Bill Ward has placed an announcement online in response to all the Email, faxes, letters, & cards wishing him well. Check it out below.

(continue reading…)

Bill Ward is back home now in California and is resting up comfortably. His doctors told him he can’t get behind a drum kit until August. At that point, Bill will be teaming up with BWB drummer Ronnie Ciago on a regiment designed to build up Bill’s health for the forthcoming US Black Sabbath tour in the fall.

Thanks for all the get well cards and emails, Bill appreciates them all!

The following is a fax received from Bill Ward in the UK:

On Wednesday, June 3rd as part of the follow up work as a result of his May 19th heart attack, Ward underwent a angioplasty procedure. He was discharged from Cardiff University Hospital on Friday 5th June. The procedure performed by Doctor Peter Groves has been a complete 100% success. Ward has been relaxing and exercising as per the rehabilitation program proposed by Neville Hall Hospital, Abergavenny, Wales. A series of regular check ups, blood tests and treadmill workouts are all showing very positive. Ward anticipates being far fitter than he was prior to the May 19th heart attack within the next two months. He will be visiting his band mates at Milton Keynes Ozzfest concert on Saturday June 20th.

— End of Fax —

Bill did make an appearance at the concert, and was introduced by Ozzy in the middle of the set, who promptly proceeded to pull down Bill’s pants in front of 60,000 people. Bill then watched the rest of the gig from the side of the stage.

This past week, during rehearsals for the Black Sabbath tour of Europe, Bill Ward started experiencing pain in his chest. He was taken to the hospital, and it was discovered he had had a mild heart attack. Currently, he is resting, and is doing well. Bill has been told to not fly for 6 weeks, and of course, he can’t tour with Black Sabbath this spring in Europe.

To this, Vinny Appice has been brought in at the last second to rehearse with the band and will take Bill’s slot for the European tour. Bill hopes to be back behind the kit for the US dates later this year.

If you would like to send get well cards, you can send them to Mungus Shine Entertainment’s Post Office Box here:

Mungus Shine Entertainment
P.O Box 3624
Seal Beach, CA 90740-7624

We will keep you updated here with any further developments in this story. A statement from Bill himself is forthcoming.

On Feburary 18th, Bill Ward is to be interviewed LIVE on KNAC. You can hear this on the Internet by going to http://www.knaclive.com. Here is some info from KNAC about the event:

KNAC on the Net (http://www.knaclive.com) premieres on Sunday, February 15th at 2pm PST with the return of many of the original KNAC-FM personalities gathered, on the air, to celebrate the stations return. Numerous surprise guests will join in on this first day “on air” celebration and throughout the first week to help kick off the return of this groundbreaking station to the Net.

On Wednesday, February 18th, from 7pm to 12midnite PST, is the return of Thrasher to KNAC on the Net in the form of ThrasherNet, CO-hosted by former Pure Rock Talkback Host Mike Stark. Expect a night of firsts. The “first” guest on their “first” show will be the drummer for the “first” metal band Black Sabbath – Bill Ward. Ward will discuss a possible Sabbath reunion tour of the US and his recent solo work.

This review originally appeared in Issue #542 of the Black Sabbath Mailing List on April 29, 1997. Brad was also kind enough to send in a handful of pictures he took at this gig; you can see them in the slideshow below. Click on the slideshow for larger pictures.

From: Brad Mozley (bradmozley@astec.com)
Date: Mon, 28 Apr 1997 17:32:04 -0700
Subject: I met Bill Ward

(Tomorrows) Dreams really do come true.

This past Friday (25 April, 1997) Bill Ward played a small club in Fullerton, California. A club called “Club 369”, named for the numbers of people the place holds but I doubt if there were 150 people there. There were 3 warm up bands, first one called “Something Meaningless”, the second one called “O.C. Bent” and the third called “Gaff”. All heavy alternative rock bands. It was interesting to note that when the announcer spoke over the PA and announced each band, you would hear some what of a moderate cheer and then he would say “and later on we have Bill Ward”, not a single cheer in the crowd. I really didn’t care for these bands, though each band played with an incredible amount of energy.

