Sharon Osbourne has reached an agreement with Jim Simpson, an early manager of Black Sabbath, over his wanting to release an album of demos they recorded when they were known as Earth. He wanted to release Earth: The Legendary Lost Tapes last July, but that’s when Sharon threatened a lawsuit.
Appearing on The Osbournes podcast, she says, “The band now have their demos back. And all four of them (Ozzy, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler and Bill Ward) own it, which is where it should be. All of that stuff should be theirs. So it all ended well… We’re gonna talk about what everybody wants to do with it, and we’ll go from there.”
While the songs are more blues based instead of the heavy metal Sabbath became known for, Sharon adds that they are “historically important — for music lovers of that genre. And then we got [the rights to] the pictures that were taken at that time too. So, that is all so important… Everybody in the band’s kids and grandkids would love to see [them]… It’s special. And I’m just happy that it’s where it should be — with the band, and [they can decide] what they wanna do as a band, what they’re gonna do with it. So that’s great…
“[Simpson] did the right thing at the end of the day. He did the right thing for the band.”
The songs are from 1969 and Simpson had them restored and remastered.
