What up Juggalos and Juggalettes? Today (Sunday, 8/10/14) marks two weeks since we all had to depart from our annual family reunion. This year marked the first change of location in SEVEN years! For us, that meant quite a few more road hours, but Legend Valley was our new home away from home!

I’ve been to every single Juggalo Gathering, and unfortunately I neglected to write reviews for a few of them.  I’ve been going strong for the past 4 years though, this being my 5th in a row.  I just reread some of my previous ones, and they seem to get more detailed every year.  I’m not sure if you ninjas like that or not, but that’s just how it is!  I have diarrhea of the mouth in the worst fashion.  Hell, look at me now! I’m already a hundred words in and I still haven’t even started yet!

I’ve got a massive outline that I have laid out before me, so let’s just go ahead and get this ball rolling!  I now present to you, my 2014 Gathering Review!

MONDAY, JULY 21ST:

This year, the Gathering didn’t officially start until Wednesday, 7/23 at 6 PM. So why was I packed up and ready to leave by 7 AM Monday morning?  I guess I am always hopeful that they will open the gates a day early.  It may have happened one out of the seven years it was at Hog Rock, but still, there’s always a chance.  So I set out to go to Fort Smith, AR where I always meet up with my homie PsykoScott for our annual Gathering adventure.  Unfortunately, our Gathering-bound crew has dwindled down from carloads with dozens of people in them to just us two.  Either way, I wouldn’t miss a Gathering for ANYTHING!

3/4 of the way through a 5 hour trip to Fort Smith, I got pulled over. I am always aware of my speed limit on a road trip, so I knew it couldn’t have been that.  By the time he got up to my car, he asked to see my license and insurance, and said that he pulled me over for “swerving”.  It was bullshit, but this is Oklahoma, so I figured the cop was just extremely bored.  He actually asked me to step out of the vehicle and come with him while he ran my tags and looked for any warrants on my record.  I knew I had no problems, so I obliged.  While in his car (which was a K9 unit), he asked me about the Tech N9ne sticker on the back of my car.  He asked “Didn’t he have a radio hit like 10 years ago?”  He said he couldn’t remember the name of the track, but finally spit out “I’m a Playa”.  I guess ninjas in Oklahoma were hearing that on the radio a decade ago, which is pretty dope!  He then told me that he pulled over Afroman in a 20 year old cargo van a couple of years ago. He was on his way to a gig, and of course had weed on him.  The cop said he was nice, and was really just trying to find a follow-up hit to “Because I Got High”, and it wasn’t working out all too well for him.  We all know Juggalos got love for Afroman…even when we’re shooting him with water balloons:

So of course the officer let me off with a warning, and I continued my trek to Fort Smith.  We met up at Hanging City Body Modification (shameless plug…he owns the place!), loaded up his car, grabbed some food, and took off towards the Gathering by about 3 PM!  PsykoScott drove for several hours, until we got to within 5 hours of Legend Valley.  We got a hotel to get our last night’s sleep in a real bed.  It was $75 for the night, and we spent all of 6-7 hours there. Was it worth it?  Hell yes!

TUESDAY, JULY 22ND:

Tuesday morning was pretty uneventful.  We woke up, ate some of the “free” continental breakfast that the Days Inn provided, and were off to our next destination! We decided to meet Tim and Jeremy, who would be our roommates for the week, at the closest Walmart to the Gathering.  It’s only about 10 miles from the Legend Valley campground, which is a nice change of pace from being COMPLETELY in the middle of nowhere with no place to shop.

We knew we were a few hours ahead of anyone getting there, so we went inside and decided to get some food.  Luckily, this one had a Subway inside, instead of the standard Mickey D’s that I’m used to seeing.  The girl working the sandwich shop was definitely not the brightest person I’ve ever met. She seemed to hate her job, and could give 2 shits less about listening to our orders. We walked right up with no wait, but by the time we finally got our sandwiches, there was a steady line of 4-5 people waiting to order. I think we conservatively spent 20 minutes getting two sandwiches ordered.  When PsykoScott asked her to put different kinds of cheeses on his sandwich, it about blew her god damn mind.  lol.

Now that the Subway debacle was out of the way, we went back outside, and looked up nearby parks.  We had some time to kill, and found a park less than 2 miles away called Hoback Park. We went there, PsykoScott showed off some of his juggling skills, and then headed back to the Walmart parking lot (where we spent entirely too much time that day) to wait for our homies.  Just a few minutes after we got there, our first set of Texas Juggalos arrived!  What’s up to Courtney, Marty, Tracy, and U4iK (Faceless & Jigsaw) if you’re reading this!  Tim and Jeremy got there a few minutes later hauling our home away from home for the week:

We went inside to stock up on supplies for the next 5 days.  This HAS to be the least amount of money we’ve EVER spent for Gathering supplies.  We got stuff for sandwiches, snacks, a few cases of water, some disposable coolers, and some ice and called it a day. I think we got out of there for 60 bucks.  Tim had already brought some food and supplies too though, so that cut down substantially on the cost.  The local people shopping were as nice as could be to us.  They were just more curious about the Gathering than anything.  We chatted it up with some people inline, including the cashier, and one of the guys said he actually had tickets to Woodstock.  He just never made it there.  I have a feeling some illegal substances were involved.  lol.

Tuesday was also the day that I had my very first taste of Cotton Candy Faygo!  That shit was DELICIOUS!  I still prefer Candy Apple, but I’ll be giddy as fuck to get my hands on either one in the future!

We parted ways with our Texas homies, and went out to load up the camper with the newly purchased supplies.  It didn’t take long before we set off towards the Gathering!

By the time we got there, it was about 6 PM. We still had about 12 hours to kill before gates would open.  We were surrounded by thousands of other eager Juggalos and Juggalettes though, so in my eyes, the Gathering had officially begun!  We were put towards the back of the parking lot with our rig, and while the line didn’t look quite as crazy as Hog Rock’s setup, it still looked like it would take a while to get in.

In the night leading up to the official start of the Gathering, we met up with several ninjas that we see every year!  Our homies from the FLH Forums, Scruffy and piggofdoom swung by and picked up their “Meetup Massacre” t-shirts.  (More on that later!)   I also saw my homies from the SCRUBS crew who I haven’t seen since either last Gathering, or Hallowicked.  Needless to say, it was the shit catching up with everybody, and meeting ninjas we’ve never seen!  I know there are a lot of first-timers at the Gathering every year, but it seemed like this year they were ESPECIALLY prevalent!  Maybe it’s the fact that it hadn’t had a venue change in 7 years, and some of the younger ninjas from the area could now make it.  Who knows!  I have a feeling that we’ll see them all again if they had as much fun this year as I did!

So here’s how tickets/passes worked this year. They had a trailer before the main entrance with 2 lines formed: one for will call, and one for walk-up purchases.  Faygoluvers had media passes, I had purchased a Big Ballers pass, and PsykoScott had his car pass on him.  We went up, I showed my ID, and we immediately were handed our press passes and lanyards.  I asked about getting a medallion (which was the Lotus cross this year) to add to my collection, and they were adamant that media didn’t get those.  I’ve got some kind of pass from every Gathering and I wasn’t going to go home without one this year, dammit!  More on that later.

In the meantime, I was sent over to the next window to redeem PsykoScott’s car pass. I guess to cut down on bootleggers, they had a Psychopathic crew member take every single person with a car pass over to their car, and apply the car pass sticker for them.  Needless to say, this process took a LONG time, and I’m not quite sure how effective it was.  That was what they had setup though, so we got our name on the list and waited.

I was told to come back with the ballers pass later (after waiting in line for about 45 minutes) because they didn’t have the stickers for them yet.  I went a few hours later, waited in the line again, and they still didn’t have them.  We actually never got a sticker for Ballers, and just put the ticket in the windshield of the truck.  I’m pretty sure that once we were inside the gates, nobody ever checked.

It was finally time for us to get the car pass sticker put on, so I rode out to the car with the Psychopathic ninja, and we got that all wrapped up.  We still had several hours until the gates opened, and at this point I came to the realization that it really didn’t matter what time you got to the Gathering grounds…hundreds of ninjas were ALWAYS going to be there before you.

To round out our Tuesday, we talked to a bunch of Juggalos and Juggalettes from all over, roamed the parking lot kickin’ it with everybody, and decided to call it a night probably around 1 AM or so. We had to get rested up for the 4 days ahead!

WEDNESDAY, JULY 23RD:

Wednesday brought on the first official day of the 15th Annual Gathering of the Juggalos!  It started out with a 6 AM wake-up call by PsykoScott who said the lines were already moving!  Luckily, we were ready to go, started up our vehicles, and were quickly on the hunt for a spot on the main road.  If you were at Hog Rock last year, you’ll probably remember that it took SEVERAL hours to finally get into the gates.  I think it was the fact that they thoroughly searched every vehicle for fireworks, glass bottles and stowaways.  This year, I barely saw any searches, and all that security was checking were for tickets and parking passes.

Unfortunately, we had a little bit of drama getting through the parking lot with a 55 foot truck and camper.  PsykoScott had started skillfully maneuvering his way through the sea of cars to get to the main road. He was on it within 20 minutes, and inside Legend Valley within 30.  I went in to make sure we had our spot lined up next to our long-time Gathering neighbors from TrueJuggaloFamily.com.  They had it caution taped and reserved for us, so we should have been good to go.  There were a few ninjas who came by with ballers passes wanting PsykoScott to move his car, which he parked strategically so as not to let anyone else in.  His response? “Move me.”  lol. It’s good to have big, intimidating looking guys as homies.

Meanwhile, Tim (who was driving the truck) texted me and asked me to come over to help him.  He said nobody was letting him in, and I told him that he had to “be aggressive”.  I got over there, and traffic was being directed by some Juggalos who had taken it upon themselves to help.  Props to them for that!  Anyways, Tim saw a gap, and he took his shot and got in front of this minivan with a young ‘lo/’lette couple who, judging by their accents, were from the Boston area.   These kids were probably in their early 20s, and just started talking MAD shit to Tim.   I am a pretty reserved ninja, so I was trying to be the cooler head in the group.  No matter how much I tried to calm their asses down, they just kept making threats, name calling, etc.  I finally just blew them off as a lost cause and we continued our trek to the main entrance.  I didn’t see those kids or their mom’s minivan the rest of the weekend, for the record.

