Jeff Fenholt's Official Home Page
Jeff Fenholt's Unofficial Home Page

Jeff's E-mail address: fenholt@gmail.com

The DEFINITIVE Black Sabbath Homepage

Dear Mike,

I just now for the first time reviewed your web site that's about me. I must say that if I didn't know me, based upon what I just read, I would think "Fenholt" is a schmuck too. I believe in my heart you are a good guy, and therefore, I am asking you to kindly print and display the letter I wrote to you explaining in detail my side of the story . I truly feel that would be appropriate and fair . For the record, the lawsuit against me from my mother was dropped after my lawyers produced court documents substantiating my testimony concerning my childhood. My mother and I enjoy a warm relationship today. Vanity Fair printed my responce to their article several months later . It would be fair of you to print that as well.

All best wishes,

Jeff Fenholt

[Note from Mike: I have added the November 1999 letter that Jeff sent me, per his request. I have not displayed it until now only because it was a personal letter to me from him, and I felt it would be inappropriate to publish it without his blessing. I was not aware that he had responded to the Vanity Fair article and will try to get the text of his response.]

Here is what I know:

Fenholt's departure from TBN came shortly after the Vanity Fair story regarding his relationship with Gala Dali. Whether that story had anything to do with him leaving TBN or not isn't clear, but his show was no longer on the TBN schedule and he no longer appeared on any of the other TBN shows.

Shortly after his departure from TBN, I traded some brief correspondence with Jeff Fenholt. He seemed to want to clear up, what he considered to be, some misconceptions about him. The e-mails were friendly and much more cordial than what I had experienced before. He said that he was in the Midwest, working on some new music. Surprised by this proposed "olive branch" I asked my friend, rock critic Dave Marsh, who has been following the Fenholt story with me for many years, what he thought of this new "improved" Jeff Fenholt. Dave, who is quick to set me right when I lose my focus, pointed out:

"You want to know what I really think? I think you're just gonna sink deeper and deeper into a barrel of bullshit because you have been dumb enough to allow this guy to show you his "point of view." FUCK him AND his point of view. His point of view is that rock n' roll is evil, the devil's work. THAT is what matters, not some marginally right or wrong horseshit about whether he did or did not jack off or sing in front of Tony Iommi one day. You are talking to this guy about the wrong thing, Mike. And he deserves no more sympathy from you than he has shown for others in rock music, which is ZERO, none, less than a millisecond. Send the motherfucker to me, I'LL tell him what changes to make: He can either start by washing his mouth out with soap and making a PUBLIC apology or he can fuck off and die. THOSE are valid choices for vermin like Jeff Fenholt. The rest is a stupid fucking waste of time."

Dave was, of course, right. My correspondence ended with Jeff and, for whatever reason, he never followed up on why I stopped corresponding with him.

A couple of days after the World Trade Center tragedy, I tuned into TBN's "Praise the Lord" program. Introduced to sing a song was Jeff Fenholt. It appears, Jeff has completely abandoned the "rock 'n roll" look. He no longer was sporting the long hair or the dark clothing that was his trademark as the "Heavy Metal" Preacher. Instead he wore a conservative business suit and his hair was cropped back close to collar length. Although I am not familiar with the song he sung, his vocal stylings were far more powerful than when he was doing his show on TBN, a sign that, maybe, his report to me that he was working on his music had some validity. After the song he left the stage, indicating to me that his return to TBN is being, somewhat, "guarded."

Also, it should be noted that I have received several correspondences from people that have been "monitoring" his activities in the Midwest, and although the reports cannot be verified, they were somewhat disturbing and matched what we've seen from him in the past. The people that sent me the correspondences had no past "ax to grind" with Jeff, but only sensed that something was not appropriate about his "ministry."

Dear Mike,

I very much appreciate you sharing your thoughts and your heart with me concerning all this Sabbath stuff. I want to respond to you. I am not seeking to defend myself, but simply to have a bit of a "heart to heart" with you, because of the fact that I appreciate your situation, as you have explained it to me.

Kindly, let me address some of the issues you have raised in your e-mail to me.

First of all, with regard to my "never overstating my involvement with Sabbath", --- Is the inference that I have overstated my position simply by not going into an in-depth expose every time their name comes up? Several things have occurred, leading to this chain of events. I received Jesus as my Lord in 1979, but because I had been so screwed up, it took me six years to get grounded in my faith. Black Sabbath called me in December of 1984 and asked me to consider getting together. I waited two weeks before I would even meet or have dinner with Tony. I finally got together with him, and after he assured me that I could write all lyrics, I accepted. At the time, I thought that perhaps the Lord wanted me in that arena. As it turns out, I was wrong. We broke camp for Christmas. We reconvened in early January. I spent quite a bit of time and energy working in The Cherokee Recording Studio with Tony, which spanned approximately a six month period.

Artistic styles vary. My style is to start with a melody and build a composition from that point with the vocal being dominant. Tony's style, as I saw it at the time, was to throw down guitar riffs and chords and build it from there. This method, viable as it is, did not work for me. Because of Tony's position as original guitarist and founding member of the band, I tried to assimilate to his style. But again, this method did not work for me. Therein lies the artistic differences. I admired Tony's talent and liked him personally. As much as I wanted this union to work, I realized we were foundering and wanted to call in my friend , Jeff Glixman, to help. By now, it was May of 1985. Tony indicated to me that he had never heard of Glixman, but he agreed to meet with him. I called my manager friend, Larry Mazar, and asked him to call Jeff Glixman and get him to fly into LA to get together with Tony and me in the hope of helping us sort out our differences and go on to complete the album. I admired Glix's talent tremendously and liked him personally. Glixman came in at my request and began working on the album. When he saw that Tony and I were having major differences, Glixman sided with Tony. I was decidedly discouraged. To further add to our problems, I had refused to sing some of the lyrics that Tony had wanted me to sing, because they went against the grain of my personal faith. When I saw that I now had two major players with opposing views to mine, I walked. I was asked to come back to the studio several times and I refused. Don Arden's son called me and asked me to come to his office. He was upset and wanted to know if there was any way for Tony and me to mend our differences, at which time I told him, "No". I mentioned to him that I had been asked to tour stadiums in South and Central America and that I was leaving straight away. He then informed me that they were going on with the project without me. Apparently, Jeff Glixman immediately called Glenn Hughes, who happens to be a friend of mine, and asked him to join them in the studio. The rest is history.

