2001 Gathering Memories

BstMstR's 2001 Gathering Memories
(Originally from a letter to a Homie on August 17th 2001)

-         Drive to Toledo, Ohio

We drove over 30 hours from Boston to Toledo, Ohio to attend the 2^nd Annual Gathering of the Juggalos. It was the shit. The following is a recap the experience of my first Juggalo Gathering… Memory lane-style! MCL / BSTMSTR

-         Faygo spray in the line outside

The 1st day of the Gathering was Friday the 13^th. My friend, "Patanka", and I waited in line outside the Seagate Convention Center with about 8,000 other Juggalos. Ninjas were spraying Faygo all over the place. Nobody gave a fuck at all! Every flavor you could imagine was dumped and spayed… even Red Pop, which stains everything!

-         Merchandise out of the way

Everybody was drooling at the bit for Tales From The Lotus Pod. I think that's the main reason the merch line was ridiculously long the entire first day. Tom Dub was working the booth as always… I got my shit early on so I could enjoy the Gathering more. Besides being one of the first hundred ninjas to get my hands on the Dark Lotus album, I also picked up Dog Beats, Bass-Ment Cuts, Cryptic Collection 2 & Ryden Dirtay (all brand new releases or virtually impossible to find up until this point).

I also got The Juggalo Show box set, ICP's radio show, before the Jeckel Bros came out, that aired at midnight in Detroit once a month for only a short while. That shit was mad expensive.

-         Morton's List seminar

They way I felt, I just traveled all the way from the East Coast to spend 3 days in a place where Psychopathic was taking the time to host seminars for Juggalos... I was intrigued by that concept and made a point to attend as many seminars as I could... First thing they did at the Morton's List seminar was toss 3 die into the crowd. I caught one of them and won a free copy of Morton's List. Fresh! Jumpsteady, Tall Jess and Nathen, the creators of the game, signed the box for me and I got to talk with Jumpsteady & Nathen for a while. I'm not going to explain Morton's List in this blog, but they schooled us all on that shit… I was impressed.

-         Juggalo Wall of Fame

This was fresh… There was a Juggalo Wall of Fame from the first Gathering that was high up on the wall. Below it was a bigger one for this year's Gathering. I took a Magnum 44 permanent marker and wrote my name nice and big under the word JUGGALO on the wall and then the bat symbol. Later on somebody kinda wrote over my shit with an even bigger marker, but I got Patanka to take some pics of it before it completely disappeared.

-         First night performances

Myzery perform and then I fought my way to the front row for Twiztid! They played so many good songs. Shit I never thought I'd ever hear live, like Old School Pervert & Whut The Dead Like! That night I fell asleep listening to Dark Lotus CD for the first time. It was such an awesome day and it was just the beginning. Real sensory overload. It was the shit!

-         Electric Girly Freak Show

The second day was crazier than ever. More Faygo got thrown in line outside before we got in than I have ever seen at a show. Juggalos were going fucking nuts. Patanka and I watched the Electric Girly Freek Show and the Tesla Coil on the main stage. It was like a circus sideshow event. It was pretty cool.

-         Twiztid seminar

ICP, Blaze & Abk all showed up at the Twiztid seminar to celebrate Monoxide's 28^th B-Day. There was about 400 Juggalos in the room. J passed out cake to as many people as he could. I actually got a piece!

Violent confessed that he smoked weed for the first time with Twiztid and some Detroit Juggalos in their hotel room (probably while I was hearing Dark Lotus for the first time). It was funny the way he explained it, all laughing and shit. He said, "I was retarded! But hey it's all right to be a little retarded! It's the Gathering of the Juggalos!" He told us all about this Twinkie he had that was all crooked.

We were let in on some drama that went down the night before. They explained how Myzery stepped up to Blaze like, "Who the fuck are you?" and instigated trouble. Madrox  & Monoxide heard about it and approached Myzery at his hotel and a fight broke out. Someone in Myzery's crew busted out a knife and Blaze got a little hurt. When it was all over Myzery was asked to leave the Gathering and Psychopathic on the spot.

-         Missy's autograph

I met Missy, the fat porn star from Big Money Hustlas. I got her autograph and my picture taken with her. She's fat as hell! I didn't stand in any of the autographs lines at the Gathering. They were wicked long the whole time… and ICP always had to leave early for other events… Only hound dogs asked for autographs during the seminars. Every time somebody asked, the room just filled with groans from annoyed Juggalos.

-         Second night performances

Blaze and Anybody Killa performed. ICP and Twiztid came out during their set for a few songs. Then the Mystery guest performance was about to begin. Some Detroit Juggalos were speculating that it was going to be Esham. But I knew it wasn't because Violent J talked about Esham at the Twiztid seminar... There was some stale air, to say the least. The mystery turned out to be Bone Thugs N Harmony! I ended up smoking a blunt with the same Detroit ninjas who were smoking Violent J and Madrox up the night before… I gots me a little retarded …and not a moment too soon, either.

I could have died a happy Juggalo at this point… but it was time for the very first performance of Dark Lotus. I tried to get up to the front row but only made it like ten feet from the stage. The crowd was intense! Dark Lotus was unbelievable. Everybody had their face painted the same, black with white, pointed crosses. They did so many awesome songs. I was shocked/psyched when they did shit like Cemetery Girl, First Day Out, Murder Murder Murder, She Ain't Afraid, $85 Bucks An Hour, Spin The Bottle, 3 Rings, Hound Dogs, and shit loads of new Lotus tunes. After that show I was all fucking done. I slept like a rock that night.

