Are avatar shows the future of music?

ABBA has done it, KISS is doing it, and Black Sabbath is open to it!

We’re talking about an avatar-style show. Digital versions of the musicians “perform” before a live audience. The idea is meant to ensure that a group’s music lives on, past the group’s ability or desire to go on tour.

Sharon Osbourne, the wife and manager of Ozzy Osbourne, said she would consider a Black Sabbath virtual project in the future: “Technology keeps moving on and on. You can do incredible things now, so what you could do in five years will be even better.”

ABBA Voyage is a virtual concert residency in London that started in 2022 and still going today. The avatars depict the group as they appeared in 1979, using vocals recorded by the group, accompanied by a 10-piece live band.

KISS performed their final concert in December 2023 – so a KISS avatar show would be awesome for fans! It’s currently in development and being produced by the same company behind the ABBA show. KISS bassist/vocalist Gene Simmons told a podcaster last December that the technology has already advanced substantially: “The future is here. A.I. now fixes itself and teaches itself. And so the technology has advanced by leaps and bounds even where the ABBA show was. You could swear ABBA was live on stage, but you have to look straight forward. If you look to the left or right, you can see your neighbor sitting behind you or next to you. And so you have that kind of, ‘Oh, this is reality. And what’s on stage looks like reality.’ But as you know, with 3D glasses, virtual glasses, your sense of what’s real and what’s not is skewed. So there’s all that.”

Follow along for news of the new KISS show here – and stay tuned for possible Black Sabbath news?!