Shelved ‘Ozzfest ’99’ Doc Finally Lets the Darkness See The Light of Day [VIDEO]

Director, Penelope Spheeris (The Decline of Western Civilization, III, Wayne’s World), often referred to as a ‘rock ‘n roll anthropologist’, shot a film about ‘OzzFest ’99’ called ‘We Sold Our Souls For Rock ‘N’ Roll’ – documenting America’s most successful summer concert tour, and the reunion performances of the original Black Sabbath (hence the title homage).

That rock doc made the film festival rounds over 20 years ago but failed to secure backing and distribution and (most importantly) music copyrights from bands like System of a Down, Godsmack and Slipknot, which contributed to it being subsequently shelved – never to see the light of day.

Now here we are in 2023 and Spheeris is hosting a screening of We Sold Our Souls For Rock ‘N’ Roll at the Academy Museum in Los Angeles on Friday.

In 2008, Sharon Osbourne said;

“We would love for We Sold Our Souls for Rock ‘n’ Roll to eventually be released. We didn’t invest over a million dollars in the movie to keep it locked away. In reality, we were unable to secure the necessary music licensing and talent releases from all of the bands that participated in the documentary. We needed a substantial amount of money to secure these releases, so as a business proposition it just didn’t make sense to pour even more money into the project. We all tried to find an independent backer to come in, but were unable to find anyone.”

Fingers crossed that a backer (aside of the Osbournes) will step up or the featured bands and their management can come to an agreement with the producers that will eventually result in a chance for us all to see it.

[X: Ozzy Osbourne]