Tony Iommi hasn't properly set his former Black Sabbath bandmate Bill Ward on fire since 1980, after an over-enthusiastic pyrotechnic prank in a London recxording studio left the drummer with third degree burns, and prompted a furious phone call from Ward's enraged mother.
The easy-going, amiable Ward was something of a whipping boy for Iommi, Ozzy Osbourne and Geezer Butler when the mischievous trio were bored, drunk or high, and was regularly targeted with dangerously stupid pranks. There was, for instance, that time in 1972 when, staying in a Los Angeles mansion while recording Vol. 4 at The Record Plant studio, the trio sprayed the hapless drummer from head-to-toe in gold paint, only realising that this was A Bad Idea when Ward went into convulsions.
