Pink Floyd fans believe musician Roger Waters will not play another show in Birmingham following his controversial comments on Ozzy Osbourne.
The former Pink Floyd frontman made it clear he was no real fan of Black Sabbath or Osbourne, who died in July this year. In a recently published interview, Waters said popular musicians could distract from political issues. He would cite Taylor Swift and the Paranoid hitmaker as examples of this. Waters said: “…Or Ozzy Osbourne, who just died, bless him, in his, whatever that state that he was in his whole life, we’ll never know. Although, he was all over the TV for hundreds of years with his idiocy and nonsense.
“The music, I have no idea, I couldn’t give a fuck. I don’t care about Black Sabbath, I never did, I have no interest in…. ‘Wahhhh!!!’ (Waters sticks his tongue out) and biting the heads off chickens or whatever they do. I couldn’t care less.” His comments on The Godfather of Heavy Metal were not well received by Black Sabbath fans, Pink Floyd fans, or Osbourne’s so, Jack Osbourne.
Sharing a post to his social media page, Jack wrote: “Hey @rogerwaters fuck you. How pathetic and out of touch you’ve become. The only way you seem to get attention these days is by vomiting out bullshit in the press. My father always thought you were a cunt – thanks for proving him right.”
Fans of Pink Floyd believe Waters will no longer be touring in Birmingham after his comments against the rock legend from the area. A post to the r/PinkFloyd subreddit saw devastated fans wonder whether the Amused to Death songwriter would be touring the city ever again. No tours have been announced at this point, though a live album, This is Not a Drill, released earlier this year.
One fan wrote: “Roger just can’t keep his mouth shut, can he? Sometimes the world doesn’t need to hear your opinions on things, Roger – and now I guess you won’t be doing any shows in Birmingham, will you!”
Another person wrote: “Classic Roger and his conceited opinions. It really does feel like the only way he can cling to relevancy is to needlessly belittle others, and reading through that article Ozzy and Sabbath weren’t mentioned by the interviewer – he just went off on a tangent to slag them off.
“Regardless of musical preferences, Ozzy as a character was adored by pretty much the entire rock and metal community and Roger could only dream of that kind of popularity.”
A third added: “I promise you this – there will be no parade for Roger. No final concert of world-famous musicians lining up to play for free. No crowds in tears standing by the side of the road as his coffin goes by.”
Osbourne, who died just weeks after the Black Sabbath farewell concert, received a swell of tributes from musicians, members of the public, and world leaders. Not everyone believes Waters has caused any controversy, with some members of the public believing the Pink Floyd founder was merely joking.
One fan wrote: “People need to lighten up, it’s just banter. It’s ok to verbally bash a deceased person. Furthermore, he has a point about Ozzy being a buffoon. Ozzy biting the head off an innocent bat is a million times more malicious and cruel than anything Roger said here.”
Another wrote: “Rogers is a bad ass. He’s an original member of Pink Floyd, his opinions matter.” Despite Waters’ decades-long disinterest in Black Sabbath (he would say Evil Woman left him “speechless” with how underwhelming it was), Osbourne was apparently a huge Pink Floyd fan. His praise for Money and Obscured by Clouds is well documented, and the Iron Man hitmaker believed Pink Floyd never made a bad album.
He said: “I can’t think of an individual song, but I really like their album Obscured By Clouds. That was the soundtrack, wasn’t it? I remember listening to it while I was high on drugs. It had those weird bubbles on the cover. The Floyd made good albums; I don’t think they ever made a bad one.” You can watch Waters’ full interview below.
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