I know that those of you who didn’t attend the first annual Dark Carnival Games Con are probably super curious to find out how it all went down.  Even if you aren’t (and you are…or else you would have never opened this review), maybe you will be after checking out a glimpse into my experience there.

Since this is the first (hopefully annual) DCG Con, I feel like I owe it to you ninjas to let you know what went down.  I’m starting out on the plane ride home with all intentions of it not being near as lengthy as my Gathering reviews.  Those take a lot out of me.

So with that said, onto the details!

PREPARATION

Several months ago, Juggalos were publicly introduced to the idea of a gaming convention.  It would happen in Detroit, Michigan, which logistically makes sense for Psychopathic to debut at, and would consist of three days of gaming flavor!  Dark Carnival Games has put out some great games over the years including Morton’s List (and all expansions), The Quest For Shangri-La, Into The Echoside, and now Juggalos Against Sanity (which debuted at the con).  So why not hold an event that highlights all of these, and give the most hardcore of players a chance to show off their skills head-to-head against one another?  Not only that, but unlike most underground events, this is something that you could feel comfortable bringing your entire family to!

While I’m not a gamer by any means, I KNEW I had to be there!  I played Morton’s List quite a bit back in my college days, love Echoside when I get the opportunity to play it, and was extremely interested to see how Juggalos Against Sanity turned out!

Psychopathic knew that they could very well take a hit on this convention, so they made sure to be as budget-smart as possible when planning.  Several Juggalos, including myself, were contacted months ago to see about volunteering for the event.  The non-official tournaments would have prizes provided by those hosting it, and no frills or travel accommodations were given.  None of that mattered though…this was the little convention that could, and I was happy to offer any services I possibly could!  Remember, there were 3 full days of flavor at the convention, seminars, free gaming, and TWO after parties with one featuring the Insane Clown Posse performing two CLASSIC EPs back to back in one show!  All of that for $40.00? Pshhh….sign me up for that ANY day.

Back to the prep work.  Jumpsteady, Rachel Paul, and a handful of others were all heavily involved in making this “little con that could” come to life!  Rachel knew I worked for a printing company for my regular 9-5, so she tapped me for the con catalogs, as well as the Juggalos Against Sanity 10 pack that you won for certain events.  We got that taken care of, and I know that my homie Trish hooked the con up with a FUCKTON of the flavor you saw there!  Everything from the 3 day badges, crew badges, giant cardboard cutouts, and much more came from her handiwork! She also designed the Faygoluvers Tsuro Challenge Faygo bottle label for those of you who saw it.  Super…fucking…talented!

Anyways, as you hopefully grasp, this whole con was a labor of love.  Jumpsteady and Rachel Paul spent countless hours organizing, lining up vendors, running into dead ends, finding workarounds, and totally schooling it all the way up until it was time to setup!

TRAVEL

I luckily could purchase my plane tickets via my frequent flyer miles, so I got my round trip to Detroit for 11 bucks total. Thanks Southwest!  ZZ would be flying out from Dallas with me, so we met up at the airport on Thursday, April 19th at a little after noon.  I actually worked a half day that morning (and was incredibly productive if my bosses are reading this!) The plan was to get there in time to take in Twiztid‘s annual 420 show. We were in Detroit, why WOULDN’T we show up and wile out for 420?

Everything started out great!  Though some storms were brewing in Detroit, our flight from Dallas got out on time, and things were looking good for us to get there at around 5 PM EST.  Well…that didn’t quite happen.  We kept receiving updates from the captain that the weather was bad, and only getting worse in Detroit.  Eventually, they made the decision to divert our flight to Grand Rapids, which is about a 2.5 hour drive to Detroit. We of course weren’t happy about it, but dude sitting next to us was flipping the fuck out!  Every announcement that was made, he would push the attendant button to get someone to come talk to him.  lol. The booze he was drinking during the flight must have kicked in soon thereafter though because he was pretty even-tempered for the remainder of it.

Grand Rapids is a tiny airport.  We had 2 food options when we landed and chose some bar burgers. I was keeping everyone posted with updates as to when we may get there.  I’ve gotta show some love to Vinnie (the ICP Kid!) who gave me a call and said that if it got to be too late to get a flight out for the night, he’d make the 5 hour round trip to come get me.  That dude is one of the most genuine ninjas you’ll ever meet!  I told him to sit tight because this would probably pass.  Luckily, as soon as we had taken our last bite of food, the call was made to make the remaining 25-minute flight to Detroit!  We paid our tab and got the fuck out of Grand Rapids!

Things were looking GREAT for the night ahead!  Unfortunately, since the show had already started, we knew we’d miss most Twiztid’s 420 event, but we for damn sure weren’t going to miss it all!

Our homies Trish and Paige from the Scrubs crew, along with some new homies Kimmy and Dylan were at the airport to meet us.  I must have forgotten to tell them that I had ZZ with me, so all 6 of us squeezed into her little Altima, luggage and all, and were off to the show!  Much love to you guys for making the trip to pick us up! We truly owe you!

I’ll save the 420 show for another review, but just know that everything was off the fuckin’ chain!  We caught the tail end of The ROC’s performance, and all of Boondox, G-Mo, Blaze, and of course Twiztid, and they tore the packed house at St. Andrews the fuck down!  Much props to George and the entire crew for always being so accommodating!