Then it was about midnight and the lights dimmed, a tape was being played, sort of an interview of Bill, with an incredible, heart beat like, intense laser sound playing along with the interview. Then this musician comes out on stage sits down with a cello and starts playing. The crowd seems puzzled and starts getting into it and then he breaks out into “Iron Man”. The crowd went crazy! (All pretty much echo of the show Chuck Begian saw last week in Phoenix, check out post #535, Thursday, April 17, 1997). My friend and I had the best seats in the house, about 5 feet from the stage. We took loads of pictures should get them back in a couple of days.

My thoughts on the performance:

Bill, through all the battles in his life, can still rock. He performed with an incredible amount of energy. The way he darted back and forth, first he’d go to his drum kit and beat on it for awhile then back to center stage, where a large floor tom was and he would beat on that for awhile, like a man gone mad. It was fantastic! He played my favorite solo track, “Bombers Can Open Bomb Bays”, great version. He played several tracks from his new CD, “When the Bough Breaks”. Most notable, “Children Killing Children”. Great track! One of the closing numbers was “It’s Alright”. He announced it by saying, “this is something I did with Black Sabbath 23 years ago”. Then the show was over. The announcer came on and said “Bill will be out in about 15 minutes to sign autographs”. So I took that opportunity to dash out to my car and get the items I had for him to sign. I had been thinking about the items for him to sign for the last couple of days. Finally I decided on Vol. 4 (inside gatefold of Bill) and an 11 x 14 photo of Bill taken in 1976 at the Long Beach Arena. I got back and waited for a short while, then I saw Bill starting to walk out from the side of the stage. At this point, there was one person in front of me. Bill greeted him and signed a poster, then it was my turn.

I was incredibly nervous, I mean here I was standing next to a Sab and been following for the last 26 years. At first the words just wouldn’t come out. Then I said “It’s a great honor to meet you Bill”, I told him my name, he quietly repeated it, we shook hands, and then the words started to flow. He signed the 2 items I had and I asked if I could get a picture of us and he said sure. My friend took several pictures of me and Bill, (I get them back in a couple of days), can’t wait. Bill and I talked for about 5 minutes. We talked about the photo he signed, his new CD, “When the Bough Breaks” (due out 29 April), the show tonight and about our mutual friend in Birmingham, England that I met a couple of years ago on my trip to England. She is a personal friend of Bill. Then he moved on to some other fans to sign autographs, I went over to my car to drop off my things and return to the gathering (only about 5 people). Then one of his crew said let’s get going. Bill finished up signing autographs, then Bill looked at me, reached out to shake my hand again and said, “nice meeting you, Brad”. Then he signed one more autograph, look at me one last time and said “see you Brad” and I said, “take care Bill”. Then he was off.

Brad ‘oz’ Mozley

This review originally appeared in Issue #535 of the Black Sabbath Mailing List on April 17, 1997.

Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 2:00:00 -0500
From: Charles Begian-SC2163 (Charles_Begian-SC2163@email.mot.com)
Subject: Bill Ward LIVE in Phoenix

Sometimes, things happen for a reason.

I missed my Tampa to Phoenix flight on Sunday, so I had to take the Monday afternoon flight. Because of that, I was driving back from Phoenix airport a bit after 8PM on Monday night, when “Sweet Leaf” came on the radio. Pleasantly suprised that the Phoenix rock station, KUPD-FM, was playing something other than “Iron Man” or “Paranoid”, I turned up the radio. When the song finished, the DJ came on and said something about “getting you in the mood for Ozzfest… oh, and by the way, Bill Ward is playing tonight in Phoenix at the Mason Jar…” BILL WARD!! I almost drove off the road! Hurried to my apartment and dropped off the luggage. A quick check of the Yellow Pages gave me an address for the Mason Jar Nite Club. Armed with that and a Phoenix map, I hit the road. Some 27 miles later, I arrived at the Mason Jar. The rest of this post is my report to you, esteemed Mailing List Readers, of what I saw and heard.

The Mason Jar Nite Club turned out to be a small bar on the north side of Phoenix. The sign outside listed the names of two local bands, plus the “Bill Ward Band”. Arriving at 9:15PM, I got a seat at the second row of tables, about 10 feet from the mike stand (if you’ve never seen a performance in a small club, I highly recommend it – you get to see the band up close without getting crushed against a stage barrier – and you’ve always got someplace to rest your beer – but, I digress…). There were about 40 people in the place, with more coming in. Being that this place serves alcohol, there weren’t any under-21 fans there. I would place the average age at about 28. Suprisingly, some of the people I talked to didn’t know who Bill Ward is – they thought the “Bill Ward Band” was just another local band. They would soon be enlightened.

