The number of songs Ozzy Osbourne is expected to sing at the final ever Black Sabbath show has been revealed, while guitarist Tony Iommi shares that preparations for the huge event have “been tough”.
The Birmingham metal band will play their last live show in their hometown this weekend (Saturday July 5) in an event dubbed ‘Back To The Beginning’. It will be held at Villa Park in Aston, and see frontman Osbourne, guitarist Iommi, bassist Geezer Butler and drummer Bill Ward perform on stage together for the first time in two decades.
The four-piece will be joined on the bill by other huge names in the genre including Metallica, Slayer, Pantera, Alice In Chains, Gojira, Anthrax, Smashing Pumpkins‘ Billy Corgan, Guns N’ Roses, KoRn, Tool, Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler and the surviving members of Soundgarden. Rage Against The Machine’s Tom Morello will serve as musical director for the concert, which is being live-streamed around the globe, and actor Jason Momoa will host.
Now, with things set to kick off tomorrow, Tony Iommi has shared that he is finding the preparations “tough”.
Speaking to the BBC, the guitarist shared that, while things are going well in terms of preparations, the band are “all nervous”, particularly as over 40,000 people “are coming from all over the world and I just can’t absorb it”.
He also shared that Ozzy will sing just four songs at the live event due to health issues.
“I wouldn’t say it’s been easy, it’s been tough, because none of us are getting younger and to stand there for a couple of hours is tiring,” he said of rehearsals, and added that working with other artists has been great as there are “no egos”.
News that Ozzy will be singing just four tracks at the event comes as there has been speculation whether the singer’s health issues would interfere with his ability to perform on the night.
The Prince Of Darkness spoke has not played a full gig since 2018, and has undergone multiple surgeries and experienced numerous health problems including Parkinson’s disease in recent years.
In an interview with The Guardian earlier this year, Osbourne similarly looked ahead to playing the last Black Sabbath show in good health, saying: “I’ll be there, and I’ll do the best I can. All I can do is turn up.” From there, there were also suggestions that he “may be sitting down” on stage, and rumours that he’d be performing from a “throne that flies over the stadium”.
Before then, he told fans that he was “in heavy training” for the forthcoming farewell concert, and was back in the gym. Osbourne also said he would only be “doing little bits and pieces” with Sabbath at Villa Park amid his health problems: “I am doing what I can, where I feel comfortable.”
His wife and manager Sharon also said to NME that, although he now “can’t walk” as a result of Parkinson’s, his illness “doesn’t affect his voice”. “He wants to say thank you to everybody,” she explained to us at Villa Park. “He didn’t have that chance because of his illness, but now he does have the chance.”
Elsewhere in the BBC interview with Tony Iommi, the guitarist said that while a lot has changed since they formed in Birmingham in 1968, they still look back fondly at those early experiences.
“I can’t remember what happened yesterday, but we can remember what happened in those days, where we used to go and the gigs we did,” he said, adding that it makes the upcoming show even more meaningful for him.
“This is totally different from anything else we’ve done, you know we’ve played for 300,000 people but this is nerve-wracking,” he said. “We’re never going to do this again, this will be it.”
