Ozzy Osbourne Having Second Thoughts About Leaving the U.S.: ‘I’m American Now’

Like a lot of people who said they were headed for the border over the past six tumultuous years in the country, Ozzy Osbourne swore his days in the U.S. were numbered. As recently as early September, the metal icon seemed poised to bounce back to his native England after it was announced that the BBC had green-lit a revival of the beloved Osbournes series starring the first family of metal.

The announcement came after Ozzy’s statement a month earlier that he was “fed up” with America and that his family was headed back to England because of the relentless string of mass shootings in the U.S. “Everything’s f—ing ridiculous there. I’m fed up with people getting killed every day. God knows how many people have been shot in school shootings,” Osbourne said in a an interview with The Observer.

But in a new cover story for Consequence of Sound, Ozzy said after decades of living in Los Angeles he’s on the fence about making the move permanent. “I’m getting a bit of flak from people,” Ozzy said about the reaction to news of the planned pack-up that will set the stage for the BBC reality series Home to Roost. “To be honest with you, if I had my way, I’d stay in America. I’m American now.”

Osbourne gave a bit of context for the decision, saying wife/manager Sharon Osbourne’s booting from the daytime TV chat program The Talk was one of the reasons the couple no longer felt like this was the safest place for them anymore.

“When my wife got called a racist on [The Talk], she is absolutely not a racist,” Ozzy said of Sharon’s March 2021 booting from the syndicated show after 11 seasons over her defense of British chatter Piers Morgan, who had mad disparaging comments regarding Meghan Markle. “Her friend is Piers Morgan… She didn’t say, ‘I agree with him.’ She just respected his ability to have freedom of speech,” Ozzy explained. “That’s all that she said. And she got a lot of flak from that, so we actually had to have f–king armed guards and all that.”

Sharon Osbourne also said safety in L.A. was an impetus for them to pack up the gargoyles and split. “When I first came here, I thought I was in heaven. In the ’70s, if you loved music, this was the place to be,” she said. “It’s not that hub anymore. It’s not exciting anymore. It hasn’t gone sideways, it’s gone down. It’s not a fun place to live. It’s dangerous here. Every big city’s got crime, but I don’t feel safe here. Neither does Ozzy.”

To be clear, though, Ozzy said he’d still rather stay put. “To be honest with you, I don’t want to go back [to England],” he told CoS. “F–k that.”

According to the BBC, producers expect to film 10 30-minute episodes for BBC One and iPlayer of Home to Roost, which will find the clan — Ozzy and Sharon, son Jack and daughter Kelly — living their new life at their 350-acre Welders House estate in Buckinghamshire. Producers promised to chronicle everything from Sharon’s recent 70th birthday party to daughter Kelly’s soon-to-be-born baby, Ozzy’s upcoming tour to the big move itself.