Ozzy Osbourne’s sisters are speaking out after the rocker’s death on Tuesday at the age of 76.
On Wednesday, Jean Powell and Gillian Hemming spoke to U.K.-based outlet The Mirror, sharing that the heavy metal icon was making plans to visit them before he passed away.
The sisters said that Osbourne’s death was unexpected, and they still don’t know the full details of his passing.
“He was frail, but it still came as a shock,” Powell told the publication, adding that he “still had plans and things he wanted to do.”
“We just can’t believe he is gone, and we won’t be getting another phone call or text from him,” she said. “Every week, without fail, he would get in touch.”
The sisters last saw Osbourne earlier this month, when he and Black Sabbath played a farewell show in their native Birmingham, England. At the concert on July 5, Osbourne performed from a chair because he was physically unable to stand due to his Parkinson’s disease.
“It was upsetting because he could not stand up straight, but he was still our John, still cracking the jokes,” Powell said of their brother, who was born John Michael Osbourne.
The rocker revealed in early 2020 that he’d been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease the previous year. He underwent multiple spinal surgeries in the years that followed.
“It’s been terribly challenging for us all,” he told Good Morning America at the time. “I did my last show New Year’s Eve at The Forum. Then I had a bad fall. I had to have surgery on my neck, which screwed all my nerves.”
Ozzy Osbourne is the third out of six siblings to have died, following their other sister, Iris, and brother Tony.
“Of the six siblings, there’s only three of us left now — me, Gillian and our brother Paul,” Powell said.
Osbourne is survived by his wife, Sharon Osbourne, to whom he’d been married since 1982. The couple shared daughters Aimee and Kelly and son Jack. Osbourne also shared children Jessica and Louis with his ex-wife, Thelma Riley, whose son Elliot he adopted.
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