Black Sabbath said goodbye to the stage with The End tour , which ended in 2017, but drummer Bill Ward at the shows. Tommy Clufetos , from The Dead Daisies and replacement for the founding member, commented on the hate he received from the audience.
At the time, the members couldn't reach an agreement with the original member and decided to continue with Clufetos , which became the target of many people's dissatisfaction. “I don't pay much attention to that. I started so young and quickly learned that you need to be tough in this business and be an adult,” he commented in an interview with Aftershocks TV (via Ultimate Guitar ). “If I had listened to people all along, (…) I would be playing in a wedding band.”
The musician explained that he learned to “trust his instincts” to take advantage of good opportunities for professional growth and learning. “I don’t listen to negative comments, but if you’re not going to listen to the negative ones, you can’t listen to the positive ones either. The people I listen to are few and far between, and a very close circle that I trust,” he continued. “Not that I don’t accept constructive criticism – that’s not it, but I’m not interested in everything that happens on the internet.”
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“I don’t listen to those things, it doesn’t bother me. It’s not that I’m bigger or anything like that, it’s just that I have a job to do, and that’s not part of my job,” he explained. “It doesn’t affect my work and I don’t think people want someone who lets themselves get down. You have to be a strong individual to survive in this business. It’s a long road, and if you can’t handle some comments, then you’re on a bumpy road.”
The band's decision to undertake this final tour without Ward was not well received by many fans. In a poll conducted by Wikimetal 2016 , 60% of readers considered the farewell without one of the classic members a "mistake." A few years later, even Ozzy Osbourne expressed regret for not having the drummer at the shows in Birmingham, the group's hometown, but ruled out the possibility of a Sabbath reunion.
Even without feeling the need to close the band, Ward recently confessed that he doesn't have the physical ability to perform live with them. "I'd have to go back 60 years in time to be able to do that," he commented in March of this year .
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