After the show, the entire carload of Juggalos was hungry.  Imagine that…leaving a 420 show with the munchies.  I didn’t smoke or drink anything (when do I ever?), but I can always eat!  For whatever reason, White Castle is still in business, and that’s what the Philly crew wanted. They bought one of those 30-pack “Hunger Boxes” from there and a few orders of fries.  I know this isn’t a food review, but those of you who don’t live anywhere where there’s a White Castle, you’re NOT missing anything.  It’s cheap, but you get what you pay for. Their sliders are just OK, but their fries are straight up horrendous.

We met up with Matt and Lisa who would be our roommates for the extended weekend at the show earlier, so they followed us to the official hotel of the 2017 DCG Con: The Concorde Inn.  We kicked it with everyone for a while that night, and ended up crashing for what would be by FAR the longest amount of sleep we’d have until after the con!

OK, now let’s get back to the real reason you clicked in to read this:

FRIDAY, APRIL 21ST (DCG CON DAY 1)

After a good 4-5 hours of sleep, it was time to get up and get ready for DAY 1 of DCG Con!  We piled into our cars and headed to the Gibraltar Trade Center so we could be there in time for doors to open at 10 AM.  Since I was technically part of the “crew” for the event, they let me in a few minutes early.  I grabbed my crew packet which had our badges and assignments and headed into the actual convention center.  The con was in roughly a 30,000 sq foot area carved out of a 600,000 square foot building.  Outside of the convention was a gigantic flea market that had vendors selling car stereos, t-shirts, jewelry, movies, clothing, food, and anything else you could possibly think of.

I went inside and just took it all in. This would be our home for the next three days!  I immediately went to the merch booth where the homie MattE was setting up.  This ninja is the shit if you don’t know him.  He got a little overwhelmed at times, as we all would if we had hundreds of Juggalos shouting t-shirt descriptions and sizes his direction all day.  Luckily, the crew could purchase Juggalos Against Sanity before doors opened, so I grabbed my copy along with a few t-shirts and went off to explore.

Check out 10 minutes of footage of me walking around right after it opened:

Everything was so well-organized! If you looked up just a tad, you could see giant banners EVERYWHERE!  We’re talking 30 foot banners touting DCG Con, along with slender banners hanging from the rafters to tell you where everything was.  At the entrance, you were greeted by some stage props from previous ICP concerts, “The Foot“‘s wheel chair, and cardboard cutouts of SuperBalls, The Witch (from Into The Echoside), and more!  There were separate “rooms” that were enclosed by curtains that would host seminars, game tournaments, Fowling, etc.  Giant versions of chess, checkers, Connect Four, and Jenga were available for your playing pleasure, and HUNDREDS of games were available to check out and play on one of the dozen or so tables that were setup!  Much props to Trish and Kimmy for manning that area for the ENTIRE WEEKEND.  14 hours for two days, and 8 for the 3rd.  I would have gone stir crazy!

DCG HQ had all of the prizes that you could potentially win displayed (including DCG Con jerseys, foil cards for Into The Echoside, medals, etc.)  There were areas for Texas Hold ‘Em, the BattleTech simulator, the inflatable obstacle course, the JCW ring where gladiatorial combat would take place, concessions, and many other areas.  One other area that I should show some love to is the Morton’s List tent.  As always, those Listalos fucking SCHOOLED it with the Morton’s Lounge!  Inside of their camo-web netting that covered the lounge, they had tables setup displaying tons of Morton’s List trinkets, a TV with X Box, a couch, a big table, art on the walls, and so much more! They were also the ones in charge of selling the remaining hard copies of Morton’s List!  On a side note, I can’t believe they only asked $20 for those!  What a steal!

As soon as the doors opened, the autograph signing for DCG Con was already underway.  We’re talking signatures from Jumpsteady, Tom Wood, Nathan, Tall Jess, and anyone else involved in Dark Carnival Games!  The line was light when I passed it, but again, the doors had JUST opened so ninjas were still walking around getting their bearings.

I made another trip around the convention center that morning and stopped at the JCW wrestling ring.  My homie Rudeboi from Delaware was hosting the gladiatorial combat in the JCW ring the entire weekend!  I stopped by to chat with him a bit and saw the giant bouncy boxing gloves.  I had played with those before and thought it’d be fun to jump in and do some pillow boxing with someone.

The homie Rellik from the group Enasnimi was there and offered to jump in with me. There were a dozen or so Juggalos standing around watching as we got our gloves strapped in. Now let me just say that these gloves were NOT like the ones I had used before.  In others, you slid the glove on and there was a solid bar that you grabbed onto from the inside so it doesn’t flop around everywhere.  This set you basically just slid your hands inside, strapped your wrists, and held onto whatever you could inside.  Definitely not ideal.

I told Rudeboi and Rellik that they were flopping around everywhere and Rellik agreed.  We both decided to go ahead with it though. We signed a waiver and people were watching, so fuck it, right?

