Tony Iommi ‘Not Opposed’ to Playing Black Sabbath Show
Black Sabbath played their final show on Feb. 4, 2017 in their native Birmingham, England, but might the door be open for a one-off performance? Guitarist Tony Iommi told Eddie Trunk on his SiriusXM Trunk Nation show that he's not opposed to it.
As heard in the player below, Iommi says, "I think that it would be good, if we could do that. The hard thing is, certainly with Sabbath, because it's such a big thing, you can't just do an occasional show. Because of the crew and you have the whole setup, it would have to be a year or an 18-month tour ... I'm not opposed to doing anything; I just would do it in a different way."
It was recently revealed that the lines of communication remain open between Iommi and Ozzy Osbourne, as the two musicians have been talking daily during self-isolation.
Reflecting on the band's touring, Iommi stated that while he enjoyed doing a final tour, it was taking a toll on him. "It was great to be able to go out and do a final tour. To be honest, I felt a bit bad [about] it, because it was basically my choice, my fault, because touring, for me, at that extent wasn't a good thing physically."
The guitarist revealed that the band was typically setting up a home base in one city, flying back after performances. "To get in at four o'clock in the morning from doing a gig, after you've done the gig, and fly back to the hotel — it was a lot of late nights. You're living a life like I used to when I was 20. Even though we were traveling [under] the best [conditions] — we had our own plane, we had fabulous hotels and we'd base ourselves in New York or Los Angeles for 10 days, or somewhere else, and do it like that. Go out, fly out, do the gig, come back, but by the time you've done that, you got back into the hotel, it's three or four o'clock by the time you get to bed. And for me, now, it was just difficult, and my doctor said to me to try and calm it down a bit. And it just seemed like the right thing to do at that time."
At present, Iommi continues to work on new music. However, the current pandemic has put a crimp in his plans. "Every night I play and put something down, but funny enough, I was due to be working now with my engineer, but, of course, you can't have anybody in your house because of the [coronavirus] lockdown, which is Mike Exeter, who I've used for years — he'd done the Sabbath stuff with us," says Iommi.
"We'd planned to come over and start putting some of the things I've got here down, because I've got so much stuff — I just wanna get the thing down now. So that was the original plan. And, of course, it went pear-shaped," continued the guitarist. "I spoke to him today, funny enough, and we thought maybe we might try this week and do it with Zoom over the internet — he can record me somehow. But hopefully when it all clears up, we'll definitely be starting."
As for a potential future release, Iommi says nothing is currently set in stone, but he does have "a couple of big things that could happen."
Tony Iommi Speaks With SiriusXM's Trunk Nation
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