Vinny Appice Says He Wasn’t Invited to ‘Back to the Beginning’ Since He’s “Associated with Dio”
Tomorrow, the world will say goodbye to one of the most iconic metal bands of all time — the mighty Black Sabbath and its original frontman Ozzy Osbourne. The ‘Back to the Beginning’ gig is going to be a who’s who of bands influenced by the Birmingham band before the original lineup gets up to do it one more time after 20 years apart. And while everyone’s ready to fête Sabbath, one guy feels his association with another era of the band resulted in him not even getting an invite.
Ex-Black Sabbath drummer Vinny Appice, who played with the band from 1980 to 1982 and once more in 1992, revealed in an interview with Detroit’s WRIF radio station (as transcribed by Blabbermouth) that he was overlooked because he primarily played with the band when Ronnie James Dio led the band. That being said, he did play a handful of gigs with most of the original lineup at one point, taking Bill Ward’s spot in the band while he dealt with a medical issue.
“No, no, no. They didn’t contact me because times have changed and I’m associated with [the Ronnie James] Dio [version of] Black Sabbath. Even though I did play — at one point I did the European tour with Ozzy and Black Sabbath, which I thought was cool. I’m sitting there on the drum set facing the audience, and then I see Ozzy in front of me, and then Tony [Iommi, Black Sabbath guitarist] and Geezer [Butler, Black Sabbath bassist], I go, ‘This is pretty damn cool. I’m with the original band now.’ It was cool with Ronnie, of course, but now this was, like, ‘Wow.’ I’m the only other drummer that played with them at that point. So that was very cool for me. So I’m associated more with Dio, so I’m not involved in this whole thing there. So that’s okay.”
Ultimately, it sounds like his omission from tomorrow’s festivities doesn’t really bother him all that much. That being said, this continues that long-running idea that Black Sabbath — and in reality it’s Ozzy’s wife/manager Sharon Osbourne — wants to wipe the non-Ozzy era of the band from history. Who knows if that’s actually the case, but it took us how long to get the Tony Martin era stuff reissued? Really makes ya think…
