"Sabbath were there for me before punk." Duff Mckagan on recording with Ozzy, jamming with Tony Iommi and why Black Sabbath were true punks

He might be famous as Guns N' Roses punk bassist, but Duff McKagan has always professed a love for music in many forms, with a longstanding relationship to both Sabbath and Ozzy Osbourne, even playing on the latter's last two albums.

Hammer caught up with Duff ahead of his participation in the almighty Back To The Beginning gig to find out what Sabbath - and Ozzy - meant to him.

What did Black Sabbath mean to a young punk fan growing up in Seattle?

“Sabbath were there for me before punk. We had an FM radio station that would play whole sides of new albums. I heard Iron Man, and to a six- or seven-year-old, that’s, like, ‘Wow!’ And then when you start playing, you go, ‘Well, maybe I could play that.’ Sabbath seemed to make things accessible.”

Did you play Sabbath covers in your early bands? “[Duff’s teenage punk group] The Fartz did Children Of The Grave. This was back in ’81. I was playing drums then, but I didn’t try the fancy stuff. We were hardcore - we just went faster. When you go faster, you can get away with a bunch of stuff.”

Was there any punk in Sabbath?

“Without a doubt. Punk rock to me was doing what you wanted to do with truth and integrity, and that was Sabbath too. They did not give a fuck. They went to the edge many times. And it’s not just punk. Sabbath Bloody Sabbath, when it drops down to that low D-riff… without that fucking riff there’s no Seattle sound, there’s no desert rock.”

When did you first meet Ozzy or the rest of Sabbath?

“Ozzy, it could have been the late 80s or early 90s, I don’t know. I famously had a little dark period, which I don’t remember a lot from, and he famously had a couple of dark periods. Velvet Revolver did the Ozzfest and I got to hang out with him. We were like, ‘Did we hang out back then? It feels like we may have done…’

“Then a few years later, maybe 2012, I get a call from Sharon: ‘Could you come out here and jam with them? Ozzy and Tony are in the studio downstairs - Geezer’s not here, but Tony’s hot.’ I’m like, ‘Wait, you want me to play with them?!’ I got to see the genesis of Tony Iommi’s riffs. I got to see Ozzy scribbling away lyrics. And then we’d go upstairs and have tea, and they’d be talking about some teacher they had in elementary school. It was so cool.”

You played on Ozzy’s two most recent solo albums. What was that like?

“[Producer and guitarist] Andrew Watt called me up. He said, ‘Man, I’m making this Ozzy record, I think we gotta do something quick – Ozzy’s ready.’ So me, [Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer] Chad Smith and Watt went in and recorded nine songs in four days. We’d listen to Black Flag or Nazareth on the way to the studio, not Ozzy or Sabbath, just to bring something fresh to it. That was Ordinary Man. We wrote some songs for the next record too. It was pretty epic. We all got bat tattoos.”

What makes Ozzy a great frontman?

“He made it seem like anyone could get up and sing. Not that he’s not a great singer – he is. But Robert Plant – I can’t sing like that. But Ozzy? He was one of us."

You can still order an official Back To The Beginning programme, with all proceeds going to the Big Issue, from the official Louder store