Jack Osbourne sheds some light about the band that was removed from the “Back to the Beginning” event

Jack Osbourne was recently questioned on Jamie Kennedy’s “Hate To Break It To Ya Podcast” regarding one of the biggest unresolved metal mysteries of 2025, as per theprp. Prior to Ozzy Osbourne and Black Sabbath‘s “Back To The Beginning” event in July 2025, rumors circulated that one artist had not been invited to the festival. After requesting an outrageous sum of money to perform, they were removed. All of the participating musicians in “Back To The Beginning” waived their regular costs, even though the performance in Birmingham, UK, featured many of the biggest names in metal and hard rock. After all, Cure Parkinson’s, the Birmingham Children’s Hospital, and Acorn Children’s Hospice were the three organizations that Ozzy personally chose to receive the event’s revenues.

In the end, the event, its official broadcast, and a related auction raised over $11 million. Although “Back To The Beginning” marked the poignant end of Ozzy and Black Sabbath‘s career, weeks prior to it, Ozzy‘s wife and manager, Sharon Osbourne, openly declared that a band was removed from the bill due to a financial dispute with a major performer. Ozzy tragically died a few weeks after the show, so Sharon never disclosed the guilty part. However, fans have continued to wonder who would allow money to prevent the heavy metal godfather from passing away. Kennedy discussed the issue with Jack when he appeared on the aforementioned program earlier this month.

Here’s what I will say, ’cause a lot of stuff online was about ‘Oh, it’s um…’ I cannot say the band. I cannot. I cannot. But what I will say is this. Everyone’s online speculating who it is, and I have not seen a single accurate [guess,] Not even close. Like I saw something that it was Wolfgang Van Halen and it was absof*ckingutely not. Like Wolf wanted to be there so badly and it was just a clash in schedule [Wolfgang Van Halen withdrew due to a scheduling conflict with his tour with Creed] and hey, he was getting a paid gig versus an unpaid gig. Go do the paid gig. You know?

Here’s the caveat [about ‘Back To The Beginning‘,] it was like listen, we’ll pay for your crew, we’ll pay your hard costs, but no one is, no one’s getting paid, like individually, like the band. But what ended up happening was a lot of crew donated their time. So, they were like, ‘No, we’re not charging for this.’ Because you know, a lot of the crews we’d all worked with for years anyway. And the one band, I will say at this point, it’s like it was in the high hundreds of thousands of dollars what they said their hard costs would be… For them just to show up without any talent fee. It was… It was very frustrating.

…But here’s the thing, it was like, ‘Are you f*cking serious?’ And then you know and then you start… Here’s what, I will give the band the benefit of the doubt, and I will say it was probably the manager, but I don’t know, you know? I don’t know.

Jack said this in response to Kennedy’s question about whether the Osbournes thought the band or manager would keep the money for themselves.

Yeah, ’cause there’s no way… My mom has worked in touring since the 1960s. So like since the 60s she’s worked, you know, in some capacity in the music industry. She knows what hard costs are and what things… what the real is. And when you start saying… they were like, ‘well, all our crew flies business class’. And you’re like, ‘excuse me?’ And so this person was just like saying all this sh*t and like I was just like, ‘You f*ckin… like you motherf*cker.’

Jack continued by saying this after thinking back on the event and how everything transpired.

It was just, it was amazing. It was like the most perfect. And here’s the cool thing about it. Some people were like only playing for like 10 or 15 minutes. But at first I was like, ‘Are people going to be bummed at only seeing like three songs from a certain artist?’ But we had the spinning stage, so the longest you were waiting between music was like five minutes. So it was just like this epic playlist all day long.

Kennedy persisted in pressuring Jack to identify the offending band or at least provide a hint, but Jack remained evasive despite excluding a few possible options. He gave this explanation for his decision to keep quiet.

I can’t [reveal the band] because there’s like the fallout. Because the fallout from it would like, I don’t think would be helpful to anyone.

Jack replied affirmatively in response to Kennedy’s question about whether the band in issue had toured with Ozzy and received assistance from him. Kennedy then became more combative in his interrogation, bringing up bands like Foo Fighters and Mötley Crüe, both of which Jack refuted. Kennedy’s selections also became more varied and lighthearted; he suggested Van Halen, U2, Coldplay, Ed Sheeran, Good Charlotte, and Celine Dion, all of which Jack dismissed.

Additionally, he disclosed that the band in question later got in touch with them and expressed regret.

They were like, ‘Please tell us what happened, we want to know the whole story.’

Jack responded as follows to Kennedy’s question on why one of the band members didn’t intervene during the conflict.

Yeah that’s how I’m just like bullsh*t. You f*ckin’ knew.