The bell rung, and we immediately started exchanging blows.  Our giant hand pillows quickly got tangled up with each other but we kept swinging.  At some point during the brief exchange, I clocked Rellik pretty solid.  This was a whirlwind of shit within about 20 seconds, so I didn’t even know that I had hit him. Not even a second later, I felt a hard THUD on my neck/ear area. I stepped back like “What the fuck?” He had thrown a glove off and taken a swing at me.  Before you start saying that it was on some bitch shit, I completely understood why he did it. I didn’t know what had happened until I saw blood steady flowing from his lip.  We both exchanged some words…he was heated and I was trying to diffuse the situation.  My gloves were still on, so I know they never flew off in our exchange.  Best I can gather is that my hand had come into the wrist area of the glove where there’s very little padding when I connected.

I assured him that I had ZERO reason to try to sucker punch him.  What would I have to gain from that?  But again, it was a heat of the moment situation and I don’t hold him at fault in the least.  After a few minutes, tempers had calmed down, I requested that the gloves be put out of commission, and Rellik and I left on good terms.  He told me that he wasn’t mad at me…just at the situation and the shitty gloves.  He left with a fat lip, and though it wasn’t visible, my neck was pretty stiff for the next day or so.  He said that made him feel a little better.  lol.

So from that point on, every time we saw each other, I made sure he was straight, and we gave each other daps and whatnot.  I bought he and his homie a beer, and we actually talked several times throughout the entirety of the weekend.  Rellik’s a good dude and I hope to see him at GOTJ this year!  Check out Enasnimi’s music at Facebook.com/EnasnimiIminsane!

Holy shit…the rumors after that all happened were fucking ridiculous! “Scottie knocked a kid out,” “Scottie threw a guy out of a window,” “Scottie definitely killed a dude…I seent it!”  lol.  I had to tell the actual story of what happened so many times over the weekend.  Funny thing is that Rellik’s homies were giving him more shit about it than anything.  Jokingly, of course.  I wish I could remember some of the lines they told me, but they were all good natured.

Alright, back to the con.  I had a little bit of time to kill before the first round of our Faygoluvers Ultimate Tsuro Challenge tournament. I swung by Toots and Joey’s Munchkin tournament to see how they were doing, and went to find a spot to hang our banner (which both Rachel Paul and Trish designed!  Much props!!) and get setup.  After snagging some zip ties, we hung the banner up, and played a few games before we got the tournament underway.

Let me give a little shine to this game.  I wasn’t familiar with Tsuro until Jumpsteady introduced it to me several months ago.  I was in Detroit last year at some point…maybe the Blahzay Roze interview?  Anyways, planning was already heavily underway for the DCG Con, and after playing Echoside at the Psychopathic Records complex in Detroit Murderous, it was time to decompress a bit with an easier game.  He busted out Tsuro: The Game of the Path and showed me the ropes.  In short, you choose a dragon, draw 3 tiles that have lines curving in all different directions, and you have to follow the path of the tile that you laid.  Your opponent(s) are doing the same thing, so if your tiles end up touching, you follow the remainder of the path until it dead ends, or you fall off the board into oblivion. The object of the game is to stay on the board for longer than your opponents.  The last one on wins!  It was simple, fun, and easy to teach other players.  When planning continued for DCG con, Jumpsteady asked if I wanted to host our own Faygoluvers event for it.  The Ultimate Tsuro Challenge was born!

I caught a couple of games with DCFaygoGuy and his girl Megz, Cherry Bomb, Blake (aka Notslim1), and a few others that I swear I’m not purposely leaving out.  We were having such a good time playing the game that I decided to just make Friday all about learning it and getting a few games under everyone’s belts since it was new to most.  There were no complaints, so we filled the remainder of the two hours that I had set aside with a bunch of rounds.  DCFaygoGuy’s girl Megz was killing it, and so was Cherry Bomb!  They were definitely on track to be in the running for our awesome prize pack!

Speaking of which, let me tell you what we had for the winners.  The most eye-catching prize BY FAR was the custom Faygo Bottle that Trish had made up for us.  Trish is an amazing graphic artist, and put together a Faygo label that actually had Faygoluvers, the Tsuro dragons, a custom nutrition facts label, and more flavor on it! Ninjas kept coming by asking how they could get one, so I told them they had to come play and win it! Even Vinnie the ICP Kid commented on how fresh it was…it was for sure highly sought after!

I had also managed to snag an extra copy of Juggalos Against Sanity from the merch booth, so I put that up for grabs with a Faygoluvers Charm, and some hat pins!

After my 2 hours was up, I packed up my copy of Tsuro and stored everything in the car. My volunteer schedule for the day was done!  I got to go check out EVERYTHING that was available at DCG con!  I hit up the Fowlarama area (props to the Reno Rydaz!) and played a game or two, caught a little bit of the Juggalos Against Sanity tournaments that were happening throughout the day, watched some Juggalo Family Feud, and so much more!

Speaking of Juggalo Family Feud, let me just give some props to Kegan “The Creep Ass” Ault on his hosting duties.  As is always expected, there were some glitches and long waits during the game, and he handled it like a pro just improvising with the audience and contestants.  The ninja Kevin who was working everything behind the scenes seemed to be having a few technical difficulties with the game and its answers, but it didn’t take away from the fun of it.  On Friday, they had a super fresh video screen with all of the answers on the board showing up if they were on the board, or red X’s if the contestant guessed incorrectly.  It looked dope, but took a while between every single question.  Eventually they resorted to a white board with erasable markers and that helped pick up the pace!  I was asked to be on a team a few times, but I had helped answer the questions so I didn’t think it would be fair to participate.  Everyone involved seemed to have a great time though, and again props to Kegan for being the charismatic host that he is.

