“Nobody wants to play those f**king Randy Rhoads solos!”: Nuno Bettencourt jokes that Wolfgang Van Halen was “smart” to drop out of Black Sabbath’s farewell concert
Unfortunately, scheduling conflicts led to Wolfgang Van Halen having to pull out of Black Sabbath’s historic farewell gig back in July. However, Extreme’s Nuno Bettencourt thinks Wolfgang dodged a bullet, because the setlist was packed with some absolutely brutal guitar solos.
While the evening was branded as a Black Sabbath gig, the show ultimately honoured Ozzy Osbourne’s impact on heavy metal. As a result, that meant plenty of The Prince of Darkness’ solo tracks were on the setlist – and that meant tackling Randy Rhoads’ and Jake E. Lee’s intimidating solos.
“I got a call [saying] Wolfgang Van Halen just dropped out…” he explains on Steve and Rik’s POTcast. “I said ‘yeah, he’s dropping out because he’s smart! Nobody wants to play those fucking Randy Rhoads or Jake E. Lee solos!’”
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It’s a pressure Bettencourt wouldn’t wish on anyone. “Nobody wants to fucking do it because if you go down in flames on that stage with Ozzy there and all your peers watching, your career is over!” he says.
While Bettencourt was originally only asked to perform two songs, he was happy to step up and cover for Wolfgang, taking on three more tracks. However, eventually, he was asked to do even more. “I ended up playing 12 fucking songs,” he explains, almost in disbelief.
Rather than crumbling under the pressure, Bettencourt committed himself to nailing every single track. “Instead of [just] learning them, I was like, ‘well, I’ve got to fucking own this shit!’” he says.
“I just wanted to respect the songs [and] fucking go all in…” he later adds. “I was in here for weeks for fucking like four or five hours a day standing up, performing the fuckers.”
Bettencourt’s commitment didn’t go unnoticed. In fact, Rick Beato rang him up after the show to congratulate him on a stand-out performance. “Rick Beato called me up [and] he goes, ‘everybody was raving about your performance!’” Bettencourt recalls.
“Then he goes, ‘one thing I noticed is that you didn’t just learn the stuff – you performed it. That’s what stuck out for you more than everybody else.’”
Despite rejecting an offer to join The Prince of Darkness’ band in the 1990s, Bettencourt’s 12-song run proved that the rejection wasn’t a reflection of his feelings towards the metal legend. In fact, it was proof of just how much he respected Ozzy and his work.
In an interview with Page Six on the red carpet at the VMAs, Bettencourt recalled his final exchange with Ozzy: “The last words we said to each other when we took the big group photo, I grabbed his hand, saying, ‘Thank you for everything, and thank you, Ozzy, for what you mean to me.’”
“Ozzy pulls me in by the hand, and he goes, ‘You were the only guitar player who said no to me.’ But he laughed! He goes, ‘I love you and thank you for being here.’”
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