Despite the drama, even though attendance was higher, it took us under 2 hours to get all the way through and parked at our new 4-day residence!  We leveled out the RV the best that we could, rolled out the awning, hung 3 different banners, and set up our bunks/workstations inside!  Tim had brought these wireless hotspots from AT&T that had EXTREMELY fast 4G connections!  I was up and running in no time!  The only drawback is that he has a 10 GB limit, and every 1 GB over that was $15.00.  So it didn’t look like I’d be uploading any videos while I was out there.

So the only other bone for the weekend that I have to tell you about is that Tim, who owned the RV, was going through some pretty bad anxiety issues. He had a brand new truck (with less than 800 miles on it), and a new 30 foot camper out in the middle of the Gathering.  He had a 5 months pregnant wife at home, and he had recently quit smoking weed and went the legal (though not as safe) route of prescription drugs to medicate himself.  He was just a wreck, and thought that it would be best for him to just go back home.  We begged and pleaded for him to stay, saying that the first day is ALWAYS the most stressful, and that everything would be fine from this point on.  He wasn’t having it. In the end, he knew what was best for him, and he had his wife make the 5 hour trek out to Ohio to pick him up.  We all felt bad about the situation, but he assured us that it was nothing we did, and that we should have a good time and not worry about him.  So Tim, we missed you homie, but hopefully you’ll have shit worked out next year to where you can enjoy yourself!

The next thing on my list to tackle was getting any Gathering merch that I wanted to purchase.  I had checked a few times before noon, and the merch tent wasn’t open yet. I think I finally swung by at around 1 PM and it was booming!

As you can see, prices were bumped up this year for some items.  Most notably, shirts were $30.00 this year, versus only $20.00 last year.  A lot of the other stuff was comparable to the everyday prices of HatchetGear.  I don’t follow merch very closely these days, but besides the Gathering shirts, it didn’t look like there were a lot of Gathering exclusive items there.   Also, while I mentioned the Gathering shirts, was this an afterthought?  I bought one just because I always do, but they left a LOT to be desired.

The MAIN item that myself and every other Gathering-bound Juggalo was looking for was the new Dark Lotus!  That’s right!  In case you didn’t get the memo, those ninjas who attended the Gathering were able to get their hands on The Mud, Water, Air, & Blood a full week early!  I grabbed a few copies of that for some eager ninjas back home, the Gathering shirt, and some merch for my homie TK out in Georgia.  I had to make a few stops back there for requests from outside of the Gathering, but Psychopathic had enough employees working to where it didn’t take long to get through the lines after the initial surge!

If you didn’t know, your homies at Faygoluvers also have a very lively FORUM where  a few dozen regulars congregate on the daily.  Last year, we decided that any Gathering-bound forum members should meet up at selected times just to kick it with one another. We carried on that meetup to this year, and I actually had some shirts pressed up for this special event. We call it the “FLH Meetup Massacre!”  For our first meetup on Wednesday afternoon, quite a few of us were there including Scruffy, Jules (aka VeryTwiztidRaven), piggofdoom, entrappedmind, GanjaGoblin, PsykoScott, and myself.  We got together, introduced ourselves to those who we’ve never met, and got caught up to those who we hadn’t seen all year!

I know I wasn’t able to hang out for long, but I do hope that we continue the tradition (and the t-shirts) annually!

Shortly after our first Meetup Massacre, PsykoScott and I went back to the temporary FLH HQ and met up with Hazin of TrueJuggaloFamily.  I asked if we could get a golf cart escort around the grounds so we could both film it.  We ended up taking about 20 minutes to make the rounds and came up with a pretty cool video that shows you the ins and outs of Legend Valley.  Keep in mind that I was hanging onto the golf cart (that had a flimsy roof to begin with) with one hand, and holding the camcorder with the other, all while standing on the back of the cart.  Fuck you if you think the video is too shaky. lol.

[youtube width=”560″ height=”344″]http://youtu.be/vZy4DiYBZYA[/youtube]

After returning, I walked around and took pics of a lot of the ‘los and ‘lettes who were walking around getting acquainted with the grounds.  You can see a lot of those in our 2014 Gathering photo gallery!

One crew of ninjas that I ran across was all of Aaron Spencer‘s homies.  Does the name Aaron Spencer not ring a bell?  It should! He was the ninja that passed away that Violent J and Jumpsteady went to visit around Xmas of last year. They also had a memorial / benefit show in Columbus this past March.  Read our review of the show right here!  Anyways, back to my point.  They were all so appreciative of us helping hook them up with Psychopathic, which ultimately led to the visit, and then the benefit, that they just wanted to say thanks.  Seriously though, what little I did to help put the pieces into place was NOTHING compared to the generosity that Psychopathic showed.  These ninjas were as cool as could be, and Aaron was lucky to have friends like them.  

It was getting close to 6 PM, so it was time to start gearing up for the main stage.  We grabbed our gear, made sure we had our press passes, and started walking that way.  This year wasn’t like last. The grounds were much smaller, and the Ballers sites were like 50 yards from main stage.  We went over to the gate towards the side of the stage, flashed the press passes, and BOOM: we’re in.  There was no hassle at all!

OK, so anyone who crossed paths with me at the Gathering probably saw me running back and forth to events, trying to cover as much as possible!  If I had to cut our conversation short or something, please forgive me for that.  The Gathering is my vacation for the year, but I also go out there to put in work, son!  Seriously though, I don’t think I rubbed any of you the wrong way, but if I did, my apologies.  Well, now that that’s out of the way…

I had to delegate some of the responsibilities to some of the other FLH staffers because I simply can’t do everything that I would deem to be important myself.  So my first HUGE shout-out goes to PsykoScott, who was by my side either filming or taking pictures for the whole Gathering at main stage.  He even took it upon himself to film and cover some of the events I couldn’t make it to because I was off somewhere else.  Much love homie!  I also put Polmar‘s skills to the test by giving him my Sony camcorder and having him film the first few songs that they allowed us to record at the main stage.  If you saw any of the Gathering highlight footage, I’d say that he did a pretty damn good job!  I’ll link to those in a minute.

This year also marked the first year that I used a semi-professional DSLR camera around the grounds and in the photo pit. My wife has a brand new Canon, and her old Olympus has been collecting dust for a while. So I decided to take that one and try my luck with it.  I am no pro, but I think that the moments I captured turned out pretty good!

First up on the main stage was WOLFPAC!  They of course came out with their entourage of dancers and Mad Max looking henchmen.  To me, this was the PERFECT way to start the Gathering with extremely high energy!  They had a bunch of scantily-clad women on stripper poles, DJ Grim-X spinning live, and of course Daddy Long Legs and Buddha did their thing!  Their masked brutes jumped into the crowd and started mosh pits with ‘los and ‘lettes and really got the 4-day party kicked into high gear!  You can see part of their set, and all of the highlights from Wednesday’s Gathering performances here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/37xKMiXysn8[/youtube]

After Wolpac’s performance, it was time for Ces Cru to hit the stage!  This was their very first time to perform on the main stage, and I think they made a LOT of new fans that night!  They opened up volleying a rhyme back and forth that has to take intense concentration.  I’ve seen them do it at smaller local shows before, but in front of thousands of people on a stage that large has to be a completely different experience!  It led into an overall great performance by Godemis and Ubiquitous, who commanded the stage for their 45 minute set!

Next, it was time to get a little bit of hard rock into the mix!  To my knowledge, Biohazard hasn’t had anything to do with the Insane Clown Posse since they toured together back in 1999.  I don’t think there was any bad blood there, just no real reason for their paths to cross again.  Whatever their history was, they fuckin’ ROCKED the Gathering! They had a nice little pit going, and every single one of them were jumping around, using the entirety of the main stage just rocking the fuck out!  It made for a dope set!

Our first Psychopathic act of the night was finally due up!  For those not following the timeline, I’m referring to the one and only native warrior: Anybody Killa!  This might be the best set that I’ve EVER seen by ABK!   He and/or Psychopathic looked like they actually dropped some money into his set because he had pyrotechnics and some big ass banners up there with him.  He brought out Big Hoodoo for a song or two, and performed all of your Juggalo favorites for nearly an hour!  I think he really stepped up his game for the Gathering this year. Kudos Killa!

It was closing in on 11 PM, which means the headliner should be about due on the main stage.  Tonight, we’ve got that killa from Kansas City who has become a staple of the Gathering: Tech N9ne!  I honestly don’t see how you can have a Gathering and NOT have Tech N9ne headline one of the nights.  He’s as much a part of our scene as any other artist you can name!  What else is there to say?  Whether you saw him or not, let me just reiterate that he fucking DESTROYED!  He and Krizz Kaliko performed in front of the sea of Juggalos and Juggalettes for well over an hour!  Their first full song was “No Can Do” followed by “Riotmaker” and “EBAH”.  Tech and whoever chooses his Gathering set list REALLY know their audience.  He brought out ALL of the bangers!  It was the perfect end to an incredible first day (on the main stage anyways) to the Gathering!

But wait…it was just after midnight.  Didn’t the first day of the Gathering just start?  Fuck yeah it did!  Who cares that we were all running on fumes at this point!  It was time to find out what late-night offerings the Gathering had in store!

The first thing I did was go over to check out Insane Eric‘s set.  For those who don’t know, he’s been a long-time graphic designer for Psychopathic Records and Twiztid, and probably has designed some of your favorite t-shirts!  He even designed a logo for us a few years back!  He’s insanely talented, and the dude can rap!  He went on right after the main stage finished at the Pendulum stage.  I showed up to show some love for a few songs, and this ninja has really stepped up his game!  Give him a listen!

