Jason Momoa on Hosting Black Sabbath’s Final Show: “The Greatest Show on Earth”

Jason Momoa won’t just be front-row for Black Sabbath’s final show. He’ll actually be on the literal stage.

The metalhead-turned-Hollywood juggernaut has been tapped to host Back To The Beginning, the band’s farewell gig going down July 5 at Birmingham’s Villa Park. For Momoa, the opportunity marks significantly more than just a gig. It’s actually payback for missing Sabbath’s last go-around in 2017. “I was already begging for tickets,” he previously told NME. “When Sharon asked me to host, I was blown away.”

That same year, Momoa filled in for Ozzy in a teaser clip when the Prince of Darkness wasn’t well enough to appear. Now, he’s fronting Sabbath’s final stand — alongside a genre-spanning lineup that reads like a metalhead’s fever dream: Metallica, Slayer, Pantera, Gojira, Alice In Chains, Mastodon, Halestorm, and more. Tom Morello is musical director. Surprise guests are locked. I’ll call it now, this thing’s going to be biblical.

Momoa makes no secret of how deep Sabbath runs for him. “That first album just introduced me to everything,” he said of their 1970 self-titled debut. “And then they came out with Paranoid six months later. One year. Two masterpieces.” He still listens to those records daily.

It’s a fan’s fantasy made real — hosting the band that shaped your musical DNA. And he’s clearly been in good company. While filming A Minecraft Movie with Jack Black, Momoa picked up a new ritual: pick an artist and listen to every album in order. “He was doing Billy Joel,” Momoa said. “It’s a cool way to get to know someone’s journey.”

Sabbath’s journey ends where it began: Birmingham. All four core members — Ozzy Osbourne, Tony Iommi, Geezer Butler, and Bill Ward — are confirmed to perform together for the first time in 20 years. As Sharon Osbourne put it, “Usually this thing is done when you’re dead.” Not this time.

It’s the end of Sabbath. But it’s also a moment for everyone they influenced — from metal giants to backyard riff-lords — to say thanks. And if Momoa calls it the “greatest show on Earth,” it might just be.