Music legend Ozzy Osbourne dies 'surrounded by love' aged 76
Black Sabbath frontman Ozzy Osbourne has died at the age of 76.
The music legend's family confirmed the news in a statement earlier today, sharing that he died this morning.
The message, from his wife Sharon Osbourne and their three children – Kelly, Jack and Aimee, read: 'It is with more sadness than mere words can convey that we have to report that our beloved Ozzy Osbourne has passed away this morning.
'He was with his family and surrounded by love.
'We ask everyone to respect our family privacy at this time. Sharon, Jack, Kelly, Aimee and Louis.'
Ozzy's cause of death has yet to be confirmed, but he had open about his devastating battle with Parkinson's over the last few years.
Osbourne and Sharon have been married since 1982 (Picture: Wireimage)
The sad news comes just weeks after he performed with Black Sabbath for the final time.
At the beginning of the month, he took to the stage at Villa Park in Birmingham for the Back to the Beginning show, and delighted the crowd with a short solo.
During the all-day event, he was also joined on stage by bandmates Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler, and Bill Ward.
'It's so good to be on this stage. You have no idea,' he said, thanking those who had gathered at the stadium 'from the bottom of [his] heart.
'You have no idea how I feel.'
Ozzy recently performed on stage at Black Sabbath's farewell gig
In January 2020, he revealed in an emotional interview that he had been diagnosed with Parkinson's after suffering health complications due to a fall in 2019, which meant he had to have surgery on his neck.
Sharon explained: 'It's Parkin's II, which a form of Parkinson's. There's so many different types of Parkinson's. It's not a death sentence by any stretch of the imagination, but it does effect certain nerves in your body.
'It's like you have a good day, a good day, and then a really bad day.'
The star had been battling a string of health issues (Picture: Getty)
Speaking to Robin Roberts on Good Morning America, she continued: 'I'm on a host of medications, mainly for this surgery. I've got numbness down this arm from the surgery, my legs [keep] going cold.
'I don't know if that's Parkinson's or what. That's the problem, because they cut nerves when they did the surgery. It's a weird feeling.'
The Black Sabbath legend added that he was taking medication for his Parkin's.
The couple were seeking treatment in Switzerland for his illness.
The couple share children Jack, Kelly and Aimee (Picture: Getty)
In 2019, Ozzy suffered a string of illnesses and accidents, which began with hospitalisation for pneumonia.
Then, the reality star suffered a horror fall in his LA home, which dislodged the metal rods in his spine that had been put in after a quad-bike accident in 2003.
Speaking to the Daily Mail's Weekend magazine, he recalled: 'I went to the bathroom in the night, lost my balance and landed flat on my face. I saw this big white flash when I hit the floor and I thought, 'You've finally done it now'.
'I knew it was bad, I thought I was paralysed, so very calmly I said, 'Sharon, I can't move. I think I've done my neck. Phone an ambulance'.'
The musician had to undergo three operations following the fall, and had to spend Christmas away from Sharon and daughter Kelly as doctors advised he was not well enough to fly back to the UK.
Osbourne, real name John Michael Osbourne, rose to fame in the 1970s as the frontman of metal band Black Sabbath, during which time he was nicknamed The Prince Of Darkness.
They went on to release tracks such as Paranoid, Iron Man and Changes.
His most infamous moment was in 1982 when he bit the head off a bat – believed to be dead at the time – while on stage at Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Des Moines, Iowa, on January 20.
The creature was launched at him from the audience by a fan and it was only after he had bitten into it that he realised it was a real animal. He was later rushed to hospital for a rabies injection.
To mark the occasion he released a plush bat with a velcro detachable head.
