Black Sabbath drummer Bill Ward – who is currently sitting out the band’s ongoing reunion citing contract disputes – has hinted at some of the specific reasons lying behind his decision to not rejoin the band in a new interview.
“I was offered a contact and I couldn’t sign it,” he tells Guitar International. “As for some of the stories – I would never, ever show up for a commitment that I could not do physically. So that should answer that one! In the statement that I did last year, I was quite clear that I came to the end of the road and promised myself and my family that I would never sign a contract that was not workable.
“It was one of the toughest decisions that I ever had to make. Because I absolutely and without question wanted to play. I haven’t left the band. Everybody thinks I have left the band. I didn’t walk out; it wasn’t like that at all! I just didn’t sign the contact and life took its own course.
“I’m the drummer in Black Sabbath so I want to do the entire show. I play all or nothing. Playing partially would kind of be aligning to my demise in Sabbath and minimize me. I’m the drummer in Sabbath and quite capable of doing the job.”
Read the entire interview at Guitar International.
In other Bill Ward news, the drummer is about to debut a fine art collection, called Absence of Corners, on August 1st. For more information, please visit www.billwarddrumart.com.
additional source: metalhammer.co.uk
36 Responses
For whatever reason they are disrespecting their “friend” and original band-mate by insulting him with an unreasonable contract. I can’t believe that if they truly wanted and respected Bill as they say they do, that they would not do right by him. On another note, they are also disrespecting their fans by having Andrew W.K. instead of a actual band open their shows in North America. Is someone in their camp afraid afraid of being shown up?
After seeing Van Halen drop an atomic bomb on them on the last Ozzy led BS tour, I’m sure they wanted nobody to open but crap.
Since 1983 Bill played on Black sabbath Born Again,The mezmerist (drummed 0n 4 songs),2 solo albums and played drums on 2 songs (psycho man and who’s foolin who) and played on what 4-5 Black sabbath tours,that is not very much work in the last 30 years. and has backed out on BS many many times. He is my favorite drummer of all time and seems like a very nice fella but he can’t keep up with commitments . Their is something very strange with the guy. Where the hell are those 3 new solo albums Bill??
If TMS does another season, which I hope they do, I would love to see Bill as the guest performer and where his drumming skills are at presently. Though we may never know about the contract and commitment side of this deal for sure, we’d certainly be able to put to rest Ozzy’s accusations that Bill lacks the ability to perform on the level of the rest of the members at this point. I’d be really curious to hear Bill on the show since Ozzy himself has set the bar so low already with his own showing on this tour. If Bill needs to bring his post-it notes and stick them to his kit as Ozzy indicated Bill needed to do during rehearsal, then so be it. It’s certainly no worse than Ozzy needing a teleprompter to sing Iron Man on the actual tour.
uh..Bill yes you have!!!!