I really wanted to catch Mick Foley this year, but too many things that I hadn’t seen before were happening at the same time.  Since I caught him when he came to the Gathering back in 2011, I decided to check out the Kaiju Big Battle Wrestling this year.  I’m not a big wrestling fan (Sorry KG!), but the idea of a giant waffle battling a Godzilla knockoff sounded intriguing to me!  I went over there with PsykoScott, Miss Disslexia  (who was wrestling the next day) and Nik from MonkeysOnCrack, and I just couldn’t get into it.  Maybe it was the tiny wrestling ring that left little room for them to move around in their giant costumes.  Maybe the wrestlers weren’t that skilled. I don’t really know, but I was done after a few minutes.

I knew that I wanted to catch Zug Izland on the Carousel stage, so I started my walk in that direction.  To my surprise, I was able to catch a majority of Stevie Stone‘s set!  I always give my homie CLAAS and his girl Sheri (TCH Bunny) shit about Stevie, but that dude can rap, his delivery is on point, and he puts on an incredible show!  I even saw them both backstage wylin’ out while Stevie was on!  I snapped some pics for our GOTJ photo gallery and kicked it over there for the rest of his time on stage.

Zug Izland was set to perform next! I didn’t know what members of the band that we’d see since there have been so many combinations over the years.  Mike P and Syn have always been there, and now the 3rd and final member is DJ Clay!  I really liked their set with the live guitar and live DJ!  Syn is always such an animated performer that seems to never tire. This trio made for an exciting, hard-rocking half hour of entertainment!  It’s what ended up being the last show that I saw for the night.

Yes, the lack of sleep had already caught up to me, and I just had to call it a night.  Even though I wanted to catch Lil Wyte, and (hed)p.e. who are one of my all-time favorite Gathering performers,  I bitched out.  Being up to see and film (hed)p.e. could have probably made me at least $500 richer if I gave the footage to TMZ.  lol. For those that don’t know what happened between (hed)p.e. frontman Jahred and a “fan”, let me try to make this quick.  Jahred fronted a glam rock band in the late 80s called The Clue.  Within the past couple of years, some footage has surfaced of one of The Clue’s performances from back in the day, and some (hed)p.e. fans latched on to it.  Now whether their original intent was to get a rise out of Jahred or not, it definitely has.  So, “Play the Clue” sign in hand, a fan went to the (hed)p.e. set at the Gathering where Jahred spotted him from the stage.  Immediately Jahred started to insult and mock him.  It carried on for a while, and eventually resulted in Jahred jumping into the crowd and throwing some punches at him. After the dust settled, Jahred got back on stage and finished up their set.

Now from an innocent bystander’s perspective, I’d say that Jahred is making WAY too much out of this. Even if The Clue ninja is doing it just to mock him, who the fuck cares?  You’re always going to have your detractors. Either ignore it and move on, or embrace that shit like Vanilla Ice did with “Ice Ice Baby” and play the fuckin’ Clue.  It makes no difference to me, but anyone knows that if someone finds something that gets a rise out of you, then they are going to keep on doing it until you snap.  It’s a troll mentality, but you’ve just gotta deal with it.

It was time to head to bed, so I made a witty Facebook post about being an old man not being able to keep up with these young ninjas, and hit the sack.

THURSDAY, JULY 24TH:

God DAMN I got a good night’s sleep on Wednesday!  I woke up fairly early, still not able to get out of my work schedule just yet.  It must have been 9 AM or so, so I had some time to kill. I know that between all of these shows and events I have been telling you about, I was doing some updating and stuff on Faygoluvers.  You know I can’t leave you ninjas in the dark!

The first thing I remember doing that day was meeting up with our favorite DC Tarot chick: Rachel Paul.  We had already been asked by the official ICP documentary to come by and be interviewed.  I guess time had gotten away from me, because before long I was getting texts asking me where I was.  I think it was around 11 AM. The documentary trailer was setup pretty close to the seminar tent, so we had a good hour to do our interview before the Psychopathic auction started that day.

I wish I had taken a picture of the setup, but let me paint a picture for you.  They brought us into this dark portable office trailer, had a square card table and two chairs in there for us, and a heat lamp just like this:

 

It had what seemed to be a 350 watt bulb in it, but that was the only light in the room.  It looked like an interrogation scene.  I definitely felt like I had done something wrong.  lol.  The people shooting the documentary put us at ease though.  Once the Q&A started, other than sweating from being in that stuffy office with a bright ass bulb pointed at you, things were all good!  These were the same filmmakers who put together the Detroit firefighting documentary BURN, so they knew what they were doing.

After they got our verbal consent to record our statements, they started conducting the interview.  I’m not even going to pretend that I remember all of the questions they asked.  I know we covered our personal backgrounds, the FBI gang label, how we got into being Juggalos, and whether we had any problems at home with local law enforcement due to our clothing or stickers on our vehicles.  Somehow, an hour got away from us, and they had to stop filming due to the exterior noise.  The Psychopathic Auctions had started, and Juggalos were gettin’ LIVE over there!  It’s all just as well, because we got into pretty serious conversations for the documentary, and I was sweating balls.  So they cut filming, thanked us, and asked us if we could meet up over there again on Saturday morning to finish their questions. We agreed and were on our way!

At some point prior to this, I talked to the homies Ninja and Teriyaki (formerly the Jacktown Juggalo show) who wanted to do a light-hearted interview with me for an upcoming show.  These ninjas were cool as can be, and I had a great time going over some ideas about how the interview would go down.  They had a green screen setup right outside the main entrance, but I don’t know how great their camping spot was because people kept coming through to use the port-a-potties.  They were literally like 5 feet from them.  Either way, we made it work! I stayed over there for 15-20 minutes or so while Rachel stood by.  She had seen some day-old fried potatoes that were chillin’ on their grill, and I guess was hungry. She asked if she could eat them, and they agreed.  Seriously, I’m sure they were delicious after they were first cooked, but I have never seen a pile of gray potatoes that I looked at like “damn, I’ve gotta eat those!”  She scarfed them down, and I know she’s still alive, so I guess they couldn’t have been all that bad.  Back to the interview…I don’t want to give anything away, but I may or may not have been constantly interrupted by a super villain…not to be confused with a Soopa Villain.  We’ll post links to that interview as soon as it’s ready!

The Saturday before I left for the Gathering, I met up with Michigan journalist Steve Miller.  Steve is writing a book on Juggalos, and wanted to meet me at my home and just talk about the whole subculture.  I ended up spending the better part of a day with him answering questions, but it was with my family and not under a spotlight, so I enjoyed it.  Steve actually wrote one of the best articles about this year’s Gathering for the Daily Beast.  You can check that out Right Here!  The point of that whole story is that Steve made it out to the Gathering to talk to more Juggalos and Juggalettes to find out what their stories were.  I saw him roaming around, and briefly spoke with him on Thursday afternoon, so I’m hoping he got the answers he was looking for!  We’ll bring you more on his book as soon as he sends us updates about it!

Before continuing, I also have to thank CLAAS and TCH Bunny for helping a homie out of a jam.  If you’re not familiar, there’s a ninja named Gene “Shine” Hooks who makes custom stainless steel charms under the company SPH.  He’s done them for a ton of people, and actually put together this crazy dope Lotus charm for FallenHalo of TJF.  He got them finished last minute, and was actually considering driving from Texas to Ohio just to make sure that FallenHalo received the charms in time for the Gathering.  I told him to hold up, made some calls, and got him all situated! TCH Bunny has some family that lives not far from Legend Valley, so I had Shine ship the charms there, and they brought the charms to me on Thursday.  FallenHalo was slangin’ them for the rest of the weekend, and even hooked me up with one as a thank you!

  

Damn, that’s a lot of shit that went down before the first official event that I had to catch!  I know that PsykoScott went over to take pics and do a little bit of coverage of the Costume Contest.  I didn’t see it myself, but I know there were some damn good entries!  Who won?  Why the guy dressed up as Jahred from The Clue of course!  He even jumped into the crowd and “punched” a heckler!  Props to that ninja for the extremely creative idea!

While he was finishing up with the costume contest, I was getting setup to record the first seminar of the weekend: Anybody Killa!  This year, instead of doing a Q&A session for 10 minutes and then drinking/smoking the entire time, he decided to set it up differently.  Kegan “The Creep Ass” Ault hosted a mini ROAST of ABK!  Kegan did a fantastic job hosting, but some of the roasters couldn’t hold a candle to Killa’s quick rebuttals!  ABK is a funny motherfucker, and I think you’ll see that if you check out the seminar:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/6T0On6FS57k[/youtube]

If you don’t watch it, just know that ABK showed a LOT of love to Faygoluvers!  He referenced me being there a few different times over the hour-long seminar, and even said that I should come on the road with them to film Road Fools 2!  I’m not sure how serious he was, but if I could do it along the course of a week, I may be down!  Before I finish the write-up about the seminar, I have to give props for the best line of the roast!  I don’t remember who said it, and don’t have time to go through the whole hour to find it, but the line of the hour was: “Big Hoodoo would have been here, but Violent J ran out of time to write his jokes for him.”  Holy Shit!  lol.  I’m paraphrasing, but that’s some funny shit!  They finished the seminar with a game of beer pong, and with that, I went back to the camper to send the audio of the seminar off to PunkRockJuggalo who was schoolin’ it keeping you ninjas at home updated!

By the time I did that, it was about 3:30, so I started to head back to the seminar tent.  I knew that Big Hoodoo had shown up at the end of ABK’s seminar, but I didn’t know that he was just going to do a continuation of ABK’s into his own.  There was no hour gap between them, so I missed about the first half of his. When I got there, he was in the middle of telling some inspirational stories that got him to where he is today.  I still heard and filmed a few more of his anecdotes, and you can see them here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/xUWOdM_1aCk[/youtube]

I went back to the RV to dump footage to an external drive yet again. I got into a habit of doing this because last year we pretty much lost a full day’s footage due to overwriting files. That pretty much sucked.  For the next couple of hours, I got everything I needed to sent over to PRJ, ate some food (probably a Quest bar, which I lived off of over those 4 days), and got the equipment ready for main stage!

