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Classic Rock Magazine - September 2025

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In this issue

Ozzy Osbourne
We look back and celebrate the life and times of the Godfather Of Heavy Metal, including specific events through the eyes of CR contributors and others who met him, many of whom knew him well. Hilarity, outrage, disbelief, madness, sadness…
You really couldn't make it up. Plus, stars bid farewell.

Walter Trout
The bluesman returns with his new album Sign Of The Times, on which he looks at a world gone wrong.

Warren Haynes
Gov’t Mule’s leader on his new release, musical and marital partnerships, how the blues can rescue you from misery…

Simply The Best

New book celebrates Tina Turner.

1 mins

Steve Miller Cancels Tour

Weather blamed, but fans suspect poor ticket sales.

1 mins

Rodney Crowell

The country star returns with a guest-packed new album, and tells us what revived his interest in southern rock.

2 mins

Dinosaur Pile-Up

Following health issues, the Leeds alt.rockers are back with their first album in six years and a September tour.

2 mins

De'Wayne

Listening to his genre-flipping new album, it's clear Taco Bell's loss is very much rock's gain.

2 mins

MICK RALPHS

Hearing a particular guitarist on the radio when he was 18 changed his life. And what a life he went on to have, as guitarist and songwriter with Mott The Hoople and Bad Company.

8 mins

Warren Haynes

Gov't Mule's leader on his new release, musical and marital partnerships, how the blues can rescue you from misery...

4 mins

WE SHARED THE YEARS

A personal Ozzy tribute by Classic Rock's Geoff Barton.

10+ mins

“I BET RINGO DIDN'T DO THIS...”

The first and last time I saw Ozzy Osbourne’s private parts was at the Townsend Hotel in Birmingham, Michigan, in July 1998. A magazine had flown me and a photographer named Hugo Dixon to meet Ozzy on his day off from the Ozzfest tour.

3 mins

‘BLACK SABBATH ARE PLAYING FOR 30 PENCE’

February 9, 1970. Arriving late at our local rock club on a rainy Monday night, the 15-year-old me is hoping to catch American blues guitarist Freddie King, but, approaching the venue, Friars Aylesbury sounds to be under some kind of bombardment. A sheet of paper tacked on the door says King can't make it, and Black Sabbath are playing instead for the half-price admission of 30 pence.

1 mins

OZZY WAS NOBODY'S FOOL, AND ALWAYS HAD THE GREATEST ONE-LINERS'

Photographer Ross Halfin offers memories and a personal view of the man behind the myth.

6 mins

“WHO WOULD YOU RATHER SLEEP WITH, OZZY OR GEEZER?”

“If you absolutely had to,” a tipsy Sharon Osbourne asks me sweetly, “who would you rather sleep with – my husband or her husband?”

3 mins

WHEN OZZY MET MOTÖRHEAD

After Ozzy was sacked by Sabbath in 1979, his solo career got off to a convoluted start with Blizzard Of Ozz, released in September 1980 in the UK and six months later in the US. With the album an instant success in America, Ozzy's epic arena tour started there in April '81. Support for the first three months were Motörhead, making their US debut. Now major stars in the UK after their breakthrough with Ace Of Spades, Lemmy, Fast Eddie and Philthy felt like they’d stepped back to their scuffling days as they often faced hostile reactions or dumbfounded apathy from audiences.

2 mins

"OZZY SHAVED HIS HEAD LAST NIGHT"

Photographer Mark Weiss offers a glimpse of the “warm, generous” Ozzy who helped his career.

2 mins

"LET'S GET A TATTOO!"

Dave Ling remembers a night out in Hollywood with the Prince Of Darkness.

3 mins

“YOU'VE GOT NICE EYEBROWS”

On July 5, 1986, Ozzy was in Sacramento, California, during a long tour in support of his latest album The Ultimate Sin. This was a few weeks before he headlined the biggest UK event of the year for heavy metal fans - the Monsters Of Rock festival at Donington Park. As a writer for weekly music paper Sounds, I travelled to Sacramento with photographer Peter Anderson to write a cover story on Ozzy. Things did not go exactly to plan.

