Jake E. Lee says that he would love to tour with Zakk Wylde.
Lee was fired from Ozzy Osbourne‘s band in 1987 and was replaced by Wylde, who has played with the BLACK SABBATH singer, on and off, for more than three decades.
Asked by Guitar World magazine if he is planning to do a full-scale tour behind “Patina”, the sophomore album from his RED DRAGON CARTEL band, Jake said: I am. I don’t think there’s any firm commitments yet other than I know we’re going to Japan in April, and we’ll probably do an American tour before that. Other than that, nothing else is actually set. We’ll probably be doing bars and clubs, although we were hoping to go out on tour with somebody. Ideally, we wanted to do something with Zakk Wylde, because I just think that would be really cool to have two Ozzy guitar players together.”
Lee went on to say that he thinks the idea has already been broached with Wylde‘s management. “Because I don’t know Zakk personally,” he explained. “I only met him once and that was when he was 19 — back when he was skinny and pretty, you know? [Laughs] But it’s been a long time since I’ve actually talked to Zakk.”
According to Jake, he met Zakk right after Wylde landed the Ozzy gig. “We were at some hotel in L.A. — I can’t think of the name — for a BADLANDS meeting,” he said. “And Ozzy walked by. And then Zakk walked by and he introduced himself. And he was really cool. I mean, I had nothing against him… I just wished him luck. It was a very brief meeting. But he seemed like a nice guy and he’s always been very kind to me in the press.”
Lee recently told Ultimate Guitar that Wylde is “an incredible guitar player” who “ended up being a better fit with Ozzy than I ever was.” He said: “I was hoping, a little piece of me was hoping [Ozzy‘s first album with Zakk, 1988’s] ‘No Rest For The Wicked’ was gonna kind of suck. You can’t help it. You want to — ‘Oh, look, he’s not as good without me.’ But it was an incredible record. And kudos to Zakk, he did a great job.”
Lee, who was tapped by Ozzy to replace the late Randy Rhoads in Osbourne‘s band, played on two Ozzy records: 1983’s “Bark At The Moon” and 1986’s “The Ultimate Sin”.