At a little after 6 PM, PsykoScott and I went to the press pit area and got ready for a main stage Whitney Peyton performance!  Whitney made her Gathering debut at Hog Rock back in 2010 on the second stage.  This was her first time to be granted main stage though, so it was a HUGE deal for her!  She opened up the Thursday main stage slot with a vengeance!   I think it’s safe to say that she made a lot of new Juggalo fans that day!  At one point during her performance, she grabbed PsykoScott’s GoPro for a few seconds, and rapped with it for a few seconds at the 2:16 mark!

[youtube]http://youtu.be/NHnJnEH1SPE[/youtube]

I had seen her perform before at that 2010 Gathering, and at a couple of tours that rolled through Dallas, but she has REALLY stepped up her game!  If you’ve been sleeping on her, hit up WhitneyPeyton.com and get schooled!

The next act to grace the main stage was the newest Psychopathic signee: Big Hoodoo!  Hoodoo did NOT disappoint the crowd! Psychopathic dropped seemed to have dropped some dough on their stage props this year!  He had a few smoking cauldrons, skulls, and would blow magic voodoo dust on the crowd!

The next artist on the lineup was Cannibal Corpse.  Nobody really had any idea how Juggalos would react to a death metal band on the main stage.  Hell, they were one of the bands I suggested to Psychopathic, and I honestly didn’t know how they would go over. Luckily, we all ate that shit up!  There were 2 separate small pits that eventually formed into one, and it didn’t stop for the entire 40+ minutes that they played!  Now, I will admittedly say that I didn’t understand a single word that they were singing, but it was still fun as fuck! There were some metalhead snobs that talked ALL kinds of shit on Juggalos, and thought that it was way beneath them to play the Gathering.  Much  love to Cannibal Corpse for playing despite what a lot of their fans said!  I also had a chance to film some pit footage with my GoPro, which got picked up on a few metal sites. You can see it here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/T9EB7pOWV_c[/youtube]

I know we still had our headliners Dark Lotus to look forward to, but one of the highlights of my Gathering experience was seeing Yelawolf perform in front of thousands of Juggalos!  Again, I have seen him a few times here in Dallas, but never on a stage that massive!  This motherfucker went OFF!  He came out wearing all black shirt and pants, and a bright red fedora with a feather in it.  He played “Trunk Muzik”, “Catfish Billy”, “Gutter”, “Pop The Trunk”, and all of the hard-hitting tracks you’d expect him to spin!  After we got through in the photo pit, we watched the show from behind most of the audience, and he had them hypnotized with his flows!  Yelawolf then did something that I was certain would make everyone turn on him.  He pulled out a fuckin’ rebel flag, wrapped it around his hand, and had it out waving proudly for the rest of his set. Juggalos didn’t bat an eye!  I don’t give two shits about that flag, but am definitely happy he didn’t get the Bubba Sparxxx / Tila Tequila treatment for it this year!  In fact, at one point in his performance, he bet that the crowd couldn’t hit him with bottle rockets.  Some ninjas in the audience took him up on it and started aiming his way. He dodged every single one of them, and seemed to have fun doing it!

Yelawolf got just about an hour for his set, and it absolutely FLEW by!  It was already around 11 PM, which meant our headliners for the night were about to grace the stage!  Tonight, it was all about Dark Lotus!  All 5 petals came out as they were named donning red hooded robes. They formed a line across the main stage, hands clasped and heads bowed, completely still. As soon as the first notes of “Hot Poison” started playing over the PA, they dropped their robes, were dressed in all black, with red crosses with a white background as face paint.

After “Hot Poison”, they played “Gimme Dat Blood”, and “Bitch I’m Sexy!”  Those were our 3 photo pit songs, so we went back to the camper to drop off footage and charge cameras so we could go back and watch the rest of the show.  Halfway through our trek to our campsite, the sound started to cut out.  I know, only at a Lotus set, right?  I swear, if I believed in any of that shit, I’d say the Lotus performance at the Gathering is cursed!  From our site, we could see and hear everything on the main stage.  All five members didn’t miss a beat! They kept right on rapping their parts, so I have to assume the stage monitors were working.  We had every intention of going back to the main stage to finish watching them as soon as the sound was fixed, but it just never was right.  I don’t know if the stage was being ran by generators that ran out of gas, or what the exact cause of it was.  Either way, they seemed to finally have it fixed by the end of the set.

At that point though, I had bigger fish to fry. I kept getting this message on my computer that said there were some drive errors that needed to be repaired.  I kept ignoring it, but since I was caught up at the moment, I rebooted and figured that would take care of it. I was absolutely WRONG.  It didn’t get the typical blue screen of death, but rather kept rebooting saying it would repair the Windows install, and then didn’t do shit.  Just an endless loop.  I’m an IT guy, so I know a few tips and tricks.  I did everything I could out in the middle of nowhere, but couldn’t get it going yet.

Sadly, I missed Insane Poetry‘s set.  He always puts on a dope ass show, so I’m sorry that I missed it due to some stale ass computer problems. I left the computer doing a scan and made my way over to the Carousel stage to check out TwistedInsane!  It was my first opportunity to EVER catch him live, and he didn’t disappoint!  He had a great crowd reaction! There were ninjas in the audience rapping every chopper verse, keeping up with one of the best choppers on the planet while he spit on stage!  He seemed to really enjoy himself up there, and even jumped onto the speakers and performed part of his set there!  He reminded me of Tech N9ne in that he was lively onstage, but STILL kept up with his fast-paced lyrics without missing a beat!

After Twisted Insane finished demolishing his onlookers, I lugged all of my shit over to the Pendulum stage to watch the rest of SCUM‘s set!  SCUM and I have been homies for years, and LSP has a following in the underground that can’t be fucked with!  He’s usually a little past tipsy when he performs, but you’d never know it!  He’s like a machine up there, reciting every verse perfectly while starting mosh pits, and keeping the energy through the roof!  LSP’s crew were rollin’ deep this year!

The next artist I had to see live was Mr. Grey!  I’ve seen him live one other time, and am a fan of his music, so why not stick around the Pendulum stage and see what he brings to the Gathering?  His homie Kung Fu Vampire had been pushing his performance in the days leading up to the Gathering too.  He is relatively unknown at this point in his career, but he brought more and more people into the Pendulum tent as they passed by and heard the shit he was spittin’! I thought he did great at holding the audience, and hope that he gets asked back next year!  On a side note, if you want to know more about him, we just conducted an interview with Mr. Grey which you can view right here!

After Mr. Grey’s performance, it was closing in on 3 AM Friday morning, and I was still wide awake!  Thank goodness though, because it was time to head over to the Carousel stage for La Coka Nostra!  I was able to catch most of their 30 minute set, and they had a HUGE turnout at 3 AM!  Sure, they were opening for the Psychopathic Rydas, but those in attendance were definitely fans of that gritty east coast rap that they bring!

At about 3:30 (according to the timeline…I wasn’t exactly looking at the clock), the Psychopathic Rydas made their presence known on the Carousel stage!  I’ve gotta say that this was by far the most colorful Rydas set I had ever seen!  I think every one of them had every color of bandana they could find at Walmart that day plastered onto them.  I found it odd that Boondox…ahem…Yung Dirt wasn’t on the stage with them, but apparently he did too when asked about it in the seminar the next day.  There were a few other non-performing Rydas on the stage with them, but not near as many as years prior.  The Rydas are always entertaining to watch, even with a set that was similar to most other performances by them that I’ve seen.

After the Rydas finished splittin’ wigs on the carousel stage, there were no more events scheduled.  I went to check out Bizarro World for a few minutes, and decided that it was time for me to call it a night…

OH, before I forget! Remember my laptop issues?  Well the scans didn’t work, and I didn’t have any of my OS DVDs with me.  So I used the cell phone wifi, set it to start downloading a 4 GB ISO file, and then went to bed.

FRIDAY, JULY 25TH:

I woke up Friday morning at about 10 AM, and that ISO file was still working on a download.  It only had about 30 minutes left, and didn’t error out overnight.  So thank goodness for that!  I ate a quick Quest meal bar (I swear I’m not being endorsed by them!), and got all of my gear ready to go for the day.  Today was the day that Twiztid Shop was supposed to be setup all day at the Gathering! They were doing it up right with exclusive GOTJ merch (including the Ninja Turtles shirts), and I had a list of things that some homies back home wanted to get their hands on.  I walked over there at about 11 AM, and that line was out of control!  The booth wasn’t even open yet, but there was NO chance that I was going to stand in it, no matter how much I wanted a t-shirt. lol.

I ran into George, Twiztid’s manager, who was driving around the grounds on a golf cart. I asked him if he still thought that they would be up and running by noon, and he said “I’m hoping sooner!”   I decided to go back and work on my laptop for the time being.  Jeremy decided that today was the day to cook up some burgers!  He had been a cook at a few restaurants before, and was seasoning up the patties.  This would be the first hot meal I’ve had since we got to the Gathering grounds!  I had survived up to that point on Quest bars and sandwiches.

While he was cooking, I burned the ISO file to a scratched up blank DVD I luckily had in my backpack, threw it in my laptop, and hoped for the best. I started a windows repair, which took its sweet time running.  It looked like it would be a while, so I went back outside to help Jeremy finish up with the burgers, and grab a couple myself.  Those fuckin’ burgers were DELICIOUS!  We cooked like 20 of them and gave them out to the rest of the crews camping around.  I think I ate three of them…they were so fuckin’ good!

