Why there will be another Black Sabbath album

By DARRYL MASON

WHEN Ozzy Osbourne spoke to Hot Metal in 1992, he said being fired from Black Sabbath was a “career highlight”! He said he had been set free to pursue his very successful 1980s solo career.

Thirty years later and Ozzy is itching to go back to Sabbath, again. Their last studio album together, 13, will soon be a decade old and the metal world is chanting for just one more Sabbath album, before it becomes an impossible task.

Ozzy, guitarist Tommy Iommi and bassist Geezer Butler have all struggled with recurring injuries and illnesses in the past three years.

 But all three have expressed interest, at various times since the end of Black Sabbath’s ‘The End’ tour, in returning to the studio together. That may happen sooner than some expect.

We almost got a Black Sabbath reunion at the closing of the Commonwealth Games in early August but Geezer couldn’t make it due to a COVID-19 infection and a “boating-related injury”.

Instead, Ozzy and Tony, along with bassist Adam Wakeman and drummer Tommy Clufetos, blazed through an energetic version of “Paranoid” to stadium thunder applause and woke to see newspapers that once called the band devil spawn suggesting the Queen should be handing out OBEs to Ozzy and Iommi. That must have blown their minds.

Ozzy and Iommi recently reunited in the studio for “Degradation Rules”, a new tune from Ozzy’s September solo album, Patient Number 9, and returned effortlessly to vintage Black Sabbath territory.

Don’t expect any official announcement on Sabbath returning to the studio until Ozzy’s new album has had a good, clear run.