Heavy metal icon Ozzy Osbourne has announced that the next edition of his popular summertime rock extravaganza Ozzfest will be free for fans.

The music world was likely expecting another f-word when Osbourne began spraypainting onto an Ozzfest 2007 poster at a concert industry trade event in Los Angeles on Tuesday.

Ozzy Osborne, seen here performing with Black Sabbath in 2005, has dropped the admission price for this year's Ozzfest to zero.
(Yui Mok/Associated Press)

However, everyone was shocked when the word the rocker and former reality TV star ultimately spelled out was "FREE."

Osbourne and his wife, music promoter-manager Sharon, then announced that Ozzfest will offer free admission when it hits the road this summer.

"It's our 12th year and we wanted to shake it up a bit and do something different," Sharon Osbourne said in an interview.

"It's not saying that I'm now Mother Teresa or that Ozzy is a saint, but you know what? He's been doing this a long time and his audience has been really good to him," she said.

Tickets to be available online

Scheduled to kick off in Los Angeles on July 27, Ozzfest 2007 will eventually hit 25 cities across North America. The list of concert stops is being finalized, as is the lineup.

Tickets, which in the past have ranged from $35 to $150 US, will be available to fans through online outlets. All the bands that will take the Ozzfest stage will do so for free, although the individual acts will be permitted to sell their merchandise and CDs onsite.

Food and drink sales as well as a number of major sponsors are expected to pay for this year's event.

"If he goes out one summer of his life and he doesn't get paid, big deal," Sharon Osbourne said.

She added that the decision to offer free admission — which is being hailed as the first time ever for a national U.S. musical tour — was intended as a move to escape the trend of artists charging increasingly higher prices for their concert tours.

Over the years, the hard rock Ozzfest event has helped boost the careers of acts such as Linkin Park, Incubus, System of a Down, Slipknot and Queens of the Stone Age.

Osbourne and his pioneering heavy metal band Black Sabbath will be inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in March.