I texted George from Twiztid’s camp at about noon asking him if the line was still ridiculous.  He said yes, and asked if there was anything specific that I was looking for.  JACKPOT!  Before you go bitching, there are a few nice perks about running Faygoluvers.  Artists and their whole team are appreciative of the promo we do for them year round, and sometimes we get hooked up with little nuggets of flavor.  Getting to skip a 2+ hour line is one of those little nuggets!  I went and met him over on the side of the Twiztid merch booth, and he had his merch guys pull the few items I was looking for.  I paid for them, chatted it up with George a little longer, and that was that!   If you didn’t see what Twiztid had to offer, you can see the few pics I squeezed in while I was there below:

I ran into a Juggalo beside the Twiztid merch tent who talked to me for a bit, and told me how much he loved and respected what we do at Faygoluvers.  Honestly, I never get tired of hearing that, but never know how to react either. lol. He was a super cool ninja.  One thing I found funny is that he said “I got love for you, but my homie can’t stand you.”  I just said “Really?  Well to each their own.”  Sometimes you can’t please everyone, right?  I’m pretty sure his homie is reading this right now though, so…hi hater!

If you were wondering, I didn’t see the line die down until the main stage started.  I guess everybody realized that Twiztid would only be selling their merch for a day and they jumped all over it! They quickly sold out of their GOTJ exclusives, and left ninjas clamoring for more!

When I got back from the merch booth, I checked on my PC, and had a message that the repair had been completed and it just needed to reboot.  With my fingers crossed, I rebooted it, waited an inordinately long amount of time…and…

BAM!  IT’S ALLIIIIIIVE!!!  So that stroke of luck got me and my PC through the rest of the Gathering.  It was resurrected just in time for me to head off to the first crucial event of the day: the AMB Seminar.

I unfortunately missed the Juggalo Wedding, which I heard was a mistake on my part.  It sucks that I can’t be everywhere, but I wanted to wish a heartfelt CONGRATULATIONS to Tiffany and Dip Set on behalf of your homies at Faygoluvers!

So I headed up Legend Valley’s “Fuck That Hill”, and to the seminar tent.  AMB started their seminar right on time, and used up just about their full hour.  They had a pretty good sized audience, and talked about a variety of topics.  Otis aka Young Wicked was the more talkative of the two, and spoke on producing for his idols, and how he gets anxiety when working alongside J and Shaggy in the studio.  He also let it slip that he did some production for DJ Paul.  His resume is getting ridiculous! The first thing they did in their seminar was welcome everybody.  Otis noticed me up front filming, gave me a shout along with Josh of YadaMedia.net!

He eventually mentioned that Faygoluvers and AMB used to have beef, but we’ve squashed it and have all grown up a lot over the past decade.  Now we see each other at shows and the Gathering and it’s nothin’ but love!  You can watch the entire seminar here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/aabH8_a7Kz8[/youtube]

After that seminar, I went back to the Gathering and kicked it in the AC until the Boondox seminar.  A few minutes prior to the seminar, I walked my happy ass back over to the seminar tent and got setup for Boondox.

Boondox’s seminar was short and sweet.  He only took a few questions because he didn’t have a mic to hand around to the crowd, and he said he was partially deaf in one ear.  He seemed like his head was elsewhere, and the seminar only lasted about 20 minutes.  You can see it in its entirety here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/ADr6tTxA5QU[/youtube]

It was only about 4:30 because of the short seminar, so I actually had time to stroll back to the camper, dump the footage, get the seminar audio over to PRJ so he could post it right away, and still have time to make the Big Silva show…or so I thought.

To my knowledge, this actually never happened.  Silva was there at the beginning of the Gathering, but apparently he “went into hiding” before his show started.  I heard that there was an oversight, and that those in charge of the show didn’t bring anything for Silva to smash.  At this point, that’s purely speculation though.

That still gave me time to make it over to see the final performance of the day on the Pendulum stage!  The homie Skitzo, who is the newest member of NATAS, had a solo performance scheduled for 5:30 PM.  I walked by his campsite a few times over the weekend, and he asked if I would come check out his show. I told him that I’d do my best, and with a little bit of luck, I made it over there! I got his first album a few years ago at the gathering, and let me tell you, he’s come a LONG way since that first release! Much love to Skitzo! Check out part of his set, as well as highlights from the ENTIRE list of Friday’s events here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/kBUtl66sh_s[/youtube]

Believe it or not, it was already time for Friday night’s main stage!  6:00 PM comes around fast when you don’t wake up until close to noon!  Caskey was the first to hit the big stage on Friday!  I had seen him a time or two before, most recently at the Fright Fest after party in Detroit.  I hadn’t seen him enough to form much of an opinion on him, but this performance definitely changed it!  Maybe it was the setting of the Gathering and how hype Juggalos and Juggalettes were…who knows!  I just know I dug the fuck out of it!  He brought on Lil Wyte and Jelly Roll, and they had the crowd going NUTS!  This was another great way to start the main stage performances!

Up next on the main stage lineup were Otis & Bonez Dubb of the Axe Murder Boyz!  I know that these two still get hate to this day, but they have put in work in the near decade they have been associated with Psychopathic Records, and definitely deserve a little bit of respect!  Hell, PsykoScott was one of their biggest detractors, mostly because of the drama from back in 2006, but even he was impressed with their show!  DJ Clay was setup towards the back on the wheels of steel, and stayed up there to spin the entire time!  AMB played a lot of Juggalo favorites, including many new ones from The Garcia Brothers! In the first few tracks of their show, Anybody Killa even joined them onstage for the track “Bleed”!  Overall, the Garcia brothers put on a hell of a good set, and I’m anxious to see what they’ve got planned for the future!

One of my all-time favorites, Blaze ya Dead Homie, was about ready to come on stage and do his thing!  He has been a staple at the Gathering of the Juggalos since his very first performance in 2000!  I’m a HUGE Blaze mark….do I say that every year?  PsykoScott, Polmar and I went into the photo pit to put in our work, and waited patiently as the rest of the ninjas in the audience was hypnotized by the antics of Mike Busey and Busey’s Beauties.

Blaze’s stage set was a giant throne with “BLAZE” engraved in it.  There were skulls all around it with glowing red eyes, and he had a Blaze banner to complete the setup.  Mr. Grundy did his entire set solo, without the help of a hype man, and still rocked it as always!  He came out with a vengeance to “Real G Shit”, then into “Grave Ain’t No Place”, and then “Deadman Walking”!  He performed his whole set in a hoodie and Dickies, so he had to be hot as fuck!

I know that I haven’t said much about Mike Busey‘s intermission act for the whole Friday night lineup.  He came on between every main stage performer and hosted semi-nude women conducting acts of debauchery before everyone’s hypnotized eyes.

There were fire breathers, seductive dancers, twerkers, women with power tools, and a pleasantly plump guy that seemingly got to grind on every female up there!

I still have yet to figure out what Mike Busey himself brings to the act.  All I really saw him doing was walking around on stage.  I’m sure he’s the mastermind behind all of it, but besides wearing Butterbean’s shorts, nobody would have noticed him missing.  That being said, I think everyone pretty much dug what he brought to the Gathering, and would love to see him and his “Beauties” back again!

To my recollection, I haven’t ever seen any version of Da Mafia 6ix perform live. Not as Three-6, DM6, or any other name they may have been known as.  If I did, maybe it just wasn’t that memorable.  Who knows at this point, but I DO know that I was hype to see what they brought to the Gathering this year!  The only members who were there of the four who are technically a part of the group were Crunchy Black and DJ Paul. They came out in silver mirrored masks with “DM6” Dickies work shirts. They had a few neon Halloween decorations and a live DJ on stage with them.  Lil Wyte also came out to open up their set and acted as a pseudo hype man! If there has EVER been a Three 6 Mafia hit, then they rapped it! It may not have been the full version, but it was covered!  They eventually even brought the dude from Mike Busey‘s camp who was all over TMZ throughout the weekend:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/6HLnLciMh-k[/youtube]

The Kottonmouth Kings are a group that I’ve seen more times than I can count.  I’m not a smoker, nor do I do drugs/drinking of any kind.  You’d think that they wouldn’t appeal to me, right?  It’s funny.  With them, I don’t get overly excited to see them do their thing, but once the show gets started, they REALLY draw me in!  First off, they have 6 (or more) guys on stage with them at all times, and every single one of them come with an assload of energy!  As of the Gathering lineup, the Kottonmouth Kings consist of:

• Daddy X
• DJ Bobby B
• Lou Dogg
• Dirtball
• Judge D
• D-Loc

Of course that lineup has changed a bit over recent years.  It didn’t matter though.  They were all tireless and their flows were on point!  Judge D seemed to fit into the show, and group in general, very organically.

It was now time for our headliners of Friday night: TWIIIZZZTTIIIIID!  We got ourselves setup in the photo pit, took a few pictures of the anxiously awaiting crowd, and got ready for devastation like only Monoxide and Madrox can bring!  They brought out the same stage set as last year, with the exception of a new banner.  If you don’t remember, they had a big Twiztid pot leaf midstage, and Madrox / Monoxide bongs on the left and right sides.  Jason and Michael Myers came out to the stage with axes and decapitated heads to set the scene.  The music started, and they came out to “Mutant X”, just as they did 14 years ago at the very first Gathering of the Juggalos!  What is there to say about a Twiztid show?  It’s always just a perfect performance! Not only did they perform “Mutant X” to start, but they brought out other old school favorites like “Blink”, “Whatthefuck?!”, and even “Old School Pervert”!

After dropping our equipment off at the camper, I came back and watched the entire rest of their set while PsykoScott left to get a good seat at Gilbert Gottfried!

I have been a big fan of Gilbert Gottfried for a long time just due to his various cameos in movies and shows. I became a HUGE fan after hearing him on Howard Stern though!  This dude has given me some of the best laugh-out-loud moments ever, and I had NEVER had a chance to see him live!  Lucky for him, he did NOT disappoint!  He started out with jokes from his “Dirty Jokes” DVD, but that quickly derailed and turned into “Fuck ______” chants!  Juggalos were chanting “Fuck ______” about everyone and everything from Aflack, to Arsenio Hall, to obscure east coast talk show hosts from decades past! I saw Upchuck off to the side of the stage just belly laughing!  It was one of the funniest moments of the Gathering, bar-none!

