What Really Happened the Night Ozzy Bit the Bat? (Don’t Ask These People!)

The story of Ozzy Osbourne biting the head off a bat is legendary and infamous... and often distorted. We got some of your favorite rock and metal musicians, as well as some fans, to do their best to recall this historic moment as they've heard it through the years.

Members of I Prevail, Corrosion of Conformity and Down, Armored Saint, GWAR, Hollywood Undead, Shadow of Intent and Currents, Three Days Grace, 200 Stab Wounds and more all try to put the pieces together. Fans who were at this year's Sonic Temple festival try to do the same.

In the video below, you can see just how crazy this story has become over the last 40-plus years. There's talk of a dove (that's a totally different story), monkey brains and some other things that take us far, far away from the path of truth (you can thank GWAR for that).

Pepper Keenan even saw Ozzy in concert just a couple of days after this incident! Ozzy, who had been receiving rabies shots, came out in a wig and revealed a bald head underneath. Keenan was blown away.

Ozzy + The Bat: What Really Happened?

READ MORE: Ozzy Osbourne & The Bat-Biting Incident - The Story You Didn't Know

The True Story of Ozzy Biting the Head Off a Bat

Where: Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Des Moines, Iowa

When: Jan. 20, 1982

Tour: Diary of a Madman

A 17-year-old fan named Mark Neal is the culprit who served as the catalyst to one of metal's most infamous moments that has become mainstream pop culture legend. He even planned it before the concert, which he won tickets to from a local radio station.

“I get a lot of weird people at my concerts, it���s rock ’n’ roll," Ozzy told David Letterman in 1982. "Somebody threw a bat onstage and I thought it was one of these toy bats, so I picked it up, bite the thing’s head off and suddenly everybody is freaking out ... I can assure you the rabies shots I went through afterwards aren’t fun.”

The bat wasn't even alive when it all went down, according the Des Moines Register.

He also told the late night TV host that the bat tasted "very salty."