Last month, Black Sabbath confirmed that the world will finally get to hear a new album (their first with Ozzy in roughly 35 years) this June. And while the reunited metal gods will be playing overseas this spring and early summer, we now know when we might get to see them live on U.S. soil.
While at NAMM, bassist Geezer Butler was interviewed by Eddie Trunk for Hartke. In addition to confirming that the new album 13 would soon be mixed, Butler gave a little insight into Sabbath’s upcoming touring plans. Watch the entire interview below, but here’s what Butler said regarding tour dates [around the 2:40 mark]:
“We start at the end of April in New Zealand, then we go to Australia, then Japan. June, we’ll be promoting the album, then July and August [is] USA. Then October is South America and Europe in November and December.”
We already knew about Sabbath’s plans in New Zealand, Australia and Japan. However, it’s awesome to hear Butler confirm American tour plans (implying at least two months’ worth of dates). Whether that means Ozzfest will return to the States, though, is yet to be seen [UPDATE: TheRamblingElf brought to our attention that in a separate NAMM interview, Butler confirms that the U.S. trek will “strickly” be Black Sabbath and not connected to Ozzfest].
However, there apparently is still one thing Sabbath doesn’t know: who will be drumming on the road. When asked whether it’ll be Rage Against The Machine’s Brad Wilk (who recorded drums on the album) or Tommy Clufetos joining them onstage this year, Butler said “We’re not sure yet. We don’t know beause I think Brad’s got commitments with Rage Against The Machine. So it’ll probably be either Tommy or Brad, depending on their commitments.”
To be honest, we assumed that it would be Clufetos playing live with Sabbath. He already filled in for Bill Ward during Sabbath’s few reunion shows last year, and we thought it made sense to have a different drummer in the studio. Then again, we also thought Clufetos was going to be featured on the album before Wilk was announced. More interestingly, though, is that Butler may have just let it slip that Rage Against The Machine are planning something this year. That’s pretty surprising since Tom Morello recently said the exact opposite.
Watch Butler’s entire interview with Eddie Trunk and Hartke after the jump.
[youtube]http://youtu.be/Tpdc5wLiWAk[/youtube]