I can now cross that performance off of my bucket list!  He’s a comic legend, and I’m glad I got a chance to see him amongst my family!

Friday night, I spent a lot of in-between time in Bizarro World, especially because it was the last night that it would even be open.  There were fire breathers, fire dancers, the Dark Carnival Tarot tent (which constantly had a line, so I never had a chance to have mine read), and more!  I rode this crazy spinning ride with a GoPro, and will put that footage up once I get this gigantic review finished!  I just wanted to show some love to Bizarro world in this review though, because it truly was a fresh area to hang out and show off your skills!

The next event I wanted to catch was Bone Crusher. He had the hit “Never Scared”, and…well that’s about it.  But still, I wanted to check it out.  Also, earlier in the year, DMoney and Michael Lee Warren did some advertising with me, and were new to the whole Juggalo scene. So it would have been interesting to see how Juggalos responded to their performance.  They were listed as supporting artists for Bone Crusher.  Unfortunately, I never made it to the carousel stage to see Bone Crusher.  What I heard from those who did go over there is that even though it was touted as a Bone Crusher set, it was mostly made up of tracks by Michael Lee Warren and DMoney Blockboy.  Again, I didn’t see it, so I don’t know how the crowd reaction was.

My homie DurtE broke his Gathering cherry this year, and was requested to perform at the Pendulum stage at 2 AM Friday night.  He was hype as fuck for this opportunity, had a shitload of merch made up to pass out, and wanted to leave a long-lasting impression on ninjas who had never seen or heard of him.  He and I had spoken about his set prior to the Gathering, and he wanted me there to help him on a small part of it.  I was gonna be there anyway, so why not?  DurtE had a decent audience to start.   He kept on rapping and the Pendulum stage kept on filling up!  There was lots of love for UPS (Underground Propaganda Squad) there for sure!  At one point about midway through the set, he had asked me to wait for the “Stone Cold” theme to come on, and to throw him a beer when he gestured to me.  I had one ready on the stage, he pointed to me, I lobbed it to him, and he cracked it open and chugged it.  Straight out of the old school Stone Cold days!  I didn’t get footage of that part (I was busy throwing a beer, remember?), but it looked similar to this:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/wzx8Qs4VXBw[/youtube]

Everyone that came to DurtE’s set got hooked up with a UPS swag bag with a hat, shirt, towel, music, etc!  You missed out on one hell of a hookup if you missed his set!

Right after DurtE’s set, it was time for me to head towards the Carousel stage where the Underground Avengers would be puttin’ it down!  The timeline showed that DurtE and UGA’s set would overlap, but luckily the set before them ran long.  I still had my camcorder and camera on me, so I got a little bit of footage of their set filmed from the photo pit.  They had an AMAZING turnout of ninjas who came to see them!  It seems like they had mic issues the entire time, which took a little bit away from the set, but that shit wasn’t their fault.  They had a great stage presence!  The big ass banner that was behind them looked dope too!  (I work for the company who printed it!)  Anyways, Boondox, CLAAS, and Bukshot definitely held it down on the carousel stage for what would be the last performance I would watch for the night!

I crashed at around 4:00 AM, but knew that I had to be up early to go get interviewed for part 2 of the ICP Documentary.

SATURDAY, JULY 26TH:

I know I slept GREAT that night! I must have been worn the fuck out though, because I fell right to sleep and got woken up at around 10 AM by a text from Rachel.  She asked if I would be down to meet up over at the interview trailer in about an hour for the second half of the interview. She was a fuckin’ trooper, because she had been up doing tarot readings until 7 that morning, and still got up before me.  ADULTS!

I got up, ate a quick meal bar, dumped all the footage and pictures onto my external drive, and got another text from her asking if I was ready.  She met me over at our camper instead, and we walked that way.  I told her about a shortcut to getting up to the seminar tent, but we’d have to cut across “Fuck That Hill” to get there.  It beat walking halfway across the Gathering to where the road split and going back up the hill.  So we started up the hill.  I got some momentum and kept my feet moving, and she was like “Hold up! We don’t all do P90X”.  I have to cut her some slack though…she is like 4 feet tall. lol.

We got to the top, went to the interview trailer, and got there right on time.  We got well into the interview, talked about more personal experiences, and who knows what else.  They have a total of about 2 hours combined for both of us, so hopefully some of what we said makes the cut!

While we were doing this, I had my phone silenced because I didn’t want to have it going off constantly while we were being filmed. I had it face down too so there would be no distractions for me.  The reason I’m telling you this is because PsykoScott had called me about 8 times, and texted even more asking where the hell I was.  I had taken his keys earlier that morning to get something out of the car, and I just kept them in my pocket.  He was getting setup to be a part of the Oddity Freak Show, and a bunch of his gear was still in the car!  He was supposed to take some hooks and suspend during the performance, but since I put him an hour behind, he missed out.  He sprinted up to the trailer just as I was getting out, I handed him the keys, and he was off.  Seriously, my bad homie!

We hung out around the interview trailer for a few more minutes talking to the crew putting together the documentary.  Farris, the Juggalo lawyer in charge of the ICP vs. the FBI lawsuit, just happened to be in the area.  I introduced myself, and his eyes lit up like “oh shit!”  He told me how big of a fan of Faygoluvers he was, and that he was on the site day and night!  His wife was there with him and confirmed what he just said.  She added that when she was trying to get to sleep, she would see the bright green glow of Faygoluvers from his tablet keeping her awake.  lol.  So while it sucks for her sleep, I appreciated the fuck outta that!  We snapped a quick pic with him:

After kickin’ it with Farris for a few minutes, the Upright Citizens Brigade were patiently waiting on us to be a part of whatever they had planned. A full crew from UCB Comedy was there to cover the event, and find out exactly how to get initiated into this “Juggalo Gang.”  I was a little bit worried that they had intentions of mocking the whole Juggalo scene, but after speaking with Sue (one of the reporters), that wasn’t their prerogative at all!  During their interview, they jokingly asked me who they had to kill to get into our gang, and asked Rachel how many dicks she had to suck to become a Juggalette.  It was all done tongue in cheek, and the outcome of the interview is incredible!  I laughed my ass off over it, and I think you will too!

[youtube]http://youtu.be/KR_QexeJABc[/youtube]

Line of the year: “Isn’t your butthole hot in that thing?”  Bahahaha!  Kudos to the UCB for keeping it positive!  I think they had a really good time out there!

After the interview, we split off from there, because I had to go get my gear for the ICP Seminar that was coming up in just over an hour or so.  I grabbed my backpack of stuff, and Jeremy told me that somebody from Psychopathic had come over to our camper!  Remember how earlier in my review, I mentioned that they were being a little bit stingy with the Gathering medallions?  Well, the Psychopathic ninja had come over with 3 of them to hook us up, and thanked us for all that we had been doing!  That’s super fuckin’ dope that they even bothered to do this!  Much love to them for that!

I started to head back to the seminar tent.  I know, it was a LOT of walking back and forth, but this time, it was a good thing!  I ran into Hopsin who was being driven around by Gritty on a golf cart. He didn’t have anyone else around him, so I went up to him.  Now I have only had a little bit of face time with Hop in the past couple of years.  I helped put together his first show in Dallas when he was relatively unknown, and he was extremely appreciative of it at the time!  I had seen him and said what’s up at other shows, but had no expectations that he would remember me.  That motherfucker knew exactly who I was though!  He gave me a dap, and I told him how dope I thought that the latest Ill Mind of Hopsin 7 was, and what it meant to me.  If you haven’t seen it, check it out here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/QBsA2ETp7JA[/youtube]

Now, it was time to finally finish making my way to the ICP Seminar!  I got there WAY early, like at least 30 minutes. Guess what?  The seminar tent was PACKED!  I made my way up to the side of the stage where the rest of the press was setup. I setup shop right next to our homies from TrueJuggaloFamily.com, who were already there, cameras ready!  Jules aka VeryTwiztidRaven stayed close by to tweet out any info that came out of the seminar,while PunkRockJuggalo was home covering it for those ninjas on our Facebook page, and of course right here on Faygoluvers.net.

Violent J and Shaggy talked for a little over 40 minutes, and covered topics such as having to restaff at Psychopathic Records, a possible Juggalo Cruise, a new solo record by DJ Paul, the new KillJoy Club (ICP / Da Mafia 6ix collab) album, and lots more!  You can see the notes from the seminar right here, or just watch it for yourself here:

 [youtube]http://youtu.be/gf61nOht0zw[/youtube]

They also spoke a lot about Otis, aka Young Wicked of the Axe Murder Boyz.  They hardcore busted his balls saying “Awww..he’s so young…so wicked…”  EVERYBODY was rollin’ with laughter!  Otis was a good sport though, and just laughed it off.  Shit was hilarious!

Before the seminar, they handed out tickets to the 1,000+ attendees.  There were still hundreds that didn’t have tickets.  I luckily got one on the sly thanks to a certain painted up, yellow-haired individual…but we’ll keep that on the low low.  I stuck around to get whatever they were giving out, which ended up being the PSYR17 Sampler! It contained tracks from Dark Lotus, Killjoy Club, AMB, Boondox, and the first track from the EP that’s coming exclusive with the Joker’s Card box set from ICP!  We have that available for download right here!

After the ICP Seminar and the chaos of getting the freebie, I completely missed my chance to go see the Oddity Freak show.  I knew that PsykoScott was a part of it though, and that he planned on filming it. So luckily, I got to watch that flavor after the fact!  I’m sure we’ll make it available in its entirety before too long, but just know that these ninjas did some crazy shit!

While PsykoScott was at the FreakShow, I got my shit ready for the JCW Seminar!  There wasn’t much of an audience there, but KG had the entire stage filled up with the stars of that night’s BloodyMania!  I check out and record the JCW seminar for the ninjas at home that don’t get to see it.  Everyone on stage had some interesting stories, and some of them even got heated at each other for talking shit!  I couldn’t tell you the first thing about the JCW rankings, but I know my boy KG can!  First, here’s the entire seminar:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/nO163TDskCA[/youtube]

You can see the full list of Gathering wrestling results by clicking right here!

