The metal world woke up Wednesday to the stunning news that the original Black Sabbath lineup was reforming for one final show in Birmingham, England, on July 5, where they’ll be joined by an impressive list of guests including Metallica, Slayer, Pantera, Anthrax, Alice in Chains, Slash and Duff McKagan, KK Downing, Tom Morello, Wolfgang Van Halen, Zakk Wylde, Jake E. Lee, and many others.
“It’s my time to go Back to the Beginning….time for me to give back to the place where I was born,” Ozzy Osbourne said in a statement. “How blessed am I to do it with the help of people whom I love. Birmingham is the true home of metal. Birmingham Forever.”
The show will mark the first performance by Osbourne, guitarist Tony Iommi, bassist Geezer Butler, and drummer Bill Ward since Oct. 18, 2005, when they were inducted into the U.K. Music Hall of Fame. They appeared together again the following year when they entered the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, but they let Metallica play for them that night. Ward was originally listed as a participant in the 2012 reunion tour, and even appeared at the press conference that rolled it out, but he backed out due to health matters and a business dispute. And considering the precarious state of Osbourne’s health, and the fact that Ward is 76 and not in stellar shape himself, this is very likely the final show.
But we can never be 100 percent sure when it comes to Black Sabbath, since this is hardly the first time they’ve announced a final concert. The first one took place Nov. 15, 1992, when Ozzy Osbourne’s No More Tours farewell run came to an end in Cosa Mesa, California, at the Pacific Amphitheater. This was largely an Osbourne solo show, but Ward, Butler, and Iommi came out at the end for “Black Sabbath,” “Fairies Wear Boots,” “Iron Man,” and “Paranoid.”
Osbourne was just 44 at the time, and nobody thought he was actually retiring. “If this is the end of the road, which I very much doubt, I want to say one thing,” he told the crowd. “Thank you for a great ride.” That ride continued just three years later when he launched the Retirement Sucks Tour, but the remnants of Black Sabbath were busy making a horrid album with Body Count guitarist Ernie C at the time. They played no role in it.
The wouldn’t change until 1997 when Black Sabbath took part in the inaugural Ozzfest tour, and then proceeded to gig with Osbourne across the globe for the next couple of years. In 1999, the band announced they were going to call it quits after a series of “Last Supper” shows they claimed would truly mark the end of the band. It closed out on Dec. 22, 1999, at the NEC Arena in their hometown of Birmingham, England. They wrapped up with “Paranoid” and walked off into a new millennium that was supposed to be Black Sabbath-free.
They broke the promise just six months later when Iommi, Butler, and Ward joined Osbourne for the encore at the KROQ Weenie Roast in Los Angeles. The following summer, the original Sabbath lineup took part in Ozzfest. They returned to Ozzy’s traveling road show in 2004 and 2005. The saga took an unexpected twist in 2006 when replacement singer Ronnie James Dio returned to the fold, and the band (minus Ward and Osbourne) dubbed themselves Heaven and Hell. They toured and recorded together until Dio’s death in 2010.
The following year, the original Sabbath lineup announced they were reforming for yet another tour. It quickly led to a very public spat with Bill Ward, who dropped out after claiming he was given an “unsignable contract” and told another drummer would be on the stage beside him. “I don’t think he could have done the gig, to be honest,” Osbourne told the New York Daily News. “He’s incredibly overweight. A drummer has to be in shape. He’s already had two heart attacks. I don’t want to be responsible for his life.”
The band brought Osbourne’s solo-band drummer, Tommy Clufetos, on the road to take Ward’s place. In 2015, they announced that they’d once again break up following a worldwide farewell tour they called “The End.” It wrapped up Feb. 4, 2017, at the Genting Arena in Birmingham, England. The show was professionally filmed and documented in the concert film Black Sabbath: The End of the End.
In the years that followed, Osbourne’s health took a severe downward turn and he was unable to finish his own farewell tour despite numerous false starts. When he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a solo artist last year, he accepted the award from a heavy metal throne and didn’t perform.
It’s unlikely that the reunited Sabbath will play more than a few songs in July. But it’ll still be a hugely historic night for Sabbath and heavy metal in general. It’ll also hold the rare distinction of being a massive band’s fourth farewell concert.