Black Sabbath co-founder Tony Iommi says he can’t believe the timing of Ozzy Osbourne’s death, just weeks after the singer’s farewell show in their hometown of Birmingham, England.
Iommi told ITV he received a message from Ozzy on Monday; the singer died Tuesday. He says it took him nearly all day to accept the news.
“It was a shock for us,” Iommi said. “When I heard … it couldn’t sink in. I thought, ‘It can’t be.’ I only had a text from him the day before. …It just seems unreal, surreal. In the night, I started thinking about it: ‘God, am I dreaming all this?'”
Iommi added that while the ‘Back to the Beginning’ farewell show was a triumph, Ozzy had “not looked well” behind the scenes.
“I think he really just held out to do that show,” he continued. “And just after that, he’s done it and said goodbye to the fans. And that was the end of it, really.
“I think he must have had something in his head that said, ‘Well, this is gonna be it, the last thing I’m ever gonna do.’ Whether he thought he was gonna die of what, I don’t know. But he really wanted to do it; he was determined to do it. And fair dues, he’d done it.”
Iommi said Ozzy was unable to rehearse for very long, and clearly battled his health through the final performances with his solo band and with Black Sabbath. But Ozzy was satisfied with the result of the show and the bookend on his career, though he later told Iommi that the gig left him drained and especially low on energy.
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