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Metro
21 minutes ago
- Metro
Ozzy Osbourne's final wish for biopic on his life that won't be fulfilled
Black Sabbath frontman Ozzy Osbourne lived a life ripe for a movie adaptation – with one officially in the works since 2021. At the late 76-year-old's final-ever gig on July 5 in his hometown of Birmingham, at Villa Park, his son Jack even had fresh updates on the project promising 'we have a lot of good momentum on the Ozzy biopic'. The rocker's boy revealed there was a director attached, and that the script was completed for the Sony-produced film. 'It is about to go through a script rewrite. It's going to be raw. We are not pulling any punches, we are really laying it all out,' he added to The Sun. An unsuspecting comment that Ozzy himself made on the film has now come to pass with his death on July 22. Discussing the developing project with wife of over four decades Sharon on the Osbournes podcast in 2024, she revealed: 'Movies take forever to make. Forever!' Ozzy's quip in response revealed his hope for the biopic as he commented: 'By the time they finish this film, I'll be dead… I wanna be alive to f***ing see it!' Sadly, that won't be the case for the musician, aka the Prince of Darkness, after a tough few years with his health following a Parkinson's diagnosis after a string of complications due to a fall in 2019. During the same chat, Sharon, 72, shared her hopes for the actress that could play her, suggesting Oppenheimer and We Live in Time star Florence Pugh or 'the little girl from Game Of Thrones' – a likely reference to Bella Ramsey, who portrayed Lyanna Mormont on the show and before starring as Ellie in The Last Of Us. But Ozzy himself had an even more epic answer as to who could take on his rollercoaster of a life and career. In 2010, before the Ozzy biopic was in development, The Nerdist podcast host Chris Hardwick asked him who he would pick to play him in a movie about his life. Without missing a beat, the rocker confidently revealed his pick, simply answering: 'Denzel Washington.' The two-time Oscar winner, who has a career total of 10 Academy Award nominations so far, has previously featured in films as varied as Taining Day, Malcolm X and The Tragedy of Macbeth. In the wake of his death, fans have been sharing Ozzy's witty reaction as they remember him fondly. 'Your turn Denzel – this is what Ozzy Osbourne would've wanted,' posted @screenthrill on Instagram. 'Denzel would nail the role,' responded @yar_zednanref, while Katie added: 'Hopefully someone who is probably working on the Ozzy biopic just needs to make this happen (or maybe put Denzel in a post credit scene where he's singing Crazy Train or War Pigs in costume).' In 2019, Sharon revealed she'd been working on developing a biopic about her early days and relationship with her iconic husband after she learned another rival script had been doing the rounds in Hollywood. She dismissed it as 'a load of crap', complaining it 'didn't make sense' and 'didn't have a heart'. 'I don't want to do another rock and roll, sex, drugs and money movie about a musician. That's not what I'm doing,' she told Variety. 'There hasn't been a movie about a woman that actually works on the management side – that's a true story – and somebody that succeeds through the struggle and you come out the other side.' Sharon said the film would cover 'everything before we get married', which they did in 1982, therefore omitting a lot of Ozzy's hellraising. At that stage she'd approached 28 Years Later filmmaker Danny Boyle to direct already and said she would want 'a complete unknown for Ozzy' as it's him 'at a very young age'. The following year, the couple teased more about the movie in an interview with Rolling Stone and a few changes that had been made. 'From what I understand, it's about Sharon and I and our relationship. It's how we met, fell in love, and how we married. She's my other half. She grew up a lot with me, and I grew up a lot with her,' Ozzy explained. 'I hope it will be a story that everybody can relate to,' Sharon added. 'You don't have to be a fan of the music, because it's a story about a survivor. No matter what life throws at you, you pick yourself up and you start again. It's just an amazing story of overcoming everything that's thrown at you in your life.' Son Jack confirmed they'd asked the writer to focus on 1979 to 1996, bringing the timeline forward compared to Sharon's initial idea. Suitably, his mum then insisted that the biopic would be 'a lot more real' than the Freddie Mercury and Queen biopic Bohemian Rhapsody because 'we don't want it to be squeaky, shiny clean and all of that'. 'We're not making it for kids. It's an adult movie for adults.' In October 2021, the official announcement then came via Variety, confirming the producers and studios involved as Polygram Entertainment, Sony Pictures and Osbourne Media – which is Sharon and two of the couple's children, Jack and daughter Aimée . The scriptwriter was revealed to be Oscar-nominated Billy Elliot and Rocketman scribe Lee Hall and the focus of the film the decades-long bond between the iconic rock star and his manager wife, which exploded onto the pop culture scene in the 2000s thanks to their TV reality show The Osbournes. 