Tony Iommi is once again hinting that Black Sabbath’s final world tour, dubbed “The End,” is actually not the end. The iconic metal pioneers took the stage Saturday night in their hometown of Birmingham, England, to close out the final leg of their year-long farewell tour. Speaking to U.K. radio station Planet Rock, Iommi told the disc jockey that a one-off show and even new music could be in the future.
“I’m going to miss playing on stage because that has been my whole life, the band and playing on stage. I like (playing on stage) and I’m sure it’s not going to end like that; I’m sure we might do a one-off show somewhere.
“It’s just the touring for me — it’s time to stop roaming the world and be at home for a bit… I’m still going to write and put stuff out.”
When the DJ asked if Black Sabbath’s recording days were over, Iommi said the band not “not ruled anything out.”
“No, I don’t think we’ve ruled anything out apart from me not wanting to tour any more on that scale, but who knows, we may do something. We haven’t spoken about it. That’s another thing — we haven’t talked about anything, really, that’s to do with what’s going to happen afterwards. But I’m sure something can happen somewhere.
“It’s nice just to take some time off and really think about it,” he said. “I’ve been offered quite a lot of stuff at the moment. It’s quite exciting. There are lots of different things coming in, things I would never have thought, to be honest. It’s all there and needs some thought. I don’t want to rush into anything.
“Thing is, when you’re touring, you’ve got to go out for six, eight, twelve months or whatever and you’ve got a schedule that you have to do. Now… if I want to do some TV for a month, I can do that.”
Black Sabbath formed in 1969 with Iommi on guitar, Ozzy Osbourne on vocals, Geezer Butler on bass and Bill Ward on drums. That lineup recorded and toured until 1978 when Ozzy was fired and replaced by Ronnie James Dio.
Sporadically getting back together in the ’90s and mid-aughts, the original lineup of Black Sabbath reformed in 2011 and released the band’s last album, the Rick Rubin-produced 13, in 2013 without Bill Ward.
