Ozzy Osbourne and Dolly Parton don’t seem like they would have much in common. However, in light of Parton declining her Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nomination, a decades-old statement from The Prince of Darkness has resurfaced.
In 1999, Black Sabbath had received their third consecutive nomination for the Rock Hall, but the heavy metal icons had yet to be inducted. This led to Osbourne issuing an official statement saying, “Just take our name off the list. Save the ink. Forget about us. The nomination is meaningless because it’s not voted on by the fans. It’s voted on by the supposed elite of the industry and the media, who’ve never bought an album or concert ticket in their lives, so their vote is totally irrelevant to me.”
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Some were annoyed or offended by Osbourne’s statement, but Patti Smith guitarist Lenny Kaye, who’s been a Rock Hall voter since it began in 1985, said at that time, “It doesn’t really have to do with one’s acceptance. It has to do with how much influence and resonance a particular band’s music has had, and there’s no question that Black Sabbath has had a major influence on the sounds that we’ve heard from the time that they began.”
Of course, Black Sabbath wouldn’t be inducted into the Rock Hall until 2006, and the lack of metal in the Rock Hall continues to be a major criticism, along with the shockingly low number of women artists in the Rock Hall.
