Legendary musician Ozzy Osbourne is “elated” as his former soloband mates Jake E Lee and Rudy Sarzo, who he has had issues with, are set to perform at Black Sabbath’s star-studded reunion concert at Villa Park this summer.
Sharon Osbourne and Tony Iommi recently announced at Villa Park on Wednesday that the original line-up of Black Sabbath – Ozzy, Tony, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward – will perform for the final time together at Aston Villa’s stadium on Saturday 5th July.
Speaking to Planet Rock’s Loz Guest at Villa Park, Live Nation’s Andy Copping, who booked the concert alongside Tom Morello and Sharon Osbourne, revealed Ozzy’s reaction to the line-up.
Telling Loz that the concert was a couple of years in the making, Andy spoke about musical director Tom Morello’s involvement.
“Tom’s really hands on. What a guy, great energy,” Andy enthused.
“Him and I and Sharon, we got together and it was like, ‘right, let’s go out and get the bands!’ So both Tom and I have been canvassing the acts. Him and I together (we’ve) just been out and we’ve got this bill together between us.”
Listing some of the huge names on the bill, Loz remarked to Andy that the concert is almost like a “mini-festival.”
“Yes, it is. It is going to be an all-day event,” Andy said.
“You obviously mentioned the bands that are playing, but we’ve also got the individuals that are playing on the bill as well.
“We’ve got Papa (V Perpetua) from Ghost, we’ve got Fred Durst from Limp Bizkit, Jonathan Davis from Korn, Slash and Duff (McKagan) from Guns N’ Roses, Billy Corgan from Smashing Pumpkins, Wolfgang Van Halen… I mean the list goes on and there’s still one or two other members that are going to be joining the party. We’ve got Sammy Hagar on there.
“Jake E Lee and Rudy Sarzo who have previously played with Ozzy, and Ozzy hasn’t seen them in over 30 years, and he’s just elated that those two guys are coming in too. But he’s happy about everybody getting involved, it’s such a great bill.”
Commenting on how all the individual artists will perform at the Back to the Beginning gig, Andy explained: “Yeah, the plan is it’s going to be a super group, and different band members will come on and off at different points throughout that set.
“People will get to see different band members from some really high end bands playing together, which has never happened before. So, they’re going to see something really special as well as, obviously, the other main bands that are on the bill.”
