Sharon Osbourne opened up about the epic ‘Back To The Beginning’ show and new movie, sharing how she she wanted the night to be a celebration of the artists who had “been considered the bastards of the music industry for so long”.
The mammoth show took place at Villa Park in Birmingham last summer, and marked both Ozzy Osbourne’s final solo performance and the last ever show from Black Sabbath’s original line-up. It was the first time that Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward performed live together in more than 20 years, and was organised by Sharon with musical direction from Rage Against The Machine icon Tom Morello.
Performances came from the likes of Metallica, Guns N’ Roses, Tool, Slayer, Pantera, Alice In Chains, Gojira, Anthrax, Lamb Of God,Mastodon, Rival Sons and Halestorm – who all covered songs from across Ozzy’s discography – and there were also guest appearances from Yungblud, Nuno Bettencourt, Ghost’s Tobias Forge, Smashing Pumpkins‘ Billy Corgan, Andrew Watt, Steven Tyler, Travis Barker, Red Hot Chili Peppers drummer Chad Smith and many more across the night.
Osbourne died aged 76 just 17 days later. The concert ultimately raised around £11million for charity and has now been made into a concert film, set to arrive in cinemas next Wednesday (October 28).
At the premiere screening in London last night (Tuesday October 20), Sharon looked back at the event and explained how, as well as being a celebration of Ozzy and his career, she wanted the night to celebrate metal music as a whole, especially as she has seen the genre become more “acceptable” compared to when Black Sabbath were first starting out.
“It represents a genre of music, a community, and these people have been considered the bastards of the music industry for so long,” she said. “It’s finally got to [the point] where you see artist after artist that are filling stadiums now with this music, and it’s just wonderful to see it.”
She added: “It’s amazing, because it was never really big in the press for a long time. It was like ‘I don’t want to write about him, he’s a nutter’, but now it has become acceptable. We have seen genres come and go, but this stayed, and it will continue to stay. ‘Back To The Beginning’ is a celebration of that.”
Also at the Q&A event at the premiere, Sharon was asked by host and journalist Phil Alexander what Ozzy was like on the day of the event, especially as he had been warned by doctors “just 10 days prior” that he would be unable to play live at the show due to his poor health.
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“He was just praying that his lungs would work and that he could sing, because along with everything else that was wrong with him, he had emphysema,” she said. “So for him to breathe was very hard. He could be great for two days, and then on the third day he’d wake up and all you’d hear was wheezing because he couldn’t breathe.
“It was tough. He could’ve been great at soundcheck and then there was a chance that the gig would happen and he wouldn’t even be able to speak. But for him it was mind over matter. He was so determined mentally to do it, that he just did it somehow.”
The star-studded night saw Ozzy perform solo tracks ‘I Don’t Know’, ‘Mr. Crowley’, ‘Suicide Solution’, ‘Mama, I’m Coming Home’, and ‘Crazy Train’, and join his Black Sabbath bandmates for ‘War Pigs’, ‘N.I.B.’, ‘Iron Man’, and ‘Paranoid’. This setlist, Sharon shared, was chosen simply because it “was what he could do vocally on that day”.
“He couldn’t do anything too much in a higher register because his lungs just wouldn’t work. So it was what was right on that day and how he felt,” she explained.
According to Sharon, while the night was hosted by Aquaman star Jason Momoa, she didn’t tell the actor that he would be “essentially MCing the entire day” until the last minute, and instead thought it’d be more fun to surprise him with the request.
“He just initially rang up to ask for tickets, and I thought ‘Why tell him? It’ll ruin the surprise’,” she revealed. “He was like ‘Wait, what do you want me to do?’ And I said, ‘Just go up there and talk to the crowd and introduce the different bands’. He went, ‘I can’t do that!’ and I said, “Fuck off, you’re an actor. Go on.”
Ozzy & Black Sabbath: Back To The Beginning will arrive in cinemas worldwide for a limited run from October 28, and tickets are on sale now via the official website here.
Tony Iommi was in attendance for the screening in Soho last night, and the premiere came following the guitarist recalling his final conversation with Osbourne, which took place the night before the singer died. “He said to me, ‘I really feel tired and really worn out’,” Iommi recalled. “I said, ‘Well, you’re bound to really, it’s been a lot of stress and pressure and stuff like that’. And the next thing, the next day, [he’s] gone.”
