer’s voice did not fit the group’s musical style. After Ozzy was fired due to heavy drinking and drug abuse, Black Sabbath’s first two albums with Dio were Heaven and Hell (1980) and Mob Rules (1981).
Sharon Osbourne said about Ronnie James Dio replacing Ozzy Osbourne on Black Sabbath:
“They had two hit albums,” she said. “They did, they had two good hit albums, they had two good tours together. Then it was the band were fighting. There was a lot of fighting in the band with Ronnie.”
“Ronnie had a great voice but to change a band that had a kind of bluesy type vocal, real gritty bluesy vocal to a rock opera vocal, it was so different,” she said. “I always looked at Ronnie as a Rock opera type singer. Ozzy had such a bluesy voice, I never got it.”
However, she likes Dio’s solo albums:
“He’s good. On his own, Dio’s great. Well, they kept getting all these different guys in.Every week it was somebody else and somebody else. They were doing really badly and taking silly gigs, like playing under somebody.
“They weren’t the headlineer anymore. Always when you go from that headliner to okay, now you’re underneath and you’re on somebody else’s tour. For so long it’s your tour and you’re the headliner, then you drop, it’s very humbling.”
Ronnie James Dio death
Back in 2009, Dio was diagnosed with stomach cancer and underwent treatment at the M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, Texas. On May 4, 2010, Heaven & Hell announced they were canceling all summer dates as a result of Dio’s health condition. His last live performance was with Heaven & Hell on August 29, 2009, in Atlantic City, New Jersey. After that, Dio died of the illness on May 16, 2010.