PHOTOGRAPHS

BY DANIEL CRONIN

WITH A FOREWORD BY CAMILLE DODERO

PRESTEL

MUNICH • LONDON • NEW YORK

PHOTOGRAPHS

BY DANIEL CRONIN

4

Knox covered over 2,000 miles to reach the middle of nowhere.

This really is the Middle of Nowhere, USA: HogRock Camp-

grounds, 115 privately owned acres in the rural village

of Cave-In-Rock, Illinois. Buried deep in a Midwestern national

forest, encircled by rolling farmlands and the Ohio River,

the local population is 318. Reliable Internet access requires

an hour’s drive. The nearest liquor store is 14 miles away.

It took Knox, a boyishly handsome young man with lean

musculature and an impish smirk, about a month to get here.

Not long ago, the Oklahoma native met a girl from the Pacifi c

Northwest whose brother was a medical cannabis grower and

followed her up there to cultivate marijuana professionally.

“Fourth of July, she robs me,” he says now. “Cash, my tattoo

equipment—she took me for everything.” The words come out

in a froggy rasp. “I was like, ‘Fuck it, I better start walking now.’”

On July 8, 2012, the 24-year-old left Portland, Oregon

with a bag, a map, and this destination. Following interstate

highways across the Western American states, he traipsed

along roadsides for seemingly countless hours each day,

passing the Rocky Mountains, detouring by the Grand Canyon,

and sleeping “under the stars” every night. In Kansas, Knox got

caught in a bad storm, “some tornado-status shit.” It’s Sunday,

August 12; he fi nally arrived here earlier this week.

Under nearly all other circumstances, this tale would sound

blusteringly tall. Yet one look at this kid makes his pilgrimage

not only feasible, but very likely. Knox’s once-white running

sneakers are tinged grey, the blanched color of concrete, with

sallow tongues and rubber soles that fl ap like banana peels.

Small cuts, scrapes, and red welts mark his lower left arm.

His fi ngernails are dirty crescents, his fi sts are constellations

of bruises. Knox is also toting around a nearly drained liter

of Kentucky Straight Bourbon Whisky, fi tting self-medication

for someone who just walked halfway across America to

a family reunion.

Knox’s real name, as it turns out, is Cody Perez. That’s how he

identifi ed himself to this book’s photographer Daniel Cronin in

2011, when Dan shot the shirtless portrait of him that appears

on page 95. When Dan met Perez in this very same place, the

young man was meatier. He still owned a belt. Like now, his

skin was an inky archive of crude tattoo experiments: the

phrase CLOWN LOVE on his upper-right shoulder, the demonic

ram’s head above his navel, the miniature Betty Boop sketch

above his left hip. But when I met Perez in 2012, these drawings

had multiplied, joined by CODY on his right knuckles, KNOX on

his left, and the tiny letters ICP under his right eye. And now he

was homeless.

Knox is one of about 10,000 like-minded souls who’d migrated

to the 13th annual Gathering of the Juggalos. Strictly speaking,

the Gathering is a live music festival for hardcore fans of

the widely mocked cartoon-rap duo Insane Clown Posse.

For fi ve summer days, HogRock Campgrounds becomes an

aggressively independent music festival of rap and metal

performers (past highlights include Ice Cube, Busta Rhymes,

Lil Jon, and Drowning Pool), celebrity hosts (Charlie Sheen

appeared in 2011), after-hours comedy sets (Gallagher

smashed watermelons during an early-morning lightning storm

in 2010), and theatrically brutal wrestling matches. But the

Gathering’s secondary activities, both offi cial and unoffi cial,

are just as ridiculously compelling: nude oil grappling,

open-air drug bartering, tentside tattooing, nitrous balloon

sucking, dance party barbecuing, and swimming in the murky

scum pond on page 30, amusingly known as Lake Hepatitis.

Cosmically speaking, the Gathering is a remote Dionysian

homecoming for social, economic, and cultural outcasts,

5

FOREWORDCAMILLE DODERO

6

a publicly detested demographic organizers have described

as the “most misunderstood people of all time.” Juggalos tend

to be dropouts, orphans, survivors—the lowest members

of America’s silent caste system. They are people like Knox,

who says he was stabbed for being a Juggalo and lifts his

shirt to show scars marking the 270 permanent stitches in his

diaphragm, where he’d been shanked after a fi ght. They are

people like 19-year-old Kelsie Ray, the freckled girl in glasses

and a sports bra Knox has been wandering around with today.

She is a self-described “gypsy” who talks about her parents

moving her around so much as a child (fi fteen different schools

by the sixth grade, thirty-fi ve total by the time of her high school

graduation), she’d been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress

disorder at the age of 13. People like them come here, fi nd

each other, and ascribe a near-religious transcendence

to this communion.

The two clown-men pictured on page 4 are ultimately

responsible for all of this. The taller one in the red jersey goes

by Violent J. The slippered gentleman cupping his genitals is

Shaggy 2 Dope. Together, they comprise Insane Clown Posse,

the American horrorcore duo who have built a multi-platinum

career spanning more than two decades with no radio play,

no mainstream support, and no critical adoration. (USA Today

handed them “Worst Album of the Year” not once, but twice.

NME called the band’s 2012 release, The Mighty Death Pop!,

“a uniquely awful affront to good taste” and gave it one star.)

They market themselves as “the Most Hated Band in the World”,

and that very well might be true.

In real life, they are Joseph Bruce and Joey Utsler, two

self-described “scrubs” who grew up dirt poor in inner-

city Detroit, Michigan. Abused by relatives, neglected by

institutions, and left to fend for themselves against the

injuries of class, the lifelong friends followed their seemingly

impossible dreams of becoming rap music stars by assuming

the fi ctional personas of serial killer clowns. Their weapon of

choice was a hatchet, which became the basis of their record

label’s omnipresent hatchetman logo, a kind of Juggalo family

crest. They channeled their homicidal impulses into lyrical

fantasies about murdering racists, pedophiles, wife-batterers,

and bullies. “The Juggla,” an early ICP track from 1992 that

birthed the term “Juggalo,” gives a fairly accurate read on the

narrative point of view: “I’m that nerd in the back of the class /

That went psycho and killed your ass / I slash and cut and hack /

With a ‘Kick Me’ sign on my back.”

In representing this perspