Black Sabbath legend Tony Iommi has admitted that the death of his bandmate Ozzy Osbourne has made him reflect on his own mortality.
In a new interview with The Telegraph, the guitarist is asked whether his friend’s death has served to remind him of his own mortality, to which he responds, “Yes, it does. A lot.
“I’ve had a few friends go now,” he says, “and you think: Blimey, hang on, I’m 78, how much longer? You do. [Queen guitarist] Brian May and myself have this conversation. He’s more dismal than me. Bloody hell.”
In the interview, Iommi also recalls his final conversation with Osbourne, on July 21 last year, the day before the singer died.
“Ozzy said, ‘I’m really tired. I’m absolutely shattered,” Iommi recalls. “I said, Well, it’s been a tough few weeks. You’re bound to be.”
The guitarist remembers telling his friend to take it easy and get some rest.
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“He went, ‘Yeah, I’ll try to do that.’ And that was it. Then I heard the next day that he’d gone. And that was… weird.”
“He was a part of my life for 60 years. I do miss him.”
Recently, producer Andrew Watt claimed that Iommi, Osbourne and Geezer Butler wanted to make one more album with the group’s original line-up in the early 2020s, but that the idea never got off the ground because drummer Bill Ward couldn’t commit to the idea. Iommi’s recollection of this is somewhat different.
“I’d met Andrew Watt when he was producing Ozzy,” Iommi recalled to Classic Rock. “He was very keen and a bit too excited. He also didn’t know what it was like working with the original Sabbath, working with Bill. Also, we’d done 13, and I didn’t like the idea of: ‘Now here’s another album’.”
Iommi is set to release a solo album, From the Dark on October 23 on BMG. The guitarist has previewed the album with the release of singles World Alone and Stormwatcher.