On a funny side note, Kegan has a LOUD voice, and it carried over into the Gibraltar Trade Center outside of the DCG Con.  He was being free with his language, repeating some of the contestants answers while throwing in comments of his own. So the “Fucks,” “shits,” and everything else were flying.  I guess it got a little too loud for people on the other side of the con, because Kegan was asked to tone it down a bit.  lol. He was conscious of that the rest of the time though, and used innuendos instead, which made it even funnier!

I know there were a lot of events going on throughout the entire weekend, but a ton of the ninjas there seemed to be focused on Into The Echoside.  Juggalos from all over were flexing their skills, building up their Gathering points, and battling some of the best players in the nation!  This was all in preparation for not only the fresh, super rare DCG Con jerseys, plaques, and Echoside foil cards, but also to battle the two creators of the game who are STILL undefeated: Jumpsteady and Louis Simpson!  Playing against the creators, and potentially defeating them is more gratifying than any physical trophy to the Echoside’s elite! So the tables around the Echoside tournament area were always occupied…whether there was a tournament happening or not.

As we began to get closer to the first after party, the crowds began to dwindle a bit.  I figured that with it being a work day today, Saturday would be boomin’!  Not only do a lot of ninjas have weekends off, but the huge double EP show would happen later that night!  But I’m jumping ahead a little bit.

I wasn’t able to head to the after party until way later, but did see that Cherry Bomb and her husband Matt started live steaming some of the acts performing!  I know that I saw MBK, B-Skan, and V-Sinizter puttin’ it down on stage from my phone while still over at DCG con!  After Trish and Kimmy had wrapped up their game library duties, we were able to head straight to the after party where ABK would be headlining!  We piled into her car at Gibraltar and took the short trek over to Diesel.

I have been to Diesel once before for a Twiztid after party, though I don’t remember what year it was.  Walking into it brought back memories though!  This place is dope!  Bowling alley, full arcade, and concert venue? Sign me up!  By the time we got there, DJ Clay was already nearly finished with his set.  So we unfortunately missed most of it.  That sucks, because I think he’s gonna make a huge impact with the Hatchet this year!  Between being heavily involved with Shaggy’s album, and hopefully getting a full-blown solo album from him, we’ll be seeing a lot of Clay!

The main room at Diesel started to fill in for ABK’s set, but it was still comfortable.  You were able to freely move around as you pleased, and there was a good-sized pit that was getting live for the majority of his set!  Killa looked like he was having a great time on stage, and luckily Cherry Bomb was able to capture some of that flavor from on stage with him!

The after party was just icing on the cake for an already phenomenal first day of the con!  It was after 2 AM, but it was only day one so nobody was ready to crash just yet.  There was a lot of partying and room hopping happening at the Concorde Inn.  Let me just give them a little bit of shine in this review.  This hotel and the entire staff were extremely accommodating, and had ZERO issues with Juggalos making it their home for the weekend.  The hallways reeked of weed, but the only comment I heard from one of the housekeepers was “Damn it smells good up here!”  Juggalos who got up early enough to take advantage of the free continental breakfast packed the banquet room, and there wasn’t so much as a single incident that I was aware of.  In fact, there was a wedding party / reception taking place there that weekend and THEY were far more obnoxious than any of my fellow Juggalos.

The rest of the night is a bit of a blur, but I can highlight some of the things I remember.  I know that Tom Wood stayed up and hung out with Juggalos throughout the night!  He seemed to be having a fantastic time room hopping and gaming with everyone.  I remember coming across a ninja with a cat on a leash chillin’ in the hallway who ended up being really cool.  A chick named Ricky who I’ve seen at multiple Gatherings also made it to the con and was hanging out at the hotel party.  She was in the hallway talking to the ninja with the cat and another Juggalo who was fucking W-A-S-T-E-D.  I have seen him at multiple shows and Gatherings, and he’s always super nice, but inebriated.  They butted heads a little bit, and I try to stay away from drama, so I started to head back to our room.  I think it was about 5 in the morning at that point, and I had to get some sleep since I had a full work schedule at the con the next day.  Ricky followed me in an attempt to get away from the ninjas I mentioned earlier.  So she came in our room where my homies Matt and Lisa were.  Holy shit…I’ve NEVER seen Matt and Lisa so drunk.  Do you have those friends who are (supposedly) completely straight dudes, but once they get a little alcohol in them “jokingly” act extremely….uhh…effeminate?  That was Matt…1000%.  He tried to crawl into my bed while Lisa encouraged it, all while holding a conversation with Ricky who was feeling unwelcome.  It was a giant clusterfuck, and went on for entirely too long.  By about 7:00 am, I’d had enough and left the room.  I went down another hallway until I heard them all leave the room and then went and crashed.  I got about 90 minutes sleep that night.  (Paybacks are a bitch!  lol)

SATURDAY, APRIL 22ND (DAY 2)

I set my alarm for about 9 AM the previous night, and it went off without a hitch.  Lucky me!  Anyways, I dragged my ass outta bed, got in contact with Trish and Kimmy who were already just about ready, and then it was off to Day 2 of DCG Con!

