Written by Heavy metal guitar hero Zakk Wylde has revealed that he believes 2025’s massive Back to the Beginning Black Sabbath tribute concert could have become a yearly event, were it not for Ozzy Osbourne’s passing just weeks later.
Speaking exclusively to Metal Hammer, Ozzy’s longtime guitarist and Black Label Society frontman says that he felt it would have given the Sabbath legend “something to strive for” if he knew he had a yearly event in the diary.
“I was talking with Oz the whole time,” Zakk explains. “I figured because Back to the Beginning went so great, we could do it once a year, you know, do it all over the world, whether its Brazil next year, next year Japan, then do another one in America. You do it once a year, it gives Ozzy something to strive for, all the money goes to charity and it’s just an awesome thing. That was what I was foreseeing.”
Over a dozen of metal’s biggest names, including Metallica, Guns ‘n’ Roses, Tool and Slayer, were present at Birmingham’s Villa Park to pay tribute to Black Sabbath on July 5 2025, in what proved to be Ozzy’s final live performance before his passing on July 22.
The forthcoming Black Label Society album, Engines of Demolition, ends with a tribute to Ozzy, named Ozzy’s Song, which Zakk wrote immediately after his funeral.
“I would never have written the song if Ozzy hadn’t passed away, obviously,” he tells us. “I had the music written, but I didn’t put any lyrics to it. Next thing you know I was back over there [in the UK], laying him to rest, and I had to go back out with Pantera. The next day when I flew home, I had a show at Jones Beach. When I got back from the Pantera celebration, as soon as I got home, is when I wrote the lyrics.”
Zakk actually credits the simple but moving song’s title to his wife.
“I remember playing it for her and she kept referencing it as, ‘Put Ozzy on, let me hear the Ozzy song again’,” he reveals. “That’s why I ended up just calling it Ozzy’s Song.“
Fittingly, the song was recorded on Zakk’s iconic, custom made Les Paul, known as ‘The Grail’, that was made famous during his early years as Ozzy’s guitarist.
“Adam [Fuller, Black Label Society’s long time engineer] was with me when I did the solo on that song, and he said, ‘You should probably go and get The Grail’,” says Zakk. “So, for the solo on that song I broke out The Grail. It makes perfect sense, you know, the first song that I ever wrote with Ozzy was on that and then also the last tribute to him.”
Engines of Demolition is released on March 27 via Spinefarm Records.
