64 Trashed

(Butler, Gillan, Iommi, Ward)
From the Black Sabbath album Born Again & also from Gillan's Inn

I was drunk, mullahed, way too happy. Returning from the local pub in my small inflatable dinghy by way of the canal and feeling adventurous I decided to do some laps in my Ford - well to be honest I really did think it was my car. Our enterprising Tour Manager, Paul Clarke, had bought a few at auction for us to use during the session. It was a lot cheaper than renting and the plan was to sell them on again when we had finished.

Now where was I? Ah yes, on the small racetrack that Richard Branson had kindly installed at 'The Manor' (a residential studio he owns near Oxford in England). The assembled company - the 'Ladies of the Manor', Peter Resty (Tony Iommi's guitar tech) and Ian 'Greenfly' the Buddhist gardener - were in attendance as spectators, timekeepers and drivers; once I had finished my stint they were each going to attempt to improve upon my time.

I did have a small mishap though; having clipped a pile of tyres on a previous lap, I ran over one of them on the next and was instantly flipped, skidding and spinning upside down at a high speed and for a great distance along the road, until I stopped eventually, inches short of the swimming pool.

Had I travelled further I would surely have drowned, because it took me an age to release myself from the inertia seatbelt from which I was suspended. Being ever safety conscious though, I was lucky enough to be wearing a crash helmet. This I'd brought along with my motorbike (Ossa 250) as I was building a ramp near my tent in the grounds with the idea of jumping the lake the next morning. That never happened as I was feeling a bit rough, but I did go into the studio and write this song over a backing track written the day before by Tony, Geezer and Bill.

Anyway it turned out I was mistaken in my assumption that the car was mine, it wasn't. Apparently it belonged to Bill Ward, which explains (sort of) the disappearance of my boat the following day. I thought it had been stolen and reported the 'theft' to the police, who told me they hadn't the slightest interest in tracing it but would I, '…please sign an autograph or two?' I think they suspected that I might have been involved in one or two other 'incidents' that had disturbed the peace of late.

It was many moons later I discovered that - as some perverse form of punishment - my boat had been more trashed than I was, by - well I won't say who, but it was slightly over the top chaps. Never mind, forgive and forget I say. However there was absolutely no excuse for Geezer's ridiculous gesture the next day when he had himself photographed for a newspaper, posing in front of the wreckage of Bill's car - sorry again Bill - pretending that he was the perp. I grew out of that sort of childish behaviour when I was thirty-five years old.