Bill Ward slates Sabbath's 13

Bill Ward has described Black Sabbath’s latest album 13 as “a pile of shit.”

The estranged Sabbath drummer didn’t play on the 2013 record, having failed to agree on the contract he was offered. Frontman Ozzy Osbourne, however, blamed Ward’s absence on the sticksman’s health issues. Rage Against The Machine’s Brad Wilk was behind the kit for the album.

Ward says he had to distance himself from the band after the fallout, with one tactic being to totally dismiss the album that was created without him.

Ward – who remains locked in a war of words with Osbourne – tells the Eddie Trunk Podcast (via Blabbermouth): “I wasn’t interested in the fucking album 13. I’ve heard 20 bars of it – that’s all I’ve heard – and then I turned it off and said, ‘That’s a pile of shit,’ and that’s the truth.

“I wanted to make sure that I went down the line and detached myself as much as possible. I had to stop loving them, because if you’re loving a dog as it’s biting you and ripping your insides out, it’s hard to love a dog that’s doing that.

“So I actually stopped loving them, and I had to learn what we call detachment. So whatever they were doing, I could care less.”

Ward this week described the standoff with his former bandmates as “very sad” and reiterated his stance that he would need a full, public apology from Osbourne before he would consider a return.

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Stef wrote close to 5,000 stories during his time as assistant online news editor and later as online news editor between 2014-2016. An accomplished reporter and journalist, Stef has written extensively for a number of UK newspapers and also played bass with UK rock favourites Logan. His favourite bands are Pixies and Clap Your Hands Say Yeah. Stef left the world of rock'n'roll news behind when he moved to his beloved Canada in 2016, but he started on his next 5000 stories in 2022.