TONY IOMMI On BLACK SABBATH's Final Tour: 'We'd Lost That Sort Of Comradeship'

BLACK SABBATH finished “The End” tour on February 4 in the band’s hometown of Birmingham, England, closing out the quartet’s groundbreaking 49-year career with an emotional 15-song set at the city’s 16,000-seat Genting Arena.

Six months on, guitarist Tony Iommi has reflected on the final trek, which was captured for new documentary, “Black Sabbath: The End Of The End”.

Speaking exclusively with Express.co.uk, the 69-year-old legend said: “I loved the whole tour. Really enjoyable. But one of the problems was we used to be all together all the time.

“As the years have gone by, everybody has their own space and schedule.

“We all travelled together on the plane, but then everybody gets into their individual cars, goes to the hotel, goes to their room. So you didn’t see anybody. We’d lost that sort of comradeship. We used to go down to the bar and have a drink, but everyone stopped drinking apart from me. We weren’t able to sit down and talk about anything. [Although] Ozzy [Osbourne, vocals] would sometimes come into my dressing room. He’d say a few words and then he’d go.”

Ozzy told The Pulse Of Radio not long ago that he’s glad that SABBATH has come full circle. “BLACK SABBATH has been through the mill over the years, but to come back and be friends with my buddies who I started off with all those years ago, it’s a closure for me, a chapter of my life which I can say, ‘Well, we came, we saw, we had a good time and now it’s over,'” he said. “I’m glad we ended up happy. Whatever axes we had to grind between us over the years, we got rid of all that and we’re friends again.”

Iommi said that he wouldn’t rule out the possibility of doing one-off shows or even more recording, saying, “I wouldn’t write that off, if one day that came about. That’s possible. Or even doing an album, ’cause then, again, you’re in one place.”

The band decided to make this tour its last because Iommi, who was diagnosed with cancer in 2012 and is currently in remission, can no longer travel for extended amounts of time.

The original lineup of SABBATH came together in 1969 with Osbourne, Iommi, Geezer Butler on bass and Bill Ward on drums. That lineup recorded and toured through 1978, and periodically reformed through the ’90s and 2000s for live work.

They regrouped again in late 2011 for a new album and tour, although Ward dropped out after a few months over financial issues. SABBATH has used Ozzy‘s regular touring drummer Tommy Clufetos since then for live work. RAGE AGAINST THE MACHINE‘s Brad Wilk laid down the drum tracks on the album “13”, which came out in June 2013.

Iommi and Butler haven’t announced any specific post-SABBATH plans yet, but Osbourne is reportedly at work on a new album, and already played a few solo shows this summer.

Fonte: Blabbermouth.net