British rock icon Ozzy Osbourne announced on Monday he was pulling out of the Power Trip music festival scheduled for October, citing persistent health problems that have plagued his career in recent years.
"My original plan was to return to the stage in the summer of 2024, & when the offer to do this show came in, I optimistically moved forward," he wrote in a statement on Twitter.
"Unfortunately, my body is telling me that I'm just not ready yet and I am much too proud to have the first show that I do in nearly five years be half-assed."
He added that the band replacing him at the festival were "personal friends of mine," and would be announced shortly. He called the decision "painful," but thanked his supporters and band for their support.
The Power Trip festival, to be held in California, is set to feature some of the world's biggest names in rock and metal including Guns N' Roses, Iron Maiden, AC/DC and Metallica.
Osbourne, 74, also nicknamed the Prince of Darkness, began his career as a member of groundbreaking metal band Black Sabbath. He won Grammy Awards for both his solo work and as part of the band.
He became famous for his colorful performances, especially throughout the 1980s, including when he threw raw meat on concertgoers, and bit into a dead bat tossed onto the stage by a fan (Osbourne had thought it was rubber. It was not).
In the 90s, Osbourne and wife, Sharron, founded the popular music festival, Ozzfest, providing a platform for a new generation of metal bands such as Slipknot.
Osbourne and his family spent more than 20 years living in Los Angeles, where their life was famously documented on the MTV reality series "The Osbournes" in the early 2000s. But he and Sharron returned to their home in England in 2022, citing gun violence and high taxes.
He has also suffered a series of health setbacks in recent years, revealing his Parkinson's diagnosis in January 2020, contracting Covid-19 in April 2022 and undergoing surgery two months later.
Then in February this year, he revealed that a major accident four years ago had damaged his spine -- prompting him to cancel all upcoming shows and retire from touring, saying he was no longer physically capable. "Never would I have imagined that my touring days would have ended this way," he wrote at the time.
