Despite being announced as one of the acts to perform at Black Sabbath and Ozzy Osbourne’s farewell show “Back to the Beginning,” Wolfgang Van Halen (son of legendary guitarist Eddie Van Halen) has revealed in a new interview that he was forced to cancel his appearance at the event.
”I, unfortunately, had to back out because the Creed tour starts the day after, and I [wouldn’t] be able to pull it off — unfortunately. I’m very excited to watch it, but I unfortunately had to back out,” he told Meltdown of Detroit radio station WRIF.
Creed’s tour, which has Wolfgang’s band Mammoth as the opening act, kicks off on July 9th, while “Back to the Beginning” will take place on July 5th at Villa Park in Birmingham, UK.
Wolfgang was then asked to name his favorite guitarist who has played with Ozzy Osbourne, to which he replied: “I’m really bad at picking, ’cause that almost implies you don’t like another one in comparison. And I feel like Randy [Rhoads] was amazing, but you can’t not give cred to Tony [Iommi] being the legend and groundbreaking genre creator he was — and is. [Laughs] So I love ’em all. That’s not the answer you wanna hear.”
Just last month, in an interview with Loudwire Nights, Wolfgang expressed excitement for getting to perform at Ozzy’s final show.
“My family lineage is intertwined and has gone way back with the likes of Ozzy,” he said at the time. “And I know my dad was very, very close with Tony, probably the closest of any other guitar players out there. So it was a crazy honor to be there for [Ozzy’s] Hall Of Fame induction [in October 2024], as well as this. It’s a crazy thing.”
“There are some legends out there where it’s just, like, they can’t be replicated. They’re just so original and they started a movement. You can’t mess with that,” Wolfgang said when asked what Black Sabbath means to him personally as a music fan.
“My dad was very much a — he kind of focused on his stuff, but any time my dad gave cred to something else, that meant it was legit. And he always told me one of his favorite guitar riffs was ‘Into The Void’ by Black Sabbath. And there’s nothing better, man. It’s just the best.”
