Ozzy Osbourne, despite health woes, wants to tour again

Ozzy Osbourne, the 73-year-old "godfather of heavy metal," says that despite such severe health issues as Parkinson's disease and a fall at home that required 15 screws to be inserted into his spine, he is resolute in his desire to tour again.

"I am determined to get back on stage even if I have to be nailed to a board and wheeled on," Osbourne told People magazine in an interview posted Wednesday. "Survival is my legacy." Being on the road touring is "where I belong," he said. "The relationship I have with my audience is the biggest love affair of my life." Osbourne performed at halftime last Thursday during the Rams-Bills game at SoFi Stadium in Inglewood, California, that kicked off the NFL season.

The former frontman of Rock & Roll Hall of Famers Black Sabbath had given a surprise performance Aug. 8 before a 30,000-strong crowd at the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England, where he was born John Michael Osbourne. He had needed a back brace in order to stand. Still, he later mused to People, "The games were a quarter of a mile away from the school that I went to growing up," he told the magazine from his home in Los Angeles, "and as we drove past it, I thought, 'If somebody would have told me I'd be doing this up the road so many years later, I would've never believed them.' "

Adding, "My life has been incredible with the things that have happened to me — both good and bad," he told the magazine, "I've never been this laid up. … I can't understand my luck."

The singer remains busy, having recently released his 13th solo studio album, "Patient Number 9," and working with his family, including wife-manager and discussion-show panelist Sharon Osbourne, on "Home to Roost," an upcoming BBC reality-TV show documenting a move from Los Angeles to their family home in the rural U.K. county of Buckinghamshire.