'Our relationship at times was often wild, insane and dangerous but it was our undying love that kept us together,' shared Sharon. 'We're thrilled to partner with Sony Pictures and Polygram to bring our story to the screen.' More Trending The update also confirmed that the biopic would feature music from both Black Sabbath and Ozzy's solo career. Jack Osbourne, 39, also shared his hopes for the earliest release possible date for the biopic at his dad's last show, as he confirmed the director they'd landed was 'absolutely phenomenal' and a 'die-hard fan' of his influential father. In terms of a predicted release, he added to The Sun: 'If the evil overlords of Hollywood give us the green light, we could be filming in the spring, so maybe it will be out by the summer of 2027.' It remains to be seen whether Ozzy's death could affect these plans. Got a story? If you've got a celebrity story, video or pictures get in touch with the entertainment team by emailing us celebtips@ calling 020 3615 2145 or by visiting our Submit Stuff page – we'd love to hear from you. MORE: Ozzy Osbourne's heartbreaking final texts to sister revealed days before death MORE: Bizarre theory around Trisha Paytas' superhero-inspired name of third baby MORE: Ozzy Osbourne predicted his epitaph would be about bats – this one isn't
The Guardian
an hour ago
- The Guardian
Ozzy Osbourne's final performance revealed fragility was the metal god's true power
Moshers gathered in their masses. Spilling out of the crazy train from Birmingham to Villa Park earlier this month, the thousands of black band shirts contained a universe: spandexed glam rock nestled next to indecipherable black metal logos, accessorised with wild hair, tough belts and tougher boots. Denim and leather jackets almost sagged under the weight of stitched-on patches. Metal's tribalism is a marvel, a commitment to a sound and lifestyle on the margins of the mainstream. That Saturday, the genre's fans were out in force, giving thanks to the man who started it all. The daylong metal celebration Back to the Beginning was billed as the farewell concert by Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath. But Ozzy's delayed retirement, due to the effects of debilitating surgeries and Parkinson's disease, barely masked a different motive: this was surely it, and not just creatively. We wondered: would Ozzy be well enough to perform. If so, what would that performance look like? It gave the day the air of a wake happening in real time. Black Sabbath had never been stymied by illness or adversity. Tony Iommi lost the tips of two fingers as a teenager but persisted in learning the guitar by making his own prosthetic fingertips and adopting light-gauge strings, which created Black Sabbath's signature tone. In recent years, he's lived with cancer. Bassist Geezer Butler has been open about his long experience with depression and drummer Bill Ward is a heart-attack survivor. A degenerative disease, Parkinson's is marked by its cruelty, robbing a person of their agency and ability to express themselves. For a performer, Parkinson's may feel like a premature death, of the persona they've created and the power it exerts. Hours before Ozzy appeared onstage at Villa Park, that power and the reverence his lovable, cartoonish, hellraising persona inspires was obvious in the legions of bands – and acolytes – who played before him. Acts forewent their usual fees to raise record-shattering profits for charities supporting children's hospitals, hospices and Parkinson's research; there was a drum-off between members of Blink-182, Red Hot Chili Peppers and Tool for Sabbath's Symptom of the Universe; Yungblud cranked Ozzy's Changes up to 11. The format soaked up the boyish camaraderie, the big kids in Ozzy's shadow who live for metal. As the skies darkened, chants of 'Ozzy! Ozzy! Ozzy!' rose and the stage illuminated a figure seated on a throne of bats. It could be easy for some to forget – through the haze of reality TV, Brummie mumbles and cartoonish antics – that Osbourne's vocals gave rise to an entire genre. To lose that would be to lose it all, so there was mass relief that he was in surprisingly good form. He was visibly fighting against his physical limitations and getting into character with wide-eyed growls, his tone and conviction punching through on Mama, I'm Coming Home and Paranoid. His fragility generated a sense of urgency; hearing him sing in person, I recognised that Ozzy's power had always been in his fragility. His voice was a soul's wail, not a grunt or growl. In life, his honesty drew people closer to him. The mythology around his performances and wilderness years propelled his fame, but this night flashed him way back to a moment when his ad in the paper searching for bandmates might have been passed over, consigning him to a life as John Michael rather than Ozzy, another working-class lad from Aston in search of immortal truths. Back to the Beginning began as an impressively curated tribute. Now it takes on greater resonance as a swansong. We didn't know it, trudging out of Villa Park with the smell of fireworks and lager in the air, but it now seems like the most well-executed exit in entertainment since David Bowie's. Closing the circle ignited something in Osbourne that night, and in turn, the audience. He clung on for one last moment under the spotlight, one final connection. And then he went home.