3 mins

'OZZY WOULD BE WATCHING THE HISTORY CHANNEL'

My first Sabbath gig was on May 30, 1970 at Malvern Winter Gardens.

2 mins

‘I SUSPECTED SHARON WAS THERE MORE TO PROTECT ME THAN LOOK OUT FOR OZZY.’

Mick Wall on Ozzy, Sharon and all manner of goings-on.

4 mins

"WHAT DOES IT FEEL LIKE TO BE A LEGEND?"

On December 4 and 5, 1997, Black Sabbath's original lineup reunited for a pair of hometown shows at Birmingham's NEC Arena. There had been a handful of fleeting reunions in the 18 years since Ozzy Osbourne had been booted out of the band, including a sluggish appearance at the US leg of Live Aid in which they had the air of a band who had drunk their hotel bar dry the night before (it turned out they had), and a four-song set in Costa Mesa, California in 1992 to mark Ozzy's farewell show (we all know how that turned out).

3 mins

WANT TO SEE THE DOLPHINS?

There was a lot going on in Ozzy Osbourne’s world in the autumn of 2001. Fresh off the ongoing Ozzfest tour, with a reunited Black Sabbath headlining, he’d got home to find out that Sharon had signed up him and his family to a new reality TV show called The Osbournes that would be broadcast the following spring. “She just told me as soon as I got home that the deal was all done. I knew nothing about it,” he'd said, clearly bemused.

2 mins

OZZY WAS READY TO GIVE IT ALL UP'

It's really hard to talk about Ozzy in the past tense. It just seems impossible he's gone.

1 mins

BABY ZEBRAS, COCKTAIL IN HAND'

When you’re doing a live syndicated radio show, if your guest is late, you're fucked.

2 mins

GLENN HUGHES

With Trapeze, Deep Purple, Black Sabbath, Black Country Communion, solo projects and more, the bassist/vocalist has spent more than 50 years in rock. Addiction nearly derailed his roller- coaster career, but he pulled himself back from the brink and is still going strong. A life? Not half.

10+ mins

THE DOORS OF PERCEPTION

Judged more by what the industry perceived them to be rather than what they actually sounded like, Harem Scarem never achieved the degree of success that their music should have brought them. But they’re still knocking on the door.

4 mins

TIMES THEY ARE A-CHANGIN'

Fully Qualified Survivor would be a perfect album title for Walter Trout. Unfortunately someone else used it. The bluesman returns with Sign Of The Times, looking at a world gone wrong.

8 mins

Helloween

The German metallers release a new album in August and play an anniversary show in October.

3 mins

Connor Selby

He's seen mostly as a blueser, but there's more to him than that.

2 mins

Warrior Soul

Marking the band's 35th year, the US band tour the UK in August and September.

3 mins

Back To The Beginning

Birmingham Villa Park. Stars turned out in force for this celebration of Ozzy Osbourne, a true legend. No one knew that it would turn out to also be a final goodbye.

5 mins

THE VIEW FROM THE SOFA

Obviously, the first blow to the sofa-bound Back To The Beginning livestream viewer is that stream though it is, live it isn't. So you're doomed to twiddle your devil-horn digits until three o'clock before one o'clock finally rolls around and a recently rebooted Mastodon waggle their collective Black Tongue at you. In the interim you pop a can and revel in the lack of a queue for your toilet.

2 mins

Neil Young And The Chrome Hearts

BST, London Hyde Park

1 mins

Rival Sons/Creeping - Jean Bournemouth 02 Academy

While the support band impress, the headliners show why they're the band that other bands are impressed by.

2 mins

Maid Of Stone - Maidstone Mote Park

Plenty of rock, lots of roll, a barrel of fun and a blown fuse on a weekend when everyone playing delivers.

2 mins

Mad Cool - Iberdrola Music, Madrid

Headliners Muse reign in Spain, headlining a bill that also includes Nine Inch Nails, Iggy Pop and Jet.

3 mins

Read all Stories from Classic Rock

Classic Rock Magazine Description:

Publisher: Future

Category: Music

Language: English

Frequency: Monthly

The trusted voice of the rock community since 1998, Classic Rock is your all-access pass, taking you backstage with exclusive interviews and behind-the-scenes insights into rock's biggest names, from living legends to the new generation.