Despite my lack of sleep, I still felt good heading to Gibraltar.  Today was my big volunteer day where I kept an eye on the 30-foot inflatable obstacle course from 10 AM to 5 PM.  I brought my laptop with me figuring that things would go by pretty slowly.  I mean who knew how many people would be running through a bounce house obstacle course?   Guess how much I got done on the computer?  Not a damn thing!  From 10 AM on through the rest of my shift, there probably wasn’t a 10 minute lapse between a grip of people showing up to race through the course.  We’d be super busy at some points, and then have 1s and 2s come through at others.  The cool thing was how many Juggalos brought their kids with them!  I know that there were 2 sets of kiddos that basically camped out and raced each other through there tons of times!  They’d get cocky and ask to race me, so I’d partake (and let them win….of course!  Lol)  For being stuck in the same spot for so long, I had an awesome time doing it.  My partner on the other end of the course, Pajamas, was the shit too!  We always checked in on each other to make sure we didn’t need breaks, etc.

I did take on some other grown ninjas in the course too.  Hanka and I raced, and he got a good lead on me. I dove towards the end though and made it out first.

At some point during the morning while I was tending to my duties, the homies from the Juggalo Yacht Club stopped by.  These Juggalos, particularly Big Zane, have always been extremely awesome to me!  We’ve seen each other at Gatherings and other Juggalo events, but the past several months we’ve linked up via Facebook and the dude has treated me like family. We had great times at Juggalo Weekend in Florida too!  Well, he and his crew came up and surprised the shit outta me with a blue and gold Juggalo Yacht Club Jersey with my name on the back of it!  Super fresh, and wanted NOTHING in return!  I still feel indebted to Zane and the whole crew, but we’re already working together to make some things happen!  Much love to my JYC homies!  Pinkies up!

While all of this was goin’ down, I missed quite a few things on the timeline.  Luckily, there were some ninjas there that were hookin’ it up for everyone who couldn’t make it to the con.  The first thing that happened that I unfortunately missed was the DCG Seminar.  On the DCG Con panel, Jumpsteady, Louis Simpson, Nathan Ninja, Tall Jess, Tom Wood and Rachel Paul were all present and there to answer questions.  Our homies from Carnival Spirits luckily caught the whole seminar and now have it up on Youtube!  See that in its entirety below:

The obstacle course was stationed right by the Battletech Simulator, and while there was never an extremely long line, a grip of Juggalos and Juggalettes took advantage of it being there. It was ALWAYS occupied, and I saw several repeat players come through as well.  I unfortunately never had a chance to try it out, but there’s always next year!

The end of my shift was coming up, and I had an hour or so break between that and the final day of the Ultimate Tsuro Challenge that I was hosting.  I went to grab a bite to eat at the concession area that was inside of the con, swung by the Games library to grab the 2^nd copy of Tsuro, and headed over to the Green Gaming area to get setup.

Surprisingly enough, we had some ninjas already waiting over there to play!  We had some pretty dope prizes (as I stated before) including FLH Charms, a rare copy of Juggalos Against Sanity (which I luckily picked up before they sold out), some FLH Hat Pins, and the most talked about coveted prize of the weekend: A Faygo trophy with a custom Faygoluvers Tsuro label!  It was so sought after that the Morton’s List ninjas “stole” it as part of one of their missions!  I had people try to buy it off me to which I responded that they should just enter the tournament and they might get lucky!

Today was where everything mattered.  It would be a winner-take-all style tournament with multiple games being played.  We had 3 games going, and something like 15 people playing.  So what we’d do is take the top two from each game and put them against each other in a final battle of the best. Whoever won that game would win it all!  There were some that showed up today that didn’t get the practice rounds yesterday, and then we had some competitors who were feeling pretty confident after their multiple wins the day before.  I was surprised to see my old homie Nathan Extra show up!  He even brought his own copy of Tsuro so more people could participate!  Much props to him for helping me keep the ball rolling on the games that were underway!  My homie Scruffy was there, along with Lisa Tillman, DCFaygoGuy and his girl Megz, Notslim1 who was bouncing back and forth between this and the Into The Echoside tournament, and a handful of others.  The games went by quickly, and soon it was down to a single board.  Ultimately, Lisa Tillman, who joined the tournament today not knowing anything about the game, came out victorious!

Lisa graciously gave the Faygoluvers Tsuro Challenge banner to the runner up, and our tournament was a wrap!  My time allotted for the tournament was 2 hours, and the entire thing wrapped up in just over an hour.  So Nathan and I went head to head on some Tsuro!  I think we played two games, and I won them both.  Sorry n shit!  It was still great to catch up with Nathan though, and I’d consider our Tsuro challenge a success!

After cleaning up my area and returning the borrowed games, it was a little past 8 PM so I still had some time to wander the con!   I didn’t mention yet that the Psychopathic Records artists were all signing and taking pictures with Juggalos at the con at the same time my Tsuro challenge was going on.  Can you guess who had more of a crowd?  The autograph line snaked through the DCG Con as far as I could see!  I know it was getting close to time for the after party, but as far as I know, all of the artists involved with the signing stayed until everyone got their stuff signed!  Dope!