The Herald Scotland
an hour ago
- The Herald Scotland
Ozzy Osbourne lived a life that feels impossible to put in rear view
He was a core part of the nucleus of something far greater than himself, while continuing to guide and mentor the monster that he had helped create. It's a testament to how much of a cultural force he was, how many people out there implicitly understood him. Osbourne was never locked into the timeframe of his successes nor reliant on the easy blessings of nostalgia like most figures in our cultural iconography – there was always a generation of teenagers in wait, ready to take the mantle and carry on all that he represented within themselves. The sheer influence, not just on music, but on people as a whole, is indescribable. Read more: I wonder if Brian Wilson ever truly knew how much his music meant to people There has been endless discussion over who or what originated heavy metal. Was it one of the early, harder-edged bands like Deep Purple or Led Zeppelin, or something less obvious like Blue Cheer's gritty 1968 single Summertime Blues? However, the whole discussion seems like a blatant distraction from the one true culprit: the debut album of Black Sabbath. Everything that could possibly be considered heavy metal is on that 1970 release. It's all there, served up helpfully in one neat package. The haunting eeriness of the cover art, the thunderous rain and bells of its opening track, the devil tones and tritones of Tony Iommi's guitar, and, of course, the nasal shrill of Osbourne projecting dark tales of wizards and nightmarish figures in black. He understood the true dramatics of rock music before any of his peers did. He knew that for a group like Black Sabbath to succeed, he had to buy in and cultivate the mythos himself. Ozzy Osbourne's contributions to Black Sabbath were part of the nucleus of the entire heavy metal genre (Image: Getty) Osbourne was never much of a singer. He was, by his own admission, not much of a musician at all. His initial opening into Black Sabbath was predicated on the simple basis of being the owner of a PA system. It made him useful for getting gigs. But he could perform, and he could forcefully bend his limited range to the will of a song. And it certainly helped that he had a knack for playing into the attention, an instinct for the theatrical, of turning a life of raucous intrigue into headlines and a long-enduring artistic persona. He was someone who could always manage to turn limitations into weapons. After being fired from Black Sabbath in 1979, Osbourne expected to burn through his remaining money holed up in a hotel room with cocaine and then return to his parents in Birmingham, ready to rejoin the dole queue as if none of his rockstar success ever happened. His manager and future wife, Sharon, pulled him from the mire and guided his career forward on a personal level, but musically, it was a young guitarist named Randy Rhoads who became his muse, providing the many iconic musical moments that drove reaction to his early solo career. Rhoads was the ingredient that gave the character of Ozzy a fresh air, a new musical dimension for him to dive in and explore. As much as Osbourne benefited from the surrounding musicians, they too saw benefit. His band was often seen as a stepping stone, a boot camp experience for future aspirations. Many now-famous heavy musicians were well-trained in the Ozzy camp. Read more: This extreme metal album blew up over a weekend – now it's accused of being AI Osbourne never lived as an island unto himself; much of the success and the drive relied on who he was surrounded by, and the relationship between himself and his guitarist was always paramount. His long solo career, which could fluctuate between tremendous highs and some garish lows, depended much on the collaborative space. His legacy well and truly stands on its own, yet it's an essential part of his story to remember the contributions of those without their names emblazoned on the marquee. Everyone already knows the mythical Prince of Darkness who bit heads off bats and inspired Satanic worship in the youth. The stories are out there, and they are endless. It was a media creation that he kept well and truly fed. It was so pervasive that he could parlay that into quite the media success of his own. His later years saw him become a big-time festival promoter, reality television star, and a general reference point in culture for everything dark and heavy. Osbourne was more than happy to play into the fantasy and mystique of his persona and all the chaos it created. After all, it was not quite the life that a factory worker from a post-industrial city could have imagined for himself. Or for anyone else.
