by In 1982, Jake E. Lee became Ozzy’s second full-time guitarist, inheriting the position from the tragically deceased Randy Rhoads. After the young guitarist’s passing, Ozzy’s band had to keep working due to previously made commitments, and they considered George Lynch as their potential new guitarist.
At the time, Jake E. Lee was working with Ronnie James Dio. He was invited to audition for Ozzy through a mutual friend, Slaughter bassist Dana Strum.
“So Dana checked out all the bands and saw what he thought were the 10 best guitar players,” Lee recalled on the Talk Is Jericho podcast (transcribed by Ultimate Guitar). “We all went into his studio and he took our photo, and then said, ‘Play something.'”
“I’m like, ‘Play what?’ He goes, ‘Whatever you want.’ So I just doodled for about a minute and a half. They sent all those to Sharon and Ozzy, and they picked three: Me, Mitch Perry, and someone else.”
When the day of his audition came, everything that could go wrong did. “I showed up late because Wendy Dio tried to prevent me from going to the audition,” Lee stated. “All my gear was in a storage locker, and when I got there, one of our roadies said, ‘Wendy says you can’t take anything.'”
Lee argued with the roadie for about fifteen minutes, then asked, “Are you gonna be the guy that stops me from auditioning for Ozzy Osbourne?” The roadie allowed him to take his gear, but Lee had to take it all out by himself. He said:
“When I got to the audition, I was late. And according to Sharon, my whole attitude after that helped me get the gig. She said, ‘You’re late. We just about walked out.’ I said, ‘Well, I’m here now. Do you want me to play or not?’ I didn’t know that much about Sharon. I might not have put it that way [if he had known]. But she went, ‘Yeah, okay. Go ahead and play.'”
“I kind of messed the songs up because with ‘Crazy Train’ and ‘I Don’t Know,’ you could swap parts in those songs. And I did, because I’d just learned them the night before. So I was kind of screwing up, and I thought, ‘Yeah, I’m not getting this gig.'”
As Lee remembered, Ozzy nodded after he was done, and then spoke quietly to Sharon. Lee shared:
“Then Sharon asked, ‘Can you do a solo?’ ‘You mean, like ‘Eruption?’ And she went, ‘Yeah, could you do that?’ I said, ‘Yeah, if I worked one out. I don’t have anything prepared, and I’m not going to do it because I already fucked the songs up.'”
Even though he gave them an attitude, the Osbournes decided Lee was the perfect fit. They just had to tell him he was hired, and tell George Lynch to leave.
“So I’m packing my gear up, and George walks in,” Lee said. “I’m about to introduce myself, because I hadn’t met him before that, and then Ozzy comes up, looks at me, and goes, ‘You want the gig?’ And he turned to George and said, ‘He’s got it. You don’t. You’re fired.'”
