Yungblud replaces Sam Fender as Rock Werchter headliner and hints at possible Black Sabbath final gig appearance

Yungblud has announced that he’s replacing Sam Fender as headliner of Rock Werchter, and has hinted at a possible appearance at Black Sabbath‘s final concert.

• READ MORE: Yungblud is ready to leave his idols behind

Last night (July 4), Fender revealed that he would be pulling out of a run of European festivals due to a vocal haemorrhage. This included his headline set at Rock Werchter tonight (July 5) on the main stage.

Now, Yungblud has revealed he’ll be taking over the slot at the Belgian festival, with his performance due to start at 11:30pm.

Before that, though, he hinted to fans on Instagram that he may be making an appearance at today’s final-ever Black Sabbath show, which has been dubbed ‘Back To The Beginning’.

The historic gig will be held at Villa Park in Aston, and will see frontman Osbourne, guitarist Tony Iommi, bassist Geezer Butler, and drummer Bill Ward perform on stage together for the first time in two decades.

Announcing his new headline slot on his Instagram story, Yungblud added: “Have to make a quick stop in Birmingham first,” before sharing a photo of him outside an Osbourne mural, alongside the hashtag #backtothebeginning.

The gig is set to include a host of other huge names in the genre, including Metallica, Slayer, Pantera, Alice In Chains, Gojira, Anthrax, Smashing Pumpkins‘ Billy Corgan, Guns N’ Roses, KoRn, Tool, Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler and the surviving members of Soundgarden. Rage Against The Machine’s Tom Morello will serve as musical director for the concert, which is being live-streamed around the globe, and actor Jason Momoa will host.

The Prince Of Darkness has not played a full gig since 2018, and has undergone multiple surgeries and experienced numerous health problems, including Parkinson’s disease in recent years.

In an interview with The Guardian earlier this year, Osbourne looked ahead to playing the last Black Sabbath show in good health, saying: “I’ll be there, and I’ll do the best I can. All I can do is turn up.” From there, there were also suggestions that he “may be sitting down” on stage, and rumours that he’d be performing from a “throne that flies over the stadium”.

Before then, he told fans that he was “in heavy training” for the forthcoming farewell concert, and was back in the gym. Osbourne also said he would only be “doing little bits and pieces” with Sabbath at Villa Park amid his health problems: “I am doing what I can, where I feel comfortable.”

His wife and manager, Sharon, also said to NME that, although he now “can’t walk” as a result of Parkinson’s, his illness “doesn’t affect his voice”. “He wants to say thank you to everybody,” she explained to us at Villa Park. “He didn’t have that chance because of his illness, but now he does have the chance.”

Elsewhere, the number of songs Osbourne is expected to sing at the show has been revealed, while Iommi has shared that preparations for the huge event have “been tough”.

In other news, Yungblud is set to embark on a UK and Ireland arena tour in 2026 – buy any remaining tickets here. Those dates will follow next month’s brief run of intimate UK gigs, dubbed ‘Idols – Up Close And Personal’, and Yungblud’s headline tours in North America and Europe later this year.

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