The JCW Seminar and the Miss Juggalette pageant overlapped on the timeline, but luckily, the host of the JCW seminar was ALSO the host of Miss Juggalette!  That’s your homie and mine: Kevin Gill!  I followed his cart over there complete with the video camera, and was going to try to pull double duty by taking pics and filming at the same time. The judges were Triplesix, Big Hoodoo (who seemed very scared by the Mr. Juggalo dancers), and a random Juggalo who was picked from the crowd!  The 3 categories were:

1. Personality
2. Talent
3. Swimsuit

These Juggalettes had a LOT of fuckin’ talent!  Talents included fire poi, fire hooping, hoop dancing, singing, rapping, dancing, the creation of a live-action working Riddlebox (by TJF’s Oreo), juggalette cosmology, and super-fast, super-ninja-like jump roping!  You can see the entire pageant, which was only an hour this year instead of nearly 3 last year, here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/ykIuHv-NAIU[/youtube]

I’ve got to send a HUGE shout-out to Dominique who is 2014’s Miss Juggalette!  I also have to give massive props to KG for doing an incredible job at hosting it!

This day was just flying by for me, and I started to get a little somber because I knew I would be leaving in just a few hours.  No time for that bullshit noise though!  The final night of main stage was here!

So when Dizzy Wright got started, the Miss Juggalette pageant was still going on.  I got a text from PsykoScott saying that he was heading to the main stage while I finished up.  I met up with him shortly after Dizzy’s set, but had missed almost the entire thing.  That’s why there are no pics of Dizzy in our photo gallery.  Sorry Dizzy!

We do, however have a little bit of footage of Dizzy, and highlights from the rest of Saturday’s events at the Gathering here:

[youtube]http://youtu.be/a9WEyjk68kU[/youtube]

Last year, Swollen Members performed as a group on the main stage at the Gathering.  This year, Psychopathic invited Madchild back for a solo show.  PsykoScott and I were ready in the photo pit! I had the DSLR that I had been using all weekend, and as I snapped my first crowd shot, I got an error on the screen!  It turns out that I left the card for that camera hooked up to my computer back at the camper.  FUCK!  Never fear though!  I had a waterproof point-and-shoot in my pocket (for use during ICP’s set) that I snapped some pretty good pics with anyways.

Madchild was at home at the Gathering!  He showed Juggalos a ton of love, and even said though he’s not a Juggalo, he fuckin’ loves us!  He did the song “Crazy” for one of his first tracks, and when he came to the line “I’ll kick you in your motherfuckin’ face like I’m a donkey”, I was the near recipient of a face kick:

I don’t know about you other Gathering veterans, but I’m down to see Madchild and/or Swollen Members there every year.  That dude is a monster!

Madchild wrapped up his set, and Boondox was due up next!  Of course I ran back to the camper to get my camera’s storage card.  The least I could do is try to get the best pictures possible!  Back to Boondox.  He had a great time slot in that he opened up for one of the Gathering’s most anticipated acts: Cypress Hill!  Boondox typically either rolled solo, or more often had Cousin Cleetus up there with him.  This time, he brought out his homie Crucifix, who we have been hearing a little more about lately!   Crucifix has an insane amount of talent! The dude can sing, rap, and I’m interested in seeing some solo shit from him!  Boondox opened up with “They Pray With Snakes”, and I know I heard “Red Mist” while I was up there too.  I think Boondox and Crucifix really fed off of each other’s energy!  They were all over that stage!

OK, everything on the main stage had been extremely solid for Saturday night.  But now, guess who it was time for?  CYPRESS FUCKING HILL! I know that I’m not alone when I say that they were on my bucket list for performers to see in my lifetime!  They not only got crossed off my list, but they fuckin’ MERKED their set!  B-Real and Sen Dog came out complete with a DJ and a ninja playing the bongo drums.  The audience was extremely hype!  Cypress Hill played all the hits in their arsenal like “How I Could Just Kill a Man”, “When The Shit Goes Down”, “Hits From The Bong”, and actually closed out of their set with “Superstar”!

After Cypress Hill’s set, we went over to the info tent to talk to Psychopathic employee Will Sigler.  I had never met this ninja in person, but know quite a few people who know him and have nothing but good things to say about him.  He told us that he’s known about and visited Faygoluvers for years, but it was great to finally meet!  PsykoScott and I had an immediate bond with Will.  He’s super fuckin’ legit!  Anyways, in my opinion, one of the most exciting and memorable things to do is to be onstage during Faygo Armageddon.  I know that security had a problem with press being up there in years prior, so I reached out to Psychopathic several weeks before the Gathering to see if it’d be possible to get up there this year.  They told Will to make sure I had no issues getting up there this year.  It was still early in the night, so he told me to come back after Hopsin and we’d figure out the logistics!  Will kept looking at my DSLR camera like he was worried about it. He asked if that’s what I was taking up for ICP.  I said not to worry, and that I have a waterproof one I purchased especially for ICP.  That reassured him…a little.

PsykoScott and I were hype about the Faygo Armageddon later, but now it was time for Hopsin!  We got all setup, ready to take pics and video.  There was a sense of anticipation in the air, and for great reason!  I don’t think there could have been a better spot for someone to play at the Gathering.  I mean opening up for the whole festival’s headliner?  I know he felt like he got the bone the last time he played in 2011 because the Rydas kinda rushed him off after 15 minutes on the 2nd stage. Opening up for ICP is something that EVERY artist playing the Gathering strives for!

Hop’s set opened up with 3-4 minutes from DJ Hoppa getting the crowd hype for Hop to come out.  Hop walked out to a deafening “Hopsin! Hopsin!” chant, and started immediately into “I Need Help!”  Everybody went fuckin’ NUTS!  Right after that track, he talked to his audience and said he had been waiting to rock the main stage for a long fuckin’ time!  He then thanked Juggalos for being the FIRST to show love to him before he blew up!  He said he appreciated us, and that he’s sorry, but he had to “rip your motherfuckin’ hearts out” right now.  It seemed like a majority of his onlookers rapped every single lyric with him! He did have to dodge some shit that was being thrown onstage.  Nothing seemingly malicious (Faygo bottles, TP, etc), but he handled it like a champ!   Hop was easily one of my favorite performances of the Gathering to this point!

After Hop finished demolishing the crowd, we had to go searching for our wigs so we could prepare to have them split once again by the wicked clowns!  All of the press at this point are veterans of the Gathering, and realize what they have to do to protect their precious (and expensive) gear!  I went and dropped anything that wasn’t waterproof off with Will at the info tent, along with anything else that could potentially be ruined.  Back at the pit, they busted out their camera condoms, and prepared for the FINAL main stage performance of the 2014 Gathering of the Juggalos!

Faygo drums were wheeled out to the main stage with candy props on either side.  There was about 5 minutes of silence after the barrels were rolled out to the stage, and then this creepy intro with a kid talking started out like this:

“Do you like CLOWNS?

Do you like scary playtime?

Do you like BLOODY BLOODY BLOODSHED?”

Then a deep voice came booming over the PA introducing the FINAL performance of the Gathering of the Juggalos, and the arrival of the Dark Carnival!  The creepy child’s voice then repeated “Wicked Clowns come out to PLAY” a few times, and out emerged Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope!   It was time for “NIGHT OF THE CHAINSAW!”  They followed up with “Chicken Huntin’!”  The strange part?  Not a single drop of Faygo in two full tracks!  Last year, the Faygo came out in full force after the first note!  This year, it seemed like they waited for the first few songs to be over for media to be out of the pit.  If they weren’t out by the time the 3rd song, “The Show Must Go On”, started, then they were FUCKED!  Faygo was flying EVERYWHERE!

I think security lost track of the number of songs they had already performed, because we got a good four tracks in before they started kicking us out of the photo pit.  Maybe they were distracted by Juggalo bodies and Faygo flying everywhere!

It was time for us to go over to make our final preparations with Will over at the info tent…so we came up with a plan.  He graciously gave me his ALL ACCESS pass, (complete with this fresh “Ninjas in Action” charm), and said it would do no good sitting there with him when we could make use of it!  I was amazed at his generosity, and thanked him profusely!   I always make it a goal to be on stage for the end of an ICP Gathering set because it’s the PERFECT way to top off an already AWESOME weekend!

He said that I could take 3 other people backstage with the All Access pass!  We had split off from Polmar after being booted from the photo pit, but I somehow managed to find him and pulled him back! I looked for Jules (VeryTwiztidRaven) as well, but had no luck finding her.  PsykoScott, Polmar and I went to the side of the stage and watched the rest of ICP.  Their set list was AMAZING!  When you’re waiting to get onstage though, it seems like an eternity!

Here’s the point where we started to get a little bit worried.  “Bang! Pow! Boom!” started to play over the PA, and typically, that’s when you were pulled onstage to take part in the madness.  This…wasn’t…happening.  Nobody on that side of the stage seemed to be in any kind of hurry to get on either.  We just kind of looked at each other like FUUUUUCK!  Then, we saw some of the JCW ninjas start to head behind the stage to make their way to the other side.  We followed them because we did NOT want to miss out on this.  There was a little bit of resistance, but after flashing the All Access pass, they let us all right on!

Juggalos, there seemed to be ENDLESS amounts of Faygo up there! We each grabbed a box on the side of the stage, brought it to the front of the stage, and started spraying anything and everything in our path!  We were having the time of our fuckin’ lives!  Just to document the flavor, we snapped a few pics of each other spraying the awaiting Gathering audience down with diet carbonated sweetness!

During the pandemonium, we saw Farris, the Juggalo lawyer up there, along with our homie Esham John, and a ton of other familiar faces!  J and Shaggy were there for the first 10 minutes or so, but we all stayed up there for probably 15+ minutes until every last Faygo bottle top was popped!  During the hysteria, PsykoScott lost his hat, and one of his expensive ear plugs onstage.  After grabbing a few souvenir bottles, we walked over through the mud pit of the in front of the stage, and he somehow managed to find his muddy, crusty hat near where the front of the crowd was standing just minutes before!

