You can’t keep “The Prince of Darkness” down: Ozzy Osbourne is ready to hit the road again.
Osbourne, 74, gave a health update to Metal Hammer on Tuesday, September 26, after undergoing what he hopes is the “final surgery” for a spinal injury that forced him to retire from touring. “I’ve had all the surgery now, thank God,” he said. “I’m feeling OK – it was just dragging on. I thought I’d be back on my feet months ago. I just couldn’t get used to this mode of living, constantly having something wrong. I can’t walk properly yet, but I’m not in any pain anymore and the surgery on my spine went great.”
Osbourne also noted that he feels good enough to get back into the studio and out on the stage. “I’m getting myself fit,” he explained. “I’ve done two albums fairly recently [2020’s Ordinary Man and 2022’s Patient Number 9], but I want to do one more album and then go back on the road.”
Osbourne — who went public with his Parkinson’s disease diagnosis in early 2020 — said that he set up a studio in his home in the U.K. and hopes to reunite with Andrew Watt, the man who produced Ordinary Man and Patient Number 9, and who has worked with the likes of the Rolling Stones and Justin Bieber. “I’m just starting to work on [the new album] now, and we’ll be recording in the early part of next year,” he said. “I want to take my time with this one!”
The heavy metal icon has been dealing with health issues since suffering a fall in 2019. The accident caused him to dislodge metal rods that had been put in his body following a quad bike crash in 2003. Osbourne went under the knife to correct the 2019 injury but later told Rolling Stone that it “f—ked everything up … I’m wobbling all over the place. And since they cut through the nerves, my right arm feels permanently cold.”
Osbourne announced earlier this year that “after three operations, stem cell treatments, endless physical therapy sessions, and most recently, groundbreaking Cybernic (HAL) Treatment, my body is still physically weak.” Due to these ongoing health issues, Osbourne said in February that he was “not physically capable of doing my upcoming European/UK tour dates” and was retiring from the road.
“Never would I have imagined that my touring days would have ended this way,” he noted.
He recently spoke about his “final” surgery on the September 19 episode of the recently rebooted “The Osbournes Podcast,” featuring Ozzy, Sharon Osbourne, Jack Osbourne and Kelly Osbourne. “Tomorrow I have my final surgery on my neck,” Ozzy said, though it’s unclear when the podcast was recorded.
“Which it is gonna be the final surgery because I can’t do it anymore,” he said. “Regardless of the way it ends up after tomorrow, I’m not doing it anymore. I can’t.”