-         ICP seminar

Everybody was tired on the last day. Juggalos were just chilling and resting and lounging everywhere. I went to the ICP seminar and got my wig flipped by Violent J and Shaggy. Twiztid showed up with Vampiro! Once again, there we all were in a room with only about 400 Juggalos while Violent J went off on shit-loads of topics and Shaggy stood they're smoking his cigarettes.

J answered tons of questions. Everybody who missed the Twiztid seminar wanted to know about the Myzery incident, so I had to sit through that again. J told us shit like, "I know what you Juggalos go through for listening to us… believe me, we know cuz we ARE us!" He talked about the whole Juggalo family concept and the coming of the Sixth Joker Card. He was wicked nervous about revealing the 6^th image. And he explained how there wasn't a need to try to advertise the Dark Carnival to anybody else anymore. At this point, it's so close to the end that if you're down - you're down, and he was happy with the amount of Juggalos that there were right now. We are the Juggalo family. It was almost creepy hearing Violent J talking about that shit the same way we have back home.

-         Mystery seminar

I barely made it into the Mystery Seminar. Again, only 400 Juggalos could fit in that room.. Jump Steady and Tall Jess were there with a big screen and a projector. Before anything started Jump Steady explained that there was going to be a mystery video and a mystery guest. We were told to put our cameras away and if anyone was caught taking a picture in the seminar room they would be beat down by Jump Steady himself. Seriously, I've never seen so many crazy-ass Juggalos so quiet and obedient in my life. Total respect for the Psychopathic Family and a lot of clown love in that room.

The video started and it was old footage of all the Psychopathic crew making a fake talk show. I must have been from 1990 or something. Alex Abbis was in it as Hazad (from Big Money Hustlas) Shaggy was a rocker with long hair wig. Violent J was a magic ninja. It was funny. We were watching their old school home movies. They said they will never release it or show it ever again... A true once and a life time experience.

During the movie, somebody walked from the back of the room, down the middle aisle with a white towel draped over his head. The film was stopped and Joe Bruce turned around and faced the crowd. The room went APE SHIT! Everyone started chanting "Joe Bruce!" over and over. It was Violent J without his face paint on. I cannot even begin to tell you how emotional it was in that seminar. Joe talked about not recognizing himself in the mirror sometimes because he's been Violent J for so long. He explained how they (Shaggy and himself) are just like us and the whole Dark Carnival is just an outlet for all of us to unite and express ourselves together.

Shaggy showed up (face paint on) and pretty much just stood there smoking his cigarettes. Once again, Joe Bruce talked about the 6^th joker card and how nervous he was about finally showing it to the Juggalos. After they took off to get ready for the concerts, we were shown the rest of the home movie footage.

Afterwards, Jump Steady asked questions related to what we just saw onscreen and three Juggalos won backstage passes. After two dudes won their passes, Tall Jess walked over to the exit of the seminar room and said the winner of the last pass was… who ever could catch him- and he bolted out the door. It was crazy seeing hundreds of Juggalos all running out of the room trying to catch him. I don't know who got it, but it definitely wasn't me.

-         Third/Final night performances

The Psychopathic Rydas came out with gansta clothes on - bandanas around their heads and faces. That was cool shit. Vanilla Ice performed next. His mic went out at one point. His music was pretty hardcore. I have to admit; I did not see that coming.  Three 6 Mafia came ... And then the moment every fucking soul in the convention center was waiting for….

I pushed my way right up to the front row for the ICP. Absolute mayhem! They came out to Carnival of Carnage and then went right into Down with The Clown! The place went fucking crazy. Faygo and water guns from the first minute. They played Dog Beats too!

From the front row, at an ICP show you ALWAYS have crowd surfers coming up over your head. This was no exception. Ninjas were flying overhead every 2 seconds. My Sebastian Bach-length hair kept getting snagged by other Juggalos around me.

After only a couple of songs, Juggalos were already up on stage, running around and dancing. Since so many Juggalos were climbing up on stage and nobody was stopping them, it really started to suck being in the front row. I was basically a steppingstone for everyone who was heading over the barricade. So, I decided to climb over early too. I got on stage it was already packed. I mean the stage was as tight as the crowd in front of the stage. But it was all good… for a while. As usual the riot took over the show and before I knew it the lights were on and the music was off.

Some assholes were wrecking the stage set and someone (allegedly) started a fire in the back. I climbed off the stage and Alex Abbis came out and told everyone (without a mic) that the electricity was out and they could not reveal the 6^th Jokers card. I was standing right in front of him, in between the barricade and the stage, so I heard him clearly. But most of the 8,000+ Juggalos in the room couldn't hear shit, and refused to leave without getting a glimpse of the Sixth, as promised. Cops showed up and used tear gas to clear the place out. The Toledo cops were assholes (not all of them but enough to fuck our shit up.

-         Concluding the Gathering

A ninja on the way to the parking told me that Violent J had said that Psychopathic Records paid for the venue and the staff and the security and shit and then paid and extra couple of thousand dollars for damages IN ADAVANCE so the Juggalos could fuck shit up and it would be alright. Well that is definitely what happened… It was too bad that the 6^th jokers card couldn't be dropped. I had my camera ready to take pictures. Now we all had to wait for the Hatching Rising Tour later that fall. Regardless, this was one of the freshes experiences of my life. I went back home so fucking proud to be a Juggalo.