With regard to Dave Spitz, I don't know him. I assume he came in later and threw down his bass, blowing the bass player we had used off of the album. Eric Singer is a great guy, and I love him. I don't have anything but fond memories of him. Beyond that, he is an incredible drummer.

As I was preparing to stand up in Ascension, Paraguay at the soccer stadium, to sing for the first time for the Lord, I was a nervous wreck. I had never done anything like this before. The man who introduced me to the crowd took it upon himself, unbeknownst to me, to introduce me as the former original lead of "Jesus Christ Superstar", and then went on to say, "Jeff Fenholt has just left Black Sabbath and has decided to sing for the Lord". It had never crossed my mind to mention Black Sabbath in my resume. I walked out, shaking, and sang for the crowd. The audience response that night was overwhelming. Quite frankly, I was shocked, both at the turnout and at the reaction. This continued throughout South America, and later on in Central America. Excerpts of these taped concerts were played, again, unbeknownst to me prior to airing them, on a Christian network throughout the United States. Inquiring minds wanted to know!

Because of the fact that I have been well known in "Jesus Christ Superstar" and on the cover of "Time" magazine, etc., I continue to receive quite a bit of attention from the public at large. After South America, it was my intention to share in my testimony, from time to time, how, in fact, I had decided to pursue Christian concerts. The time that I spent with Black Sabbath was highly significant in my coming to a decision to serve the Lord. When Tony came out in the press saying that he had never heard of me, I was being called a liar, a fraud and just about everything but a Ruben sandwich. I had two choices, given this scenario; either to tuck my tail between my legs and sort of "fade" away or stand up and tell the truth. I chose the latter. In the "swirl" that ensued, Black Sabbath received a tremendous amount of publicity throughout the world, which they appeared to embrace with glee. Tony went on MTV and called me names. Their head of promotion from IRS Records, told me on the phone that he couldn't believe the amount of PR that was going out. On a personal note, I was shocked at Tony's apparent insensitivity toward me. The "Larry King Live" Show called me and asked if I would appear with Tony and Cardinal John O'Connor. They called me back and said that Tony had refused to appear once he found out that I had accepted. The show was subsequently canceled. We could have set the record straight, right then and there, had Tony agreed to appear.

You say that you would like for me to set the record straight, concerning Black Sabbath. I have done this over and over again, but this story seems to have a life of its own. I ask that you understand that I am and will continue to be contacted for interviews, appearances, etc., over and over again. It would be impossible for me to go into depth about Black Sabbath each and every time that I am in the public eye, and quite frankly, the topic almost never comes up. What would you recommend?

To answer your next question, yes, I do, in fact, consider myself a musician, composer and singer, and one of my favorite mediums has been and will remain rock and roll. I am working on a new album as we speak, that is a futuristic return to my roots. I am NOT against all rock and roll. I have, however, stated that "if a musician's heart belongs to the devil, so will his music". Conversely, if his heart belongs to the Lord, etc. I am not a fan of groups who espouse Satanism and spiritual darkness. Satan is my enemy. Jesus is my Lord. If I have been interpreted to "bad-mouth" rock music at large, I must say that that has never been my intention. For that, I am sorry.

As an artist, I admire all talent. Tony Iommi has been gifted of God with an awesome talent. In my opinion, he is probably the most amazing heavy rock guitarist in the world. Even with our differences, I always liked Tony. At this point in my life, I would welcome the opportunity to have a private sit-down with Tony to mend fences.

In response to your last comment, you say that I need to make changes concerning all this. What would you suggest?

Please stay in touch.

God bless,

Jeff

PS I have been in the Midwest, spending a lot of time working with my arranger on my upcoming project.

My favorite TV evangelist is back in the news - Jeff Fenholt. For a guy so bent on dropping the name "Black Sabbath" whenever he can, I find it curious that he has not been able to put a spin on this latest "celebrity" connection to artist Salvador Dali. The December issue of Vanity Fair reports in an article by John Richardson, on an upcoming biography on Dali by Ian Gibson, that Fenholt was one of a series of "boy toys" for the, then 82 year old, wife of the late artist.

From the article:

"After a year or two, he was displaced by Jeff Fenholt, the long-haired star of Jesus Christ Superstar. Fenholt was given a recording studio at Pubol. There he spent night after night rocking away, to the tense irritation of Gala, who wanted him in her bed, as well as the other guests, who wanted to sleep. Fenholt proved a very expensive item. He persuaded Gala to give him a sizable house on Long Island and send him large sums of money ("Must have $38,000 or will die," read one telegram). According to Gibson, Fenholt showed Gala little or no gratitude. His impersonation of Jesus had not engendered any redeeming qualities; however, the role came in useful later on, when he switched to being a TV evangelist in California. Dali was said to be outraged at the expenditure and at the degree of Gala's infatuation, which would last almost until she died."