Clowning Man

Past Gatherings have featured Vanilla Ice, Ice Cube, Dustin Diamond (Screech from "Saved by the Bell"), and Charlie Sheen.

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hances are, whether you’ve ever heard a note of their music or not, you’ve heard about the Insane Clown Posse (most commonly referred to as ICP). They made numerous appearances on the Howard Stern Show in the ‘90s, they’ve been mocked in nearly every national music magazine under the sun, they were parodied on Saturday Night Live, and they made the news last year when the FBI included their fans, collectively known as “juggalos” in their 2011 National Gang Threat Assessment. 

ICP’s particular schtick—rappers dressed as maniacal clowns—may seem preposterously lame, but it’s proven not only to be remarkably popular, but durable; the band has been putting out music since the early 1990s (in their previous incarnation as Inner City Posse, they were mere white rappers). And each year since 2000 the band has thrown a festival for its adoring fans (most of whom also don clown makeup) known as the Gathering of the Juggalos.

Juggalos: still not sure how magnets work.

And each year, the Gathering gets bigger, not only in terms of crowd size, but in terms of attracting relatively big-name acts to perform at the event. Past Gatherings have featured Vanilla Ice, Ice Cube, Dustin Diamond (Screech from Saved by the Bell), and Charlie Sheen.

This year’s event features a who’s who, or rather a who-used-to-be-who of rap stars: DMX, Warren G, Biz Markie, Fat Boys, Raekwon, and Lil Eazy. There’s also a comedy stage featuring Cheech & Chong, Ralphie May, Jamie Kennedy, Bobcat Golthwait, and someone called Upchuck the Clown.

The event takes place at a campground in Cave-In-Rock, Illinois, which is located near the Shawnee National Forest and close to the Illinois-Kentucky border. Last year’s event was marred by the death of a 24-year-old, whose body was discovered in the Ohio River. The Gathering commonly results in numerous arrests for underage drinking and drug use.

If you’re curious about ICP, check out their oft-mocked video for “Miracles,” the song that dares to ask the probing question “how do magnets work?”

And if you want to learn about the Gathering, try to make it through the band’s 24-minute long commercial.