For the past few months, the metal community’s attention has been pretty much focused on The Big 4 U.S. dates. Then, we had Mayhem Fest to distract us while waiting for essentially more Big 4 updates. So it’s no surprise really that during this entire time, we all totally forgot about another big metal tour: Ozzfest. Well, it would appear that so did Ozzy and Sharon.
Last year, Ozzfest made its “return” after a short hiatus with a six date tour featuring the Prince Of Darkness himself and Motley Crue co-headlining. It seemed like a sure thing that Ozzfest would be continuing after 2010. However, it is already May, and there have been no announcements regarding bands, dates or…anything, actually, about the festival tour. Come to think of it, there haven’t even been any rumors flying around the web as to who might be on this year’s bill. So what gives?
Well, it appears that all signs point to there being no Ozzfest this year. In addition to the official start of Summer being just around the corner, Vulgar Display Of Blog discovered many changes to Ozzfest.com. The band page, which originally stated “Ozzfest 2011Bands Coming Soon,” is now completely blank, while the site’s fan forum page asking fans to suggest bands for the bill has been completed deleted as well.
If these tidbits do indeed imply that Ozzfest 2011 is not happening, then it isn’t too surprising. In addition to the current economic problems effecting touring in general, this Summer is already crowded with big metal/hard rock tours such as Mayhem Fest, Uproar Tour and the Summer Slaughter Tour (just to name a few). Plus, it’s safe to say that a lot of fans spent their money on tickets for the Big 4’s West and East Coast shows. So in truth, unless they could get a stellar and unique lineup at the last minute, it makes more sense for Ozzfest to happen this Summer.
But what does this mean for Ozzfest’s future? Is Ozzfest as a touring festival officially dead? While we could only speculate about that, it doesn’t necessarily look good for the tour either. After building last year as the festival’s “big return” to the public eye, it would definitely be hard (though not impossible) for Ozzfest to return after another year long hiatus. Even coming back as a destination festival (which they did in 2008) would still leave egg on their faces.
Again, though, all of this about Ozzfest’s future, and even the tour’s Summer plans, should only be taken as speculation. We’ll keep you posted, though, if more develops.