The first opening band took the stage late, and played too long. Believe they were called “Pure Grain” or something like that. The second band was better, but I didn’t catch their name. Bill Ward Band was due to start at 11:15, but due to the opening act being late, it was 11:45 before they would take the stage. By then, the crowd had grown to about 60-70 people (which pretty much filled the place).

While their equipment was being set up, it became obvious that there was going to be a *lot* of talent on that stage. I counted ten(!) different guitars, two drum kits (the larger one was in the center, at the back of the stage, with a smaller one on the right side of the stage) and A MANDOLIN! The PA system was playing various tracks from Master of Reality, in (what seemed to me like) random order. A chair was set up at center stage. The house lights dimmed. The crowd began to make that great noise which can only be described as a mixture of raw energy and anticipation. There is movement at side stage, and then…

Instead of Bill, out walks a young musician in a white tuxedo. He is carrying a cello(!). Calmly, he sits in the chair at center stage, and as the stage lights begin to glow, he begins to play. At first, he played a few bars of something that I (not knowing much about cello music) didn’t recognize. The crowd grew silent for a moment, puzzled by what was happening, but listening with anticipation for something they could connect with. They didn’t have long to wait. The cello player began playing the opening riff to “Iron Man”. The crowd went wild! He played it slowly at first, progressively becoming more aggressive. It was the perfect way to set the tone for the evening – the music that followed wouldn’t necessarily be like Sabbath, but it would be played by musicians that were true professionals, and with proper respect paid to Bill’s Sabbath roots. The cellist finished playing, and left the stage with much well-deserved applause. More on him later.

The Bill Ward Band then took the stage. The band lineup was a bit different than what Joe has listed on his site for “When the Bough Breaks”. I can confirm that Ronnie Ciago was on the main drum kit, and I believe Keith Lynch was on lead guitar, but Bill also had a second guitarist (who later played that mandolin) and a bass player (Paul Ill?). Bill introduced the band at the end of the show, but the crowd was making so much noise that I only heard Ciago’s name for sure.

Bill took the mike, and the band opened with (Mobile) Shooting Gallery. Bill never stops moving during this song, right side, left side, center stage – all the while, his eyes are darting back and forth across the crowd. He seems a bit nervous during the first song, but this quickly passes. As the show progresses, he steadily builds steam – audience applause seems to give him energy.

The next song is something from the new album “When the Bough Breaks” (due out in the US April 29). I notice that the band is tight. Bill goes over to the small drum kit, and begins “beating the skins”. He is about 15 feet from me now, but I can clearly see that something more than drumming is taking place. Bill gets a fierce look in his eyes, something like a growling dog that is ready to pounce. He is in his element. For those of you that might be wondering if Bill can still drum – I’ve seen it! He can still play – and with a vengance.

The Bill Ward Band’s set lasts about an hour, followed by two encores, for a total of about 1:15. Most of the set is from the new album, notably a great version of “Children Killing Children”. He also did an *acoustic* version of “Bombers Can Open Bomb Bays” from the “Ward One” album (I was hoping they would do “Tall Stories” from that album, but no such luck… maybe they’ll add it to the setlist this summer).

Some notes on the performance:

As I said, the band is tight. All of them did a good job (Ciago especially) but I would have liked to hear a solo or two from the others.

Physically, Bill does not look like an athlete. He is approaching 50, and it shows. However, he had no trouble completing the show. He had some water between a couple of songs, but that was it. He never left the stage, and never stopped performing at any point (he was always doing *something*, either singing or playing drums). I was paying special attention to this, as we all know the problems he has had to overcome in the personal life. He sang all the songs for the entire show, and never sounded hoarse, or out of breath. He did sweat a bit though (but no more than a certain ex-bandmate who is at a similar age and in similar physical condition :).

Between songs, a fan yells out: “Black Sabbath!” Bill looks up, and smiling, responds: “God bless you!”.

The band played two encores. The first was “It’s Alright”. Bill introduced it by saying, “This next song I did with the Sabs, well (pause) a long time ago”. The second encore was from the new material, but I didn’t catch the name of it.

At the end of the show, Bill thanked the crowd, explaining that the band was just “taking its baby steps”, and seemed to be pleased that they had gone over so well with the audience.

