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Where there’s smoke, there’s probably fire.

And the rumors of a Black Sabbath reunion picked up more heat following Ozzy Osbourne’s absence Monday night from the Hollywood premiere and special MusiCares screening of his movie, “God Bless Ozzy Osbourne.”

Ozzy was conspicuously absent from the event, leaving his family to handle questions from the press.

"My dad is… I don't know if I'm allowed to tell you," daughter Kelly told Artisan News Service. "But he's doing something that is very, very exciting. He's just finished a tour. But he's doing something very exciting. I'm not allowed to talk about it, though."

When asked if there is any truth to the reports that Ozzy is in England working on a new Sabbath album, son Jack replied, "I can neither confirm nor deny who he is with or where he is."

Sabbath’s reunion cover was blown last week when the Birmingham Mail ran a story featuring comments guitarist Tony Iommi made “off the record” to a reporter in June.

“We’re really looking forward to it and I think the stuff we’ve been writing is really good," the Mail reported Iommi as saying. "It’s more back to the old original stuff."

He added that the reunion has been kept under wraps for some time. "It’s all been very hush-hush,” Iommi reportedly added. “Ozzy’s been the worst at trying to hold it back. He’s doing a lot of TV and he’s being asked stuff about a reunion and he’s going ‘well I never say never’. He told me, ‘I don’t know what to say’.?

Sabbath reunion headlines around the world followed the item, leaving Iommi to go into damage control mode.

“I'm saddened that a Birmingham journalist whom I trusted has chosen this point in time to take a conversation we had back in June and make it sound like we spoke yesterday about a Black Sabbath reunion,” wrote Iommi. “At the time I was supporting the Home of Metal exhibition and was merely speculating, shooting the breeze, on something all of us get asked constantly, "Are you getting back together?"

“Thanks to the internet, it's gone round the world as some sort of "official" statement on my part, absolute nonsense,” added the guitarist. “I hope he's enjoyed his moment of glory, he won't have another at my expense.”

“To my old pals, Ozzy, Geezer and Bill, sorry about this, I should have known better.”

Iommi’s apology to his band mates suggests an attempt to make amends about the guitarist’s role in the reunion leak, while fans continue to speculate on the status of the reunion itself.

Black Sabbath reunion
Artisan News Service – August 23, 2011