Bruce Dickinson has dismissed his feud with Sharon and Ozzy Osbourne as a "storm in a teacup." The IRON MAIDEN singer was involved in a verbal battle with Sharon more than a decade ago when his band was pelted with eggs, lighters and ice during the final performance of its headlining performance on the Ozzfest tour. Sharon reportedly ordered interference with MAIDEN's PA system, delayed the stage entrance of the band's mascot Eddie, and even encouraged the crowd to throw bottles at Dickinson because she took offense to remarks she said the singer made concerning the quality of the tour's sound system and criticisms he made about Ozzy. Among the comments she objected to was Dickinson telling fans during MAIDEN's set that they would never see his band featured "in a reality show," presumably a reference to the MTV series "The Osbournes" and "Battle For Ozzfest". But in a brand new interview with NME, Dickinson downplayed the friction between him and the Osbournes, saying: "It's a complete storm in a teacup. I grew up listening to early SABBATH with Ozzy. Ozzy and SABBATH are icons so that's that, end of story. "The fact that I don't like reality TV shows, well I'm not gonna offer an olive branch to the Kardashians either," he added. In a 2010 chat with The Quietus, Ozzy defended his wife over the Ozzfest incident, saying: "Unbeknown to me, every night [on the Ozzfest tour, Bruce] was going on stage slagging me off. And that wasn't fair. If he didn't like the fuckin' tour, he should have said, 'I'm jumping [off] the fuckin' tour,' but to go on stage and fuckin' slag me off for no reason… I'd never said a fuckin' bad thing to him. The bass player [Steve Harris] came round at the last gig and said, 'I'm sorry about Bruce,' and I'm like, 'What the fuck are you talking about?' Nobody had told me, you know. I said, 'You know what? I don't understand what the fuck you're talking about here.' "And so, I mean, Sharon got pissed off… it was nothing to do with me. I suppose Sharon got pissed off. I'll back my wife up to the hilt, but I didn't know what was going down. But you know what? [MAIDEN were getting] a few fuckin' quid out of that Ozzfest. If you've got something to talk to me about, be a man. Come to my face and say, 'I think you're a fuckin' asshole.' Don't be a fuckin' idiot. It's so pathetically childish. "Unfortunately, the rest of the band had to suffer: I suppose they were pissed off with him. But it's wrong: I've never, ever, ever spoken to the guy… No, I tell a lie, one night they were about to go on stage and I didn't know anything was going down, and I said to them, 'Have a good show, guys.' But I don't like all that shit going down. If you don't like me, just say 'I don't like you, I'm doing this festival but I think you're a cunt.' That's all right. But to go on my stage and start slagging me off — that ain't fair. They weren't fucking slagging me off when they got paid every fucking night." He added: "To this day I don't understand what the fuckin' beef was. I just don't get it. To go on the Ozzfest and slag [people] off, that's crazy. I really think he needs a fuckin' psychiatrist if he does that, he's fucking nuts. It's an irresponsible fuckin' thing to do. Sharon must have got pissed off with this cunt, you know." Dey Street Books (formerly It Books), an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers, will publish Dickinson's autobiography, "What Does This Button Do?", in the U.S. on October 31.
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