Rod Stewart’s in-concert tribute to Ozzy Osbourne has met with criticism after video of the tribute, featuring AI images of Osbourne and other gone-too-soon artists, emerged on social media.
During Stewart’s last handful of concerts since Osbourne’s passing on July 22nd, he has dedicated his song “Forever Young” to the Black Sabbath singer. However, what originally started as a normal tribute with a simple image of Osbourne shown on the video screens, recently took a bizarre turn when “Forever Young” was accompanied by the AI Osbourne in heaven with a selfie stick in hand. He was taking photos of himself with the likes of Freddie Mercury, Kurt Cobain, and Amy Winehouse.
In addition to the selfies with Prince, Bob Marley, Tupac Shakur, and Whitney Houston, the perpetrator of the insensitive AI video also strangely decided to have Osbourne take photos with controversial artists like Michael Jackson and XXX tentacion.
To add insult to the injury, Stewart told the Charlotte, North Carolina crowd following the “Forever Young” performance, “Very sad. A lot of those people died ’cause of drugs… I’m still here, though!,” the Charlotte Observer noted in their review of Stewart’s July 29 show.
Following news of Osbourne’s passing, Stewart previously wrote on Instagram, “Bye, bye Ozzy. Sleep well, my friend. I’ll see you up there, later rather than sooner.” But unfortunately, things have now turned ugly.