After the show, the band went back into a dressing room. The cellist was standing by the door, still in his tux. I chatted with him for a moment, complimenting him on his performance. Found out that his name is Chris Lancaster (“I’ll give you my card so you won’t misspell my name”). Chris was very personable, as was everyone associated with the show, from the band to the guys from Mungus Shine Entertainment. Hope that Chris goes out on the regular tour – he’s well worth seeing.

At this point, the Mungus Shine guys come by and say that Bill will be out to sign autographs in a few minutes, and that the line was forming outside (the club owners were trying to get people cleared out, it was almost 1:30AM). My sincere thanks to the Mungus Shine crew. At all times, they treated the fans with respect and courtesy. They seemed to be genuinely interested in making Bill accessible to us, and promoting the band without raping our wallets (the posters were $4, and they gave away some pictures of the band for free. I also saw at least one person with a CD-single from the soon-to-be re-released “Ward One”).

There were approximately 20 people waiting outside when Bill came out. He sat in the back of car, sitting on the back of a lowered tailgate. He had a towel on his head, and a jacket draped over his shoulders. With his long hair, he looked something like an old prophet, sitting with his legs crossed, addressing the faithful. He signed all kinds of things for people – one guy had 3 Sabbath LPs signed – another had his girlfriend take his picture sitting next to Bill. Everyone was trying to talk to him at once, asking all sorts of questions. Someone asked where they were playing next. He said that they were going back to L.A. (which would have been on Tuesday) and then back in the studio. There will be a tour, but no details are firm yet. He was signing the cover of the album “Black Sabbath”, when I asked where the picture was taken. Was it his farm? He said that no, it was not his farm, and he really wasn’t sure where they took the picture. Finally, my turn came for an autograph. What
do you say to a Sab? While he signed my poster, I said something about him going through a lot of hard times, and thanked him for not giving up. He smiled, and said, “no, we never give up. Rock ‘n roll, y’know”. I wanted to talk to him more, but there were other people waiting, so we shook hands, and he said “Pleasure meeting you, Chuck”. I was struck by Bill’s politeness towards people, and his total lack of pomposity or “rock star ego”. Soft-spoken and good-natured, he projected an aura of calm – a man who after a long and arduous personal journey, is finally at peace with himself. He didn’t need to impress anybody that night – he’d been there and done all that before. Rather, he was a musician, sitting on a tailgate in a parking lot in Phoenix, making and playing music because that’s what he loves to do.

This summer will find many of us at one of the Ozzfests, paying steep prices to hear 30 minutes of what Sharon Osbourne tells us we want, while wondering “Where’s Bill?”. I’ll tell you where Bill will be. He’ll be playing to a smaller crowd somewhere, in a smaller venue for a smaller price…

Somewhere, Bill will be giving it all, and asking for no return.

-Chuck Begian

Bill’s first ever live gig as a solo artist was on March 26, 1997 at Club 369 in Fullerton, California. Here is a review of the show as it appeared in the L.A. Times.

Friday, March 28, 1997
It Used to Be Black, but a New Dawn Is Rising

Pop music review: Sabbath old-timer Bill Ward goes solo, shedding light on the prevailing darkness of ’90s arena rock.

By MIKE BOEHM, Times Staff Writer FULLERTON–What’s more unusual nowadays than a rock show by a vintage figure from the ’60s and ’70s that carries an aura of uncertainty, risk and nervous expectation?

Bill Ward, who pounded the drums in Black Sabbath from 1968 to 1984, provided that rare opportunity Wednesday night at Club 369. It was Ward’s first concert as a solo artist, and it came off the way a screenwriter might have scripted it: from early jitters, to gathering confidence before an enthusiastic and warmly supportive crowd of about 250 fans, to final confirmation that a valuable new-but-old figure has arrived on the hard-rock scene.

It left Ward beaming and happily babbling. “It’s a beautiful night,” he said repeatedly.

More important than marking a personal milestone, the evening posed intriguing questions about what the future might hold for a very promising singer-songwriter-bandleader whose music is built on sturdy, familiar elements (albeit far more of Cream, the Who and Pink Floyd than of Black Sabbath) yet whose approach is full of anomalies for today’s hard-rock world.

Ward’s expressions of hope and outraged innocence contrast markedly with the prevailing darkness of ’90s arena rock; it’s not Pollyanna-ish, but born of hard experience.

