Tony Iommi Claims Geezer Butler Doesn’t Want to Record Another Black Sabbath Album

Shortly after Black Sabbath released their latest studio album, 13, various members of the band spoke about making one more record. However, Ozzy Osbourne recently claimed those plans were scrapped. Ozzy didn’t elaborate much on why, but in a new interview, guitarist Tony Iommi spoke of bassist Geezer Butler‘s resistance to head back into the studio.

13 made history for Black Sabbath, giving the heavy metal legends their first album to hit No. 1 in the U.S. “If we did an album and it went to No. 2, people would go, ‘It’s over,’” Ozzy said recently. “There’s only one more place you can go after No. 1 and that’s No. 2, you know.” That was Ozzy’s first inclination that Sabbath were finished making records, as he had previously spoke with excitement about one last album multiple times.

Though he’s still fighting lymphoma, Tony Iommi has soldiered on to keep the riffs coming for Sabbath. He’s got plenty more, but in an interview with Q Magazine, he reveals that it was Geezer Butler who wasn’t interested in recording. “I’ve got so many riffs. I wrote a whole load of stuff for another album and we met up in L.A. but the others… well, Geezer didn’t particularly want to do another album,” Iommi says. “Then again, after you’ve just had a No. 1 album, where do you go from there? For the last LP, we did record 16 songs, so we may still put something out from that. We don’t know yet. Do I intend to stop playing? No. It’s the touring, really [that is difficult]. I’d love to do something with the guys. But, whatever happens, I will do something.”

At the 2015 Q Awards, Iommi echoed his statement, “I’d love to write. I wrote loads of stuff for another album, but we didn’t do one.”

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