As I made my way through more of the con, I passed by the Jenga Bomb tournament that Scruffy was helping host, and that looked like everyone was having a great time!  I still don’t quite grasp the concept, but it’s basically playing Jenga and throwing shit at each other’s stacks to try to knock them over.  Lol.  I know that I also stopped by the Juggalos Against Sanity tournament area that Mankini and Cupcake were in charge of a few different times.  On more than one occasion, I had someone stop me and tell me that they got to use the “Scottie D” card and it won them some points!  I mean when you get something like this, it’s hard not to use it:

By this time, my homie and FLH photographer Cherry Bomb and her husband Matt were already over at the Diesel Concert Lounge at the after party.  How did I know? Because my phone kept dinging to let me know that Faygoluvers was LIVE during sets from Alla Xul Elu and Lyte among others!  My ass was staying put at the DCG con for the time being though.  Since I was rolling with Trish, and she and Kimmy were manning the Games Library table for like 37 hours a day, I waited until around midnight when their shift ended so we could all roll out together.

While we were sittin’ back kickin’ it, I heard some Juggalos speaking on the N Séance that Morton’s List was conducting. I didn’t see it go down, but one Juggalo said that they were creeped the fuck out by what went down there. Maybe it should remain a secret to those who attended…

It was midnight, and that meant it was time to pack it up and head to the after party!  We all jammed into Trish’s Nissan and made the short drive to the Diesel.  After waiting in line next to the bowling alley inside for a good 20-30 minutes, we were finally in!  To say that the venue area was jam-fucking-packed would be a MASSIVE understatement.  There’s a little area outside of the main venue where artists setup with their merch, and people could order from the bar.  But as soon as you went inside, things got super cozy!  Don’t forget though: Juggalos were here to see a HISTORIC performance of both Beverly Kills 50187 and the Terror Wheel!

By the time we got there, Big Hoodoo’s set was already in progress, but don’t think that he didn’t school the shit out of it!  Where there was room, Juggalos moshed, danced, and were vibing with Hoodoo.  His stage presence has only gotten better with time!

Between acts, I went back into the cramped lounge area and ran into a TON of people there.  Rude Boy was kickin’ it, as was ABK, the whole A.X.E. crew, the Yacht club (I was still sportin’ my JYC jersey like what!) and the homie B-Skan aka Headshot Louie.  He had a set the night before but still set up his merch area to slang T-shirts and CDs.  B-Skan is a dope ass rapper, and as cool and humble as they come.  We kicked it for a few minutes, he hooked me up with his label’s latest albums to check out, and it was off to mingle some more!  For real though, check him and the whole Black Flag Music crew out at BFMSTL.com!

Soon, it was time for the Insane Clown Posse to hit the stage to give Juggalos what they were looking for: the double EP show for BK50187 and Terror Wheel!  The opening sounds of the bottles clanking together played over the PA, and the track “Beverly Kills” followed!  For the next hour, we witnessed a Faygo-less set by the Wicked Clowns as they performed every track from both EPs…except “Out” from Terror Wheel for some reason.  I don’t have any explanation for that one, but it definitely caught ninjas off guard when “The Smog” rolled into “I Stuck Her With My Wang”.  Either way though, it was still a crazy dope performance, and something we may never see again!

After J and Shaggy finished with the EPs, we got treated to even more tracks!  They went into their “Beautiful (Indestructible)” cover, and then did “Little Yellow Bus”, and “Shiny Diamonds.”  Finally, everyone in attendance was treated to some unexpected flavor when the entire Psychopathic Records roster came out to perform their “If We Were A Gang” Psypher!  I got some good footage of that which you can see here:

One of the coolest parts of the night is that after the Psypher was finished, every single artist on Psychopathic stayed on stage and for the next several minutes went down the sea of Juggalos slappin’ hands, giving daps, hugging ninjas, etc just to show their love and appreciation.  It was a fantastic way to end the night!

Ninjas started to pile out of the Diesel and head back to their homes or hotels.  I know that my crew was set on using the Vanderbilt Room at the Concorde Inn hotel to game into the night.  A few of us had found out about another after party, and we decided to hit that up to see what was poppin’ off there.  So Trish, our homie Joanna, and myself made the trek out there while everyone else found something else to get into.

We kicked it at the after party for HOURS.  It was super laid back, but lasted up until the point where we had to get back to the hotel to get ready for the next day.  So, at about 9:00 AM (!!!!) we hopped in the car, drove an hour or so back, dropped Joanna off so she could sleep, dipped into the Concorde real quick to change, and we were back to the Gibraltar Trade Center with absolutely ZERO sleep.  Remember, I was already on like 90 minutes of sleep from the night before.  I literally survived on caffeine pills, 5 Hour Energy, and adrenaline.  Hahaha

SUNDAY, APRIL 23rd (DAY 3)

It was the last day of DCG con, and for having basically no sleep for the past two days, I felt surprisingly good!  Maybe it was all the positivity that I was surrounded by!  Either way, it was a short day and included all of the Master’s Tournaments that the best of the best would be competing in!

Since my duties for the weekend had already been fulfilled, I decided to roam and kick it with everyone for the entire day.  I stopped by to check on Toots and Ape Boy’s Scrubtastic Munchkin Madness Tournament where they had some ridiculously fresh custom made prizes! I’m not sure who won, but consider yourself lucky to go home with that!

