This morning, the lineup for this year’s Lollapalooza was officially announced. And though most of the lineup had been leaked earlier this week, the announcement confirms that Black Sabbath will indeed be performing at Lollapalooza. Also confirmed for the three day festival in Chicago are the Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Black Keys, Jack White, At The Drive-In, Florence + The Machine and many others.
As we said before, Black Sabbath’s participation at Lollapalooza doesn’t come as much of a surprise. After all, Sharon Osbourne did let it slip that the reunited band will be performing one show in the U.S. this coming August (shortly after the band scaled back their European tour to one date). However, what makes this ironic is that there was a time when Lollapalooza didn’t want anything to do with Ozzy Osbourne. Back in 1996, Sharon tried to get Ozzy on the festival’s bill (back when it was a touring festival), but organizers turned them down. Lollapalooza’s refusal inspired Sharon to launch Ozzfest. Granted, Lollapalooza was ran by different organizers at the time after Perry Farrell (also of Jane’s Addiction) briefly cut ties with the festival he launched. However, we still can’t help but notice the irony of Ozzy playing Lollapalooza with Sabbath while Ozzfest is no where to be found.
Of course, the one thing that still isn’t clear is who will be joining Black Sabbath on drums (for both Lollapalooza and the UK’s Download Festival). Whether it will be Bill Ward or not, at least we know that Sabbath will be playing one show in America this year (depending on Iommi’s health). You can see this year’s full lineup over at Lollapalooza’s official website. Lollapalooza will take place from August 3 to 5 at Grant Park in Chicago.
