Sharon Osbourne has revealed that she is considering bringing OzzFest back, and it could return as soon as 2027.
The TV personality, music manager, and widow of Black Sabbath frontman and heavy metal pioneer Ozzy Osbourne, revealed in a recent interview that she is considering bringing back the hard rock and metal festival that they launched together 30 years ago.
The inaugural edition took place in October 1996 and spanned two days. The following year it expanded into a full-blown tour rather than a one-time event, and then continued annually almost every year up until 2018 (although it reverted to a single-day event from 2008).
The final instalment was held in Inglewood, California on New Year’s Eve 2018 and saw performances from Rob Zombie, Marilyn Manson, DevilDriver and Ozzy himself.
Speaking to Billboard, Sharon said that she had been “talking to Live Nation” about having the live music event return.
“It was something Ozzy was very passionate about: giving young talent a stage in front of a lot of people,” she said. “We really started metal festivals in this country. It was [replicated but] never done with the spirit of what ours was, because ours was a place for new talent. It was like summer camp for kids.”
She went on to say that while nothing had been set in stone yet, the festival could be launching as soon as 2027. However, the event would now be centring on multiple different music genres, rather than just rock and metal.
The comments come as she also made a nod towards a return of OzzFest back in January 2024, stating on The Osbournes podcast that she would like to do another iteration of the festival, provided she could iron out some minor setbacks.
After Kelly Osbourne – the daughter of Sharon and Ozzy – said that it would ultimately “comes down to” whether or not the artists and managers could be “realistic” about what they wanted to get paid, Sharon continued: “Why is it when it comes to us that everybody thinks that we are trillionaires?”
“Every manager who wants their band on our festival wants one of the fucking trillions they think we’ve got to put on the festival?”
The comments echoed what she said in November 2023 too, when she revealed that OzzFest ultimately came to an end as managers for artists playing there became too “greedy”.
“We made a profit. But it was not like – we couldn’t retire on it,” she said. “And managers and agents wanted more and more and more, and it just wasn’t cost-effective anymore. We stopped because it just wasn’t cost-effective.”
She then gave an example of the demands that she received from some artists’ managers, including one act refusing to “go on stage until I agreed to give them $10,000 more”.
As well as talking about OzzFest in the recent Billboard interview, Sharon also confirmed that she is also working with Live Nation to create a new classical tour. This, she explained, will see local orchestras come together to put their own spin on Black Sabbath tracks, and it will be performed alongside state-of-the-art visuals.
More details about both the classical tour and the potential return of OzzFest are expected to be released at a later date.
Last year, Sharon helped organise the star-studded ‘Back To The Beginning’ show which took place at Villa Park in Birmingham over the summer. It was the final show from both Ozzy and Black Sabbath, and took place just over two weeks before the Prince Of Darkness passed away.
She would then go on to claim in an episode of The Osbournes podcast in November that the true number raised for charity thanks to the show was around $11million (£8.24million).
Since Ozzy’s passing, Sharon recently revealed the touching final words that he said to her before he died at their family home. She has also hit out at Roger Waters for making hurtful comments about her late husband, and dropped hints about an upcoming Ozzy biopic.