We waddled over to the info tent, and I thanked Will profusely once again and handed his sticky all access pass back to him.  PsykoScott and I were smiling ear to ear!  Will noticed, and knew that he just topped off our Gathering experience.  Much love to you homie!

It was now raining, and we made our way back to the camper, soaked from head to toe.  We didn’t get into any hurry to get out of the Faygo-soaked clothes for some reason…probably because at that time, we simply gave no fucks.  Rachel came by our site and was *allegedly* high as giraffe nuts!  She said that she got super stoned off of a few hits of weed during Cypress Hill.  She doesn’t typically drink or smoke, so it didn’t take much to get her 80 pound frame all sorts of blitzed!  It was hilarious!  We said our goodbyes, just in case we didn’t get to see her or the Philly scrubs crew again.

We got word that Tim, who had kindly let us borrow the camper for the weekend after we left, would be coming by to pick it up at around 5 AM.  We now had a decision to make. We still had to get all packed up and ready to roll, but should we sleep for a couple of hours knowing that we would have to get up, start our trek towards Fort Smith for the 12+ hour drive, and probably not make it very far?  OR, we could pack up, get on the road ASAP, find a hotel near Columbus, and then wake up refreshed for the full day’s drive ahead.  We decided on the latter.

We rinsed off in the shower (separately, of course), packed all of our belongings, rolled up banners, and packed PsykoScott’s car up with our gear.  Unfortunately, we couldn’t make it to any late-night shows, including Jarren Benton, Cryptic Wisdom, and Shock G, but that was the sacrifice we had to make to ensure we got home safely.

After saying our goodbyes to our camping buddies once again, we left at about 3 AM to hit the road towards home.  PsykoScott drove, and kept nearly falling asleep while driving.  We had to stop at 2 hotels before we found one with a vacancy.  The first one we stopped at said that it would be 70 bucks for the night, but the door was broken, so he’d have to let us in and out.  FUCK THAT!  We found one a few miles down the road, and a little out of the way, but we gave no fucks.  It had two beds and a shower, and that’s all we cared about.  PsykoScott passed right the fuck out.  I was still pretty high off of the adrenaline, so I worked on pics and videos for a while before I finally decided to crash.

SUNDAY, JULY 27TH:

We woke up after a decent night’s rest, got loaded up, and were on our way home.  I had called my dad to wish him a happy birthday since I had missed the celebration.  They moved the Gathering dates, but I have family birthdays all throughout July and August.  So I’m bound to miss at least one during the Juggalo festivities.  Nevertheless, I had to say Happy Birthday Pop!

It took us about 13 hours to get to Fort Smith.  I got there, slept, and drove home the next morning.  The drive home is ALWAYS the biggest kick in the nuts after such a fresh, but exhausting weekend!   We all made it home safely though, and that’s all that matters!

WRAPPING UP:

Well, that just about wraps up my long-winded review of the 2014 Gathering of the Juggalos! I hope you all enjoyed the read, and that it either gave you another perspective of the Gathering that you didn’t see for yourself, or that you maybe lived it vicariously through our experiences!  For more coverage, make sure to check out the following links:

Faygoluvers GOTJ 2014 Photo Gallery

Faygoluvers GOTJ 2014 Video Gallery

Of course, you can check out our Gathering news coverage by scrolling through our news feed.

For next year, I hope to be able to see a few more events that I had every intention of seeing this year, but just never made it.  That includes Juggalo Night Court, Psychopathic Radio, Juggalo Gong Show, and the Juggalo Wedding (if there is one).

The overall vibe of this year was so fuckin’ positive!  I think the change of venue, the lack of the drug bridge, and the ninjas who decided to come here this year all made for some of the best times of my life!  I don’t want to make this all about me, but it IS MY review. lol.  So I want to say THANK YOU to EVERYONE who came up to our camper, saw us busting our asses working, or just gave us a dap in passing to thank us for the website!  We strive to bring you all of the flavor that we experience at the Gathering straight to your computer or phone screens.  I hope we did you ninjas right!  I also hope that after 15 years of doing this, you Juggalos and Juggalettes who haven’t made it to the Gathering yet start saving your fuckin’ pennies!  If I didn’t have a great time doing what I do, I guarantee it wouldn’t be the vacation I choose to take every single year of my adult life!  GET THERE!

Before I finally end this, I want to give props to a few deserving people:

• Amanda and Pierce – Thank you for understanding me going out of town to cover the Gathering (and have a kick ass time doing it)!  I know things were tough this year, but you both continue to stand by my side and support this crazy endeavor!
• Steve Trickle – he owns Legend Valley and welcomed us into his home, despite being kicked out of Kaiser, and being labeled a gang.  Thanks for believing in what we are all about!
• PsykoScott – one of my closest homies!  The past 2 years you have gone out of your way to make sure we get all of our bases covered!  I know we never stopped moving this year, but I appreciate you bro!
• Psychopathic Records – for putting on yet another amazing festival!  Get the kinks worked out on the organization tip with Ballers and car passes, and I don’t think you could ask for a better four days!
• Will Sigler – The definition of a Juggalo!  This ninja selflessly puts others first, and worked endless hours to ensure that all of us had a great time!
• Jumpsteady – He worked closely with me this year to get my opinions of some of the artists they were looking to book, and was now fully back in charge of everything Gathering related.  You pulled it off remarkably despite major setbacks! HUGE props for that!
• J-Webb – While I didn’t have any interaction with him directly at the Gathering this year, he made sure that Faygoluvers was taken care of with our press passes, and gave my name out to the ICP documentary, the Upright Citizens Brigade, and a few other media outlets.  Much love to him for thinking I’m good enough to represent Juggalos to the rest of the world!
• True Juggalo Family – Hazin, Oreo, Shane, The Foot, and the rest of the TJF crew could NOT be better Gathering neighbors!  From the initial setup, keeping an eye on things while we were away, and chauffeuring us on the golf cart a few times over the weekend…you are all the shit!
• Nik aka InsaneNinja of Monkeys On Crack – Thank you for the nearly hour-long photography class you gave me with my DSLR.  I am the meaning of the word novice, but I know our gallery wouldn’t be nearly as fresh without your guidance!
• KG – Kevin has been my homie for years, and did an awesome job hosting every event I saw him at!  He also was able to hook up our old friend Miss DissLexia with a spot on the women’s wrestling roster!  Much love homie!
• Aaron Spencer’s crew – You all were a pleasure to get to meet and chat with.  Aaron seemed like the best of homies even though I never got to meet him.  If he was anything as fresh as you, then I’m sorry I never had the opportunity to kick it with him.
• The FLH Staff – Jules (VeryTwiztidRaven), Polmar, Tempestas, Big Ian (even though I barely saw you), PunkRockJuggalo (for holding it down at home!)  and anyone else I may have forgotten.  Like Psychopathic, FLH has a truly down ass core set of ninjas who bust their ass to make sure we get the info out that you crave!  I didn’t forget about the others that do this shit year-round…I appreciate all of you too!
• Bluntman – I barely got a chance to talk to you, but you got a laugh out of me every time I walked past your booth.  Always hustlin’ or holding a crazy contest for discounted or free merch. You’re the shit!
• Tim – Even though you didn’t get to enjoy the festivities with us, you let us use your home away from home as our headquarters for a few days.  I hope you get to kick it with us for the entire weekend next year!
• Jeremy – you busted your Gathering cherry, and I know you had the time of your life!  It was cool getting to know you better, and I’m 99.9% sure I’ll see you there again next year!
• George V. – You have always, and will continue to be the shit!  Thanks for lookin’ out for me this year, and I hope to finally schedule some interviews with Twiztid and Blaze when they come through!
• Upchuck – I didn’t think I was gonna see you at all this year, but you surprisingly showed up, looked a lot less stressed, and seemed to really be enjoying yourself!
• Juggalos and Juggalettes at the Gathering – You did YOU all weekend, and I couldn’t ask for more than that! I miss all of you and can’t wait to see you for our reunion next year!
• The Licking County Sheriff’s Department – Say what you will about police in general, but these particular cops had no issues with us that I heard about, and were only there to make sure that everyone was safe.  I even heard a few of them “Whoop-Whoop”ing at us, and saw more than a few of them with smiles on their faces!
• All artists and performers – I saw a LOT of shows that week, and I honestly didn’t come across a bad one! Every single one of you from the main stage to the Pendulum acts held it the fuck down!
• The ICP Documentary Crew – You seemed to really take an interest at what we had to say, and I had a good time conversing with you all.  I can’t wait to see the results of all of your hard work!
• Media – There wasn’t a single jerk that I came across as far as the media there!  The Upright Citizens Brigade were the shit, and so was anyone else we came across
• Photo Pit crew – Everyone from Jason Shaltz, the guys from SOSEG, NEHip-Hop, TJF, and everyone else we spent an inordinate amount of time with in the photo pit…much love!  I’m still not sure about the guy from SPIN who’s there every year.  He never seems to be having a good time.
• The DC Tarot – Even though I didn’t get a reading from either of you, you guided a lot of ninjas through rough spots in their lives.  That’s the shit in itself!  I WILL get my reading next year!
• The Philly Scrubs – I finally got a taste of a DeadBody Cheesesteak, and it was god damn delicious! Much love DBD! I wish I could have kicked it with all of you for longer at the Gathering, but hope to see you all on Juggalo Day 2015!
• Kristal Tsosie – this is the Juggalette who unfortunately passed away due to complications from a preexisting medical condition.  I never met her, but am always devastated to hear about the loss of a family member.  Read more about her in the latest Hatchet Herald.  RIP Kristal!

Honestly, I know there are a lot more people to thank, but aren’t you exhausted with this read already?  I know I am!  So with that said, THANK YOU for reading this, and I am officially OUT!