Tom Morello opens up about overseeing Ozzy Osbourne’s final performance

In a recent interview with Chicago radio station WBEZ’s Clare Lane, guitarist Tom Morello of Rage Against The Machine discussed his involvement in what he has dubbed “the greatest heavy metal show ever”—the charity event “Back To The Beginning” that will take place on July 5 at Birmingham, UK’s Villa Park. At the concert, Ozzy Osbourne will make his final solo appearance and Black Sabbath’s original lineup will play their final show ever.

Heavy metal is the music that made me love music, and Black Sabbath is the band that invented heavy metal. So, when Ozzy and Sharon Osbourne asked me to be the musical director of what’s going to be the last Black Sabbath show — the last Ozzy Osbourne show in the soccer stadium that’s like a half-block down from where Ozzy Osbourne and Geezer Butler, the bass player of Black Sabbath, grew up — I was honored to do that. Right now, we have, like, 14 bands. You know, it’s Metallica, Guns N’ Roses. It’s, like, all the biggest bands in the history of heavy metal. The show is gonna be about 10 hours long, but it’s gonna be a salute to a genre that people all around the world love. You know, it’s been the music that has really made me love music. I’m interested in a lot of different kinds of music now, but I never would have been interested in any kind of music had it not been for metal.

Morello himself will be up on the stage, too.

Oh, of course, I will be up there. Speaking of Northern Illinois, this may be a little bit of a spoiler alert, but Adam Jones, the guitarist of Tool, he and I went to Libertyville High School together and played in a band. Billy Corgan, the singer of Smashing Pumpkins, grew up a few suburbs over. The three of us are going to play together for the first time ever at the show. So, there’ll be an 847 connection.