“We paid $30,000 to get bullied like we were in high school!” Matt Heafy says Trivium was “bullied” by Ozzfest crew after refusing to egg Iron Maiden
Trivium frontman Matt Heafy has spoken about how the band was “bullied” after refusing to egg Iron Maiden at 2005’s Ozzfest.
In 2005, a notable feud erupted between Iron Maiden’s Bruce Dickinson and Sharon Osbourne, the organiser of Ozzfest. The conflict supposedly stemmed from Dickinson making critical comments about the reality series The Osbournes, which Sharon found offensive.
Tension peaked during the final Ozzfest show in Los Angeles when Sharon encouraged around 20 audience members, including nurses from her chemotherapy treatment, to throw eggs at Dickinson while he performed. Sharon later recounted how she orchestrated the egging as a response to Dickinson’s disrespectful comments about the tour and its headliner, Ozzy Osbourne.
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Speaking in a new interview with Metal Hammer, Heafy says that Trivium had paid $30,000 at the time to join the Ozzfest bill, which covered expenses like bus rental and crew costs for the tour.
“Some days we were opening at 9 in the morning,” he recalls, “but I remember on the last Iron Maiden day the tour was going to continue but we were asked by some of the Ozzfest crew, ‘Hey do you want to egg Iron Maiden?’ It was like, ‘Why the hell would we do that?’”
Instead, the band showed their support for the metal icons by wearing their t-shirts to perform and covering The Trooper during their sets — an act of defiance that the Ozzfest crew apparently did not take too kindly to.
Recalling the harassment the members faced, Heafy says, “We got bullied by the Ozzfest crew; they’d drive their golf carts right up to our faces, shoot dirt at us. Paolo [Gregoletto, bass] almost got arrested at one of the shows. It was a strange time; we paid $30,000 to get bullied like we were in high school!”
The guitarist also reveals that Trivium were only very “recently” approached by the Ozzfest management with a somewhat conciliatory proposal: “We were actually told recently if we apologised we’d be allowed to do the tour again someday,” Heafy says.
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