I would have never thought Sharon and Ozzy would do this but i thought this news was interesting:



Sure, they say it every year: This summer's Ozzfest will be like none that came before.


But this time, it's true: Admission will be free. Yes, free.


At a press conference held in Los Angeles Tuesday afternoon (February 6), festival co-founder Sharon Osbourne announced that, in response to the ever-escalating costs of concert tickets, admission to this year's Ozzfest — which will be headlined by Ozzy Osbourne — won't cost fans a dime.


"For the last few years, ticket prices have steadily climbed as artists demand more and more money for summer tours," she said in a statement. "We certainly want everybody to make money, however we also want the kids to be able to afford to come out and have an incredible experience. If we continued with the traditional touring-festival model, we would have no choice but to raise ticket prices again this year."


As part of the announcement, which a press release promises "will forever mark the year Ozzfest spiked the concert industry's punch and gave every headbanging American kid a reason to strap on an air guitar," Osbourne and the fest's producer, Live Nation, said they will support their new business model by calling on sponsors to provide added support.


"This summer's Ozzfest will provide select sponsors with a unique opportunity to engage fans one-on-one, utilizing one of music's best-known brands," reads the release.


"We're reaching the same point we did years ago when kids no longer wanted to pay for overpriced CDs," Sharon Osbourne said. "As a result, they found alternative ways of getting music. That's what's happening with summer touring in this country, it's out-pricing itself. We started this and we want to keep it and we want to make it bigger and bigger each year by getting bigger sponsors to be involved with the festival and underwriting the festival. That's what it's about."


Ozzfest will launch in Los Angeles on July 7, and make stops in San Francisco; Seattle; Denver; Albuquerque, New Mexico; Phoenix; Dallas; Chicago; Pittsburgh; New York; Boston; Philadelphia; Hartford, Connecticut; Charlotte, North Carolina; Atlanta; West Palm Beach, Florida; and Nashville. A full list of confirmed cities and dates is expected to be released soon.


Apart from announcing Ozzy Osbourne as this year's mainstage headliner (and that he'll be performing material from his forthcoming studio LP), no further performer announcements were made.


In order to get inside Ozzfest this summer, fans will need to visit the tour's Web site, "to find links that will direct them to special sponsor sites where tickets can be secured," according to the release. More details regarding the process will be revealed in the coming weeks.


Sharon Osbourne said that, while the rest of the bill's being firmed up, "we're hoping that after today's announcement, we'll have a whole influx of artists who want to be a part of something this groundbreaking. We know there aren't any major headlining acts that would tour all summer for nothing, but we're confident we can turn some of the genre's biggest bands on to what we're doing and have them come out to play a date or two. If they're in town and want the rush of performing in front of 20,000 frenzied kids, they're more than welcome to join us. They can sell their T-shirts, CDs, and whatever else they've got."


For more on Ozzfest, check out the feature "Backstage at Ozzfest."

This is very interesting, but I'll be skeptical that it'll work until I see it work.

that's definitely an interesting idea. i'll wait to see what happens and who's playing.

I might actually go this year

i bet this will be like one of those free ipod scams where you have to sign up and buy stuff from sponsors.

i bet they will have you bring a dozen eggs to each show so that sharon can tell you to throw them to any band that happens to blow ozzy out

First thought: Good for them

Second thought: $10 bottles of water

Third thought: no way am i going to any of these shows, there will be more trash than a Skynard headlined county fair if it is free.

This is my guess of how it will work....

If they play an arena, like in the Tweeter in Jersey, that has both seats and a lawn, the lawn will be free and the seats will be tickets through ticketmaster that are for purchase for about 80 bucks. What they will probably do is set up with sponsors that make it so you can have a free lawn seat if you go to their site and fill out a survey or listen or watch a sitcom or something like and give your opinion. They will give you a web coupon and you take that to the arena and that is your lawn seat. They might even take it further, because it will be first come first serve, that a code will be given on the official Ozzy Forum or something to that effect so that more real fans have a shot at getting the tickets.

Now I have no proof of this or anything, its just a guess of how I think it would work.

Still not going

Do you any idea how many links or special trials you'll have to do to get to cover the costs of a regular ticket? Good idea, but there's no way a couple sponsors can cover the cost of the entire festival.

For how shitty ozzfest is, they should be paying people to attend.

That's pretty amazing...too bad they'll probably continue to host derivative numetal rip-offs and shit like Slipknot.

i've lost track of the setlists for the last couple couple of years, but i think back in the 90's it was at least decent. ozzy, original sabbath, pantera, tool, manson, black label society, megadeth. at different points in time these bands were on ozzfest. i would've liked to have seen one of those.



i have no idea who gets billed these days

I'm not into metal/hard-rock that much anymore but if I had money to spare I would probably pay pretty decent to see a line-up like that. Maybe.

I really don't give a shit if bands like Linkin Park and Trapt are playing for free. They should be paying people to go see them.

can't argue with that

As rafa_garcia18 mentioned, they should have just quit while they were ahead. Back in the day Ozzfest had some good line-ups and was a pretty heavy hitter in the summer. This just feels like they're reaching.

free ozzfest

theres some catch..whatever it may be..good bands dont just play for free

if no catch, id hate to see the dirtball acts they have there

the catch is very similar to freeipods.com. you know, you click on a bunch of links, do a bunch of special offers, and then the advertising pays off.

The lineup this year is pretty decent. I'd consider going.


Ozzy
Lamb of God
Lordi (who the fuck are these guys?)
Behemoth
Hatebreed
Mondo Generator