Gus Griesinger at Backstage Axxess recently caught up with BLACK SABBATH drummer Bill Ward. An excerpt from the interview is available below.

Gus: What’s the status of your relationship with the other original members of Black Sabbath? Is everyone on good speaking terms?

Bill: "Yeah! I spoke to Tony a couple of times this year. Me and him seem to be getting along fine. We had a good heart to heart on some things. I know he’s been busy. We talk to each other over the phone. I talk to Ozzy at least twice a week. He will call and I’ll try to call him back and what have you. We are always talking to each other. Geezer ...I don’t talk to on the phone. He likes to email. I don’t get to correspond with him very often. He’s always in my heart. He’s just there, period, all the time."

Gus: Do you foresee a reunion of any sorts with the original members of Black Sabbath at any point, including the possibility of recording new material?

Bill: "Gus, I have a complete open mind. I would be available to see what we would like to do and how we would like to do it. I would have to look at the entire picture. Would I like to? My open mind says yes! We would have to see if that was possible by how everybody else is feeling, and if there is a possibility to move forward. It’s hard. It's so wonderful to play with the band that I didn’t want to come off the last tour. Like I said, I think the last tour ended like three years ago. When the band played Europe, Gus, I just thought the band was flying high and the band sounded great! It sounded tight. I thought ...My God... let’s keep on playing! Let’s go around the world with this all the way around and around again. It was hard to come off the tour. I know all good things must come to an end but it was tough."

Gus: When that ended and the Heaven and Hell project took flight in early 2007, you had an opportunity to participate in that but decided it wasn’t for you. Can you explain to your fans exactly what happened and why you didn’t join the Heaven and Hell project?

Bill: "I had some reservations going in, however, when we actually started to play the songs, I liked the songs and the music won me over. Unfortunately for me, I had a bit of a difficult time bringing some chops to the guys, especially Ronnie, who wanted a certain kind of feel. I’m not very good in being able to play to cater to musicians in a way that they might want something to be heard (laughs). It’s the difference between being a drummer and an orchestrated drummer. I play in an orchestrated way. Where as a drummer you can give the drummer notes and he will play the notes. So it sounds like a little bit of fish out of water. Not quite comfortable. There were some other instances where I felt very uncomfortable with. All in all, it made it very difficult for me to try to lay the tracks as I was hoping I could for the guys and for myself. I needed to be happy in this too! It just didn’t work out. I feel if I had enough running time… I had about a week to learn three songs. To me that’s not enough ime as a drummer. I like to be able to know what the hell I’m doing and I was at a place at the time where I was still feeling the tracks out. I was still getting used to the tracks. It takes me a while to get where I want to be when I’m rehearsing songs. I wasn’t able to slot in what they wanted me to be. It was incompatible and it didn’t work out!"

Go to this location for the complete in-depth interview.