Ward earned it during the early ’80s, when he fought a climactic, nearly fatal battle with alcoholism, and again in the early ’90s, when he had more rough personal sledding that sidetracked him for a time after the 1990 release of his first solo album, “Ward One: Along the Way.”

Ward, 48, is a transplanted Englishman who has lived in Orange County for almost 15 years, most of them in Seal Beach. He arrives at his solo performing career well armed to do battle.

In addition to “Along the Way,” which he plans to re-release, he has two new albums in the can–“When the Bough Breaks” will come out April 29 on Cleopatra Records, a Los Angeles-based independent label, and “Remembering” is scheduled to follow in September.

Ward’s 70-minute set drew from all three–an unusual advantage for an emerging artist.

The striking, varied dynamics and structure of his material–ranging from driving rock to acoustic ballads, with some songs oscillating between the two–ensured that there would be no ruts.

Ward’s stage persona also betokened good things. His jitters lasted all of about three minutes as he paced the stage with his eyes down, failing to reach out and connect as he sang the opening number, “Mobile Shooting Gallery.” By its spontaneously riffing ending, though, Ward was stretching his voice and projecting outward.

Many years’ worth of stored-up nervous energy had him pacing and shuffling about more than he needed to during the show–sometimes costing him the focus that can best be gained by standing still, fixing one’s gaze and singing to the back row. But Ward benefited from the strong emotional content written into his material, which allowed for connections forged of far sturdier stuff than stagecraft alone.

He repeatedly showed a dramatic flair, and his expressive face mapped out feelings as he sang. One surprise was Ward’s comic gift. Skittering about in a slope-shouldered posture, he was not altogether unlike a certain gnomish, bleaty-voiced fellow, nicknamed Ozzy. * * *

But rather than playing a heavy-metal gnome like his old band’s singer, Ward, decked out in a tweed vest over a loose smock and billowing white pajama-like pants, resembled a village baker or blacksmith from the pages of “Great Expectations” or “Tom Jones.”.

Ward led off with a sequence of hard-driving songs, supported by the marvelous, cowbell-syncopated drumming of Ronnie Ciago, who spent the show smiling like a kid unwrapping Christmas presents.

Ward, known for establishing, along with Led Zeppelin’s John Bonham, the slog-and-tromp heaviness of heavy metal, occasionally sauntered over to a smaller kit, which he used to tap out accents and embellishments, including some jazzy fills in one double-drummer sequence. Playing standing, he added to the show’s humor by circling around his drum kit, tapping at cymbals and skins like a mad professor poring over his test tubes.

Like Ciago, bassist Paul Ill added heaviness in a supple way; unlike Ciago, the tattooed, shaven-headed Ill was all fixed-jawed intensity. Keith Lynch and Spencer Sercombe formed a good, complementary guitar tandem–Lynch with wailing, Cream-era Clapton-like tones and harder metal-chug riffs, and Sercombe offering some nice, lyrical and economical leads that called to mind Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour. * * *

Ward’s innocence is his essence. On the ballads “Children Killing Children” and “That’s Somebody’s Heart,” his litany-like lyrics were simple and innocent almost to the point of naivete. The tenderness in Ward’s voice–a bit like Roger Daltrey in his quietest mode–and the pleading look on his face allowed him to pull it off.

In “That’s Somebody’s Heart,” Ward fondly added all three of his Sabbath mates to the chorus’ plaintive litany–“Don’t step on Oz, friend, ’cause he’s got a heart,” he sang. Far from disowning his Sabbath past, Ward embraced it in a dramatic opening flourish that found a cellist sawing out famous Black Sabbath riffs before Ward’s band arrived on stage, and he began his encore with “That’s Alright,” a ballad he originally sang in Black Sabbath. It carried an atypical (for Sabbath) message of comfort and warmth.

Will today’s hard-rock kids sit still for tenderness–the way the mainly twenty- and thirty-something crowd did so raptly at Club 369? Or will they tune out Ward before they can get to numbers such as the concluding “Shine,” an excellent, ambitiously constructed anthem that moves between biting self-examination and soaring affirmation–all delivered in a supple, confident voice?

It’s nice to have some interesting questions to ponder as this intriguing, contradictory, newly arrived old-timer moves forward.

As for the verdict on his maiden solo voyage, Ward gave it himself in the ebullient chorus of his pre-encore closing number: “Reach out, reach out, reach out, whoa / This has to be your finest hour.”