Today, I woke up to a blast of warm air on my face. What used to be our air conditioner has now become a furnace. Our power was out. In fact, everyone on our side of JuggaloNation (my new name for The Gathering of the Juggalos campground) was out of power. Apparently, the generator was having problems.
Menace, Naptown Mike and myself congregated in the shade outside of our camper while waiting for some relief. Of course, our obnoxious, misogynistic and awfully hilarious neighbor was harassing everyone that walked by for our entertainment. Today, he even had a new pickup line for us to giggle at from afar.
“Hi honey, how would you like to go half-and-half on a bastard child?”
I am pretty sure that guy hasn’t scored since we arrived. For any single ladies out there, he may carry some extra weight on him, but he’s funny. Trust me.
While waiting for the technician to repair the electricity, I went to see Boondox’s seminar.
Boondox described himself as a terrible speaker because his brain works faster than his mouth.
“I’m up here trying to hype my new music while thinking about a wall I need to paint at home,” joked the southern rapper.
He kept his speech short while talking about what it was like to get signed and his love for the scene. He also hinted that he might be releasing his newest album on Magik Ninja Entertainment, instead of ICP’s Psychopathic.
After Boondox, I went back to the camper. The electricity still wasn’t on, so I hit the gravel again and made my way to the Pendulum stage where 16 girls agreed to compete in a wet T-shirt contest with Faygo. This was fun for a few minutes, but the girls were kind of stale. Don’t get me wrong, they appeared to have a good time, but the really attractive ones seemed like strippers who had been planted.
I couldn’t stay for the whole thing because Twiztid was about to go on stage for their seminar. Once again, I ran up the drug hill to the seminar stage. Unlike the other seminars, this one was spilling over with people. I only got to stay for a short while — long enough to hear Jamie Maddrox talk about hitting Monoxide Child in the crotch with a frozen banana. My sources, however, told me that a group of people brought the ashes of their deceased friend to bury in the presence of Twiztid. Unfortunately, I couldn't stick around for that, because I had to go to the gates to meet with the photographer for TrueJuggaloFamily, Ed Steele.
Of course, Ed being one of my best friends, I took him to get a Faygo right away. We clinked our Red Pop cans and I showed him around JuggaloNation. First stop: stripper poles.
For the next hour or so, I gave Ed the full run down. Just a couple days ago, I was a total newbie. Now, I am passing my veteran knowledge down to my colleague and he is bathing in the glee and wonder of his first Gathering experience.
By the time I'd shown Ed all the breasts and crazy outfits, the electricity was finally back on.
Then, Jarren Benton’s set started. Benton is a relatively new artist who is signed to Funk Volume Records — a label owned by fellow Gathering performer Hopsin. At the end of his set, he invited the audience to the stage. Turns out, that was against the Gathering rules for performers and he got asked to send them packing. Oh well, I guess he knows for next time.
Now, I've had a lot of weirdos ask me a lot of crazy questions in my day. I am a part of the media and that pretty much always makes us targets for nonsense when we cover public events. But, tonight, I got asked a question that left me speechless.
As I was hanging out, watching In This Moment finish their bizarre set, a cute girl walked up to me.
“I noticed you were wearing cargo pants and have four big pockets,” she said. “Can I pee in one of them?”
“Huh?” I asked.
“Can I pee in your pocket? I’ll let you take a picture.”
Now, the journalist in me wanted to say “Yes” out of curiosity. Was this girl messing with me? Was the word “pee” a pun or metaphor for something I am too dense to get? Would she have really attempted to douse my leg with her urine?
Fortunately, my indecisiveness was off-putting to her and she turned around and left me in a state of total confusion. Great job, Pee Girl. You got me good.
I finished the evening watching Twiztid destroy the stage. Juggalo rappers don’t really get a lot of respect for their skill. It goes back to the fact that ICP really formed out of the old school style of rap and have constantly evolved. Twiztid, however, keep growing on each album. I have never had the chance to see them perform, but their show was similar to what I'd imagined: giant beach balls, a dancing Jason Voorhees and Michael Myers and crazy stories of Maddrox pooping in the woods.
I made my way back to the trailer to crash for the evening. Tomorrow is the final day and the godfathers themselves will be directing the Faygo rain down on all of us.
What I learned from Day 4 of the Gathering:
- They don’t replenish the Faygo in the kiddie pools during the wet T-shirt contest. Instead, they embrace it by shouting “recycled Faygo!” between every round,
- The taco place is the cheapest food at The Gathering and it is, actually, some of the best fast-food style Mexican food I have ever had. True, I could just be really hungry, but the burrito I had earlier was the bomb,
- The guys from Potluck don’t typically smoke weed before their shows. I know this from booking them in 2008 and offering them some weed in addition to their tour ryder. If you want to get Potluck stoned before or during their show, all you need to do is show up with a 6-foot bong and it’s on like Donkey Kong.