I took some time to play in the last day of the Fowlarama Tournament!  Team Faygoluvers got past the first round, and unfortunately was eliminated in round two.  Throwing footballs at stationary bowling pins from several feet away is harder than it sounds!  Props again to the Reno Rydaz for setting that all up and having some trophies and medals to present to the winners!  After that crushing defeat, I then went to check out the Juggalo Family Feud again.  I swear that every time I went in to check that game out, Team Faygoluvers was there representin’!  FLH was so deep at the con that they eventually created another team appropriately named Also Faygoluvers.  That shit had me rollin’!

I went to check on Vinnie at the Texas Hold ‘Em area at some point in the day, and things were already wrapped up and a winner was crowned.  Vinnie was over in that spot for the entire weekend!  He’s a bit of a perfectionist, so he was stressing a bit making sure that everything went over well, and that ninjas in attendance had a great time.  He was supposed to have a partner the whole weekend, but they no-showed, so he rocked it solo the whole time!  Much props to him for schoolin’ it!

Since I had no itinerary for the day, I decided to venture out into the rest of the 600,000 sq ft Gibraltar Trade Center.  Anything you can think of buying is probably there!  I went through several aisles just browsing and came up to a cinnamon/sugar mini donut stand with a line about a half dozen people deep.  It was for good reason too!  I bought the big bag and brought it back inside to share with everyone sitting by the Games Library for the remainder of the con.  Kudos to those mini donuts!

The last piece of the events scheduled at DCG con that I want to cover is the Into The Echoside Head’s Up Tournament.  Talk about INTENSE!  These Juggalos were racking up karma and Gathering points to hopefully become the triumphant winners and get to play the UNDEFEATED team of Louis Simpson and Jumpsteady in the Master’s Tournament!  I don’t know who all got knocked out and who exactly went to the finals, but I do know that Louis and Jumpsteady remain undefeated in team play.  I mean they ARE the creators of the game, but at some point, the student has to defeat the master….RIGHT?!

It was starting to get late into the afternoon, and the crowds were dying down as people had to catch flights home or start their journey back home to be at work on Monday.  As soon as 6 PM hit, we got the word from Jumpsteady to start packing away the games, tables, and anything else that wasn’t attached to the convention area at the Gibraltar.  The Games Library itself had HUNDREDS of games!  There were several giant plastic bins that they belonged in, so we had an assembly line of ninjas putting each game in a baggy, and stacking them Tetris style into the bins.  That was a lot of work itself!  Then, we packed up dozens of tables, peeled some of the vinyl stickers from the floor, put away the giant-sized checker and chess games (man what a pain in the ass that was!), and made walked around the con one last time to make sure we weren’t forgetting anything.

You know that feeling of sadness that you get when you’re rolling away from the last day of the Gathering?  Yeah, it felt like that.  There was SO much to do for three straight days, all surrounded by the Juggalo family, that you just didn’t want it to end!  I seldom saw anyone walking around without a smile on their face!

I found Vinnie one more time, gave that ninja a hug and a dap and wished him well as he left to get back to his family for what was left of the weekend.  Jumpsteady was next, and as physically drained as I knew he had to be, he was fuckin’ BEAMING after the success of DCG Con!  He personally thanked me for the volunteer time and the printing contributions, and I thanked him for an unforgettable weekend.  And just like that, DCG con was officially over.

A bunch of us decided to meet for dinner since there were no after party plans for the evening.  We walked into the nearly bare parking lot and noticed something didn’t look right about Trish’s car.  As we got closer, it was apparently that somebody had backed into her rear bumper on the driver’s side and left a dent the size of a fucking basketball.  She commented that it was “just my luck.”  Yeah, super stale way to end an otherwise awesome weekend!  Well luckily, most cars are basically made from plastic these days. So I got underneath it, found a way to reach the area of the bumper that was dented, and then I started punching the shit out of it.  lol.  It took some “convincing”, but eventually it popped back out to look ALMOST as good as new!  I busted a few knuckles doing it, but was definitely glad that I could fix it!

So now, it was off to YELP to find some good food in the area! We ultimately decided to see how Detroit did Mexican food.  I found a place called El Charro in Macomb which we all agreed on and met up there.  There were about a dozen of us in the restaurant, and we were all starving after eating basically concession stand food all weekend. If I never have another slice of pizza, it’d be too soon.  So yeah, we pigged out, talked about our experiences over the weekend, and then headed outside to start thinking about getting back to reality.

We all said our goodbyes, and then it was time to get back to the hotel for some sleep….FINALLY!

Or so I thought.  As I was getting ready for bed at around 9 PM (yeah, it’s early, so what!), I hit up DJ Clay via text.  He told me he wanted to meet up the next day so I just wanted to make sure he was still down.  His response:

I of course told him that nothing was happening at the moment, but I died a little inside.  LOL!  I knew this would be the only chance to meet up, so I got dressed, asked Trish (who was already passed out in her room) to borrow her car, grabbed ZZ, and we took off toward’s Clay’s house!  It was a little more than a 30 minute drive, but I felt every bit of it.  I even stopped to get my one and only Faygo for the weekend and some snacks just to wake my ass up!

