In a brand new interview with The Sydney Morning Herald, BLACK SABBATH singer Ozzy Osbourne spoke about the band’s decision to call it quits after the conclusion of their “The End” world tour, kicked off in Nebraska in January.
“We’re all in our late 60s!” he said. “I’m 68! The way things are going, people are dying left, right and centre this year, you know what I mean? So many of our colleagues have died.
“Lemmy’s died, [David] Bowie’s died. Jimmy [Bain] from Ronnie James Dio died, Natalie Cole died, the singer from the STONE TEMPLE PILOTS died, the guy from THE EAGLES died. It’s like, every day somebody else dies and I’m thinking, fucking hell, I hope I’m not… I’m not liking this.”
Ozzy talked in more detail about the December loss of his close friend Lemmy, with whom he had collaborated in the past.
“I spoke to him two days before he died, or tried to. I couldn’t make head nor tail what the fuck he was talking about, he was so ill. And two days before I spoke to him he just had a birthday, his 70th … I mean, there’s nothing fucking good about fucking dying at any age, you know?
“But as he said to me, in one of the last conversations I had with him, he says, ‘Well, I lived my life the way I wanted to live it. Who wants to live to 85? You’re gonna be bored shitless.'”
Ozzy also reiterated that SABBATH will not come back and do any more touring after the completion of the current trek, which is scheduled to hit Australia in April.
“It’s definitely our farewell tour,” he said. If somebody thinks that a couple of years up the road we’ll have problems with our memory and do another 90 shows… This is definitely the end for BLACK SABBATH.”
BLACK SABBATH is selling a new limited-edition CD titled “The End” at the shows on its farewell tour. The disc features four previously unheard studio tracks left off the band’s 2013 reunion album, “13”, as well as live versions of four songs from the world tour the band did in support of that disc.
The four studio cuts are “Season Of The Dead”, “Cry All Night”, “Take Me Home” and “Isolated Man”. They feature drums by Brad Wilk.
The live tracks, with drumming from Tommy Clufetos, are “God Is Dead?”, “Under The Sun”, “End Of The Beginning” and “Age Of Reason”. The live cuts were recorded in Sydney, Australia, Auckland, New Zealand and Hamilton, Ontario.
Wilk and Clufetos had to get involved after founding SABBATH drummer Bill Ward withdrew from the reunion after initially agreeing to participate in it.
Source: Blabbermouth
