Insane Clown Posse has had quite a few beefs in their day, but the one between them and Sharon Osbourne is legendary. In fact, the British music manager once bet the Detroit rappers $50,000 that their album would fail and they’d be dropped by their record label.
It all went down during an episode of Howard Stern’s show back in the early 2000s. The two parties were beefing over ICP dismissing Coal Chamber—whom Osbourne worked with—from a tour due to low ticket sales, per Rolling Stone. This set off a chain reaction of hate from both camps, culminating in their Stern appearance.
Who remembers this classic? Insane Clown Posse vs Sharon Osbourne on #HowardStern
While on camera, Osbourne fired some heated comments at ICP. “You’re dead,” she said, then adding that their “career is over” and in the “toilet.” She went on to bet them $50K that their next record would not sell more than 200,000 copies and that their record label would drop them. ICP’s Violent J saw her bet and raised her 300k. Per his prediction, ICP’s next album would sell at least 500,000.
That next project ended up being the double album: Bizaar / Bizzar (2000). The first Bizaar did not quite sell over 500,000 units, but did sell more than 200,000. Collectively, the projects did sell more than 500,000, however.
Did Sharon Osbourne ever make good on the bet?
So the natural next question is, did Sharon Osbourne ever make good on the bet? Well, as of 2020, she hadn’t. At the time, Loudwire reported that ICP was on the record as saying they never saw any of that $50,000.
“She lost that bet super hard,” Violent J told the outlet. “That record went gold. She, without question, owes us that money.” He went on to explain that they didn’t even need to be given the money themselves. They preferred for it to go to a non-profit organization.
“We said, ‘You ain’t gotta pay us. Just pay it to a charity in our name.’ Because if it would’ve went the other way around,” he continued, “I bet you they would’ve been calling us out, saying when are we gonna pay?” Shaggy 2 Dope added, “What do you expect from someone who’s a liar anyhow?”
To date, ICP has sold more than 3.2 million albums. They released The Naught, their 17th album, in 2025. It appears that Osbourne has not spoken publicly on the bet in many years.
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