Yungblud and Steven Tyler to catch crazy train to the VMAs for Ozzy Osbourne tribute

Joe Perry and Nuno Bettencourt will also pay tribute to the Prince Of Darkness.

By Emma Keates | September 5, 2025 | 2:29pm

Photos: Frazer Harrison/Getty Images for ABA; Yungblud/YouTube

Music News Ozzy Osbourne

Yungblud and Steven Tyler to catch crazy train to the VMAs for Ozzy Osbourne tribute

This Sunday’s MTV Video Music Awards will pay tribute to Ozzy Osbourne in appropriately hard-rocking fashion. MTV has recruited Yungblud, Aerosmith’s Steven Tyler and Joe Perry, and Extreme guitarist Nuno Bettencourt to perform a medley of some of Osbourne’s greatest hits, Rolling Stone reports. It’s a worthy group. Yungblud, Bettencourt, and Tyler all took part in Osbourne’s Back to the Beginning farewell concert, which saw dozens of metal artists and some 40,000 fans flock to Black Sabbath’s native Birmingham for an epic, day-long show just weeks before his death. Yungblud was also a mentee and close friend of Osbourne’s and wrote that the legendary musician would “be in every single note I sing and with me every single time I walk on stage” in a memorial post. Today, he also wrote that he would “try my best to do you proud Oz” in Sunday’s performance. “Tune in from up there,” he continued. “I love you forever.”

MTV is a fitting host for this celebration of Osbourne’s legacy. It was, after all, the channel that aired The Osbournes back in the early 2000s. Osbourne’s videos were also in frequent rotation throughout the ’80s and ’90s. Additionally, the tribute is notable for reuniting Tyler and Perry, who have rarely performed together since Aerosmith’s farewell tour was canceled in 2023.

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The VMAs aren’t the only event to mount an Osbourne tribute this week. On the same day, a U.K. pub will be hosting an “all-day charity music festival” featuring 40 local musicians to raise funds for Parkinson’s U.K. in the rocker’s honor. Osbourne was diagnosed with the disease in 2019. Earlier this week, a Toronto-based choir also gathered what they estimated to be over 7,000 singers to perform Black Sabbath’s 1970 single, “Paranoid.” In the weeks after Osbourne died, many artists, including Lady Gaga, The Who, Coldplay, and more, performed covers and dedicated their own shows to him.

Sunday’s VMA ceremony will also feature performances by Sabrina Carpenter, Lady Gaga, Tate McRae, Doja Cat, and more. The event kicks off at 8 p.m. ET.