When we got there, we chopped it up with Clay for a bit about some things he’s been working on, and then we decided to take a ride in his Caddy!  At around 11 PM on a Sunday night, me and ZZ got a tour of Delray from DJ Clay.  We ran into some street races on Jefferson, so we stopped to watch them for a bit before they got lit up by the red and blue.  We didn’t stick around to see what was gonna happen, so we shot through some back alleys as the cops stayed on the main roads while the racers scattered.  Talk about an unexpected eventful night!  Soon after, we were back at his crib and I had to call it a night.  I asked ZZ to drive because if I did, I wouldn’t be conscious, and it would have meant certain death…

At about 1 AM, I FINALLY got the sleep I had been longing for.  I crashed for a good 7 or 8 hours, and then had to wake up to pack and get all of our bags loaded up for check out.  We didn’t have to be out of Detroit until like 5 PM, so luckily, Hanka and Hashly had room for us and all of our shit in their SUV!  We decided to do lunch with the crew one last time.  We found an AWESOME diner that served breakfast all day…and it wasn’t IHOP.  This little mom and pop restaurant called Emerson’s On The Grill served up a bomb ass omelet! After everyone finished eating, it was time for our Philly friends to start making their way back home.  We gave Trish, Paige, Kimmy, and Dylan our final hugs and daps, and then they were off.

Luckily, we still had a few hours to kill, so we visited the Heidelberg Project, along with the giant Fist monument in downtown Detroit.  We were also given the location of a piece of graffiti that Shaggy 2 Dope himself tagged up several years ago.  So we went there, snapped a few pics, and then made our way to the airport.

There’s not much left to say about DCG Con except that if it DOES happen again, YOU SHOULD BE THERE!  From what I understand, the 2^nd Annual DCG Con is a GO, and it’ll probably happen at the same spot.  So make sure you set some cash and vacation time aside for that!

Before I wrap everything up, I just want to give some props to some people who made this devastatingly fresh weekend even better!  First off, much love to Jumpsteady for seeing this idea that started several months ago through!  Props to both he and Rachel Paul for spending COUNTLESS hours on planning for the DCG Con, and implementing it like pros!  I’m telling you, Rachel worked her ass off so much that she had to take a break right in the middle of the day in the Morton’s Lounge

Props to the back office ninjas at Psychopathic Records for helping pull all of this together too!  From Dean, to MattE, to Mr. X, you guys rocked it!

ABK, Lyte, Str8Jaket, ICP, DJ Clay, Hoodoo – The after parties were off the chain!  Thanks for adding that extra bonus flavor to an already outstanding event!

Much love to Trish for being our chauffeur around Detroit for the weekend, and for being an all around badass! Much of the signage, cutouts, stand-ups, and even the badges you wore around your neck were thanks to her!

Paige, you’re hilarious and a trip to hang out with!   Can’t wait for the next time…and fuck White Castle!

Vinnie, what can I say my friend?  You are like OG Day 1 Juggalo, and I’m proud to call you a friend. You school it harder than most!

Cherry Bomb – You worked your ass off the entire time taking incredible photos! I know that’s where you feel at home, but just know it’s appreciated by me and everyone else you snapped!  Much love to the hubby Matt too for running some of our live streams!

Hashly and Hanka…you guys are the shit! Thanks for being there for us, hauling us around Detroit, and for being a part of Team FLH!

The SCRUBS – Everyone from Krissy, Rocko, Krista, Toots, Joey…fuckin ALL of you!  Love you guys!

Lisa and Matt Tillman – I may not ever want to room with you drunk bastards again, but you’re still alright by me! lol

Speaking of Faygoluvers…everyone who was there reppin’ us from Scruffy, Rachelette, Sewerside, CellE (Thanks for “saving” me homie! Lol), Maryonette, Kreeper, DemonicSwagger, dribblybob, and anyone else I may have forgotten!  Thank you for holdin’ it down for us!

Nathan Extra – it was great to see you once again, and I appreciate your help with the Tsuro tournament!  Always a pleasure homie!

ZZ – You’ve become my road dog…only by plane.  Lol. Looking forward to the next Juggalo adventure we embark on!

Big Zane and the Juggalo Yacht Club – I can’t thank you enough for bringing me into the fold!  I’m grateful to call you all friends!

Morton’s List crew, the entire crew from Dark Carnival Games, DCFaygoGuy, DJ Shimmy D, Kegan, Joanna, Mankini, Ozzy, Hazin, Cupcake, Notslim1, KingOfStatusB, DJ Clay, Rudy, Natalie, Str8Jaket, Lyte, Tom Wood, Joe, and anyone else that I missed…thank you for making this such a spectacular weekend!  There’s been a lot of “Juggling” this year, but this event was an absolute highlight for me!

More Info:

• DCGCon.com
• Cherry Bomb’s gallery
• Rachelette’s gallery
• Hazin’s gallery
• DCFaygoGuy’s Youtube Channel

PS: I didn’t want to put this in the actual review, so I saved it for the end.  TWO things were stolen from DCG Con: A stage prop tricycle that ICP used on the Mighty Death Pop tour, and the bell by the wrestling ring.

 

If you know its whereabouts, please hit me up at [email protected] so we can get it back to Psychopathic Records.

Location:

• Gibraltar Trade Center
• Michigan
• United States

Guests:

• ICP, Big Hoodoo, Anybody Killa, Lyte, DJ Clay, Mad V, MBK, B-Skan, Alla Xul Elu, more!

Record Label:

• Psychopathic Records

Websites:

• DCGCon.com

Reviewer:

• Scottie D

Review Date:

• 04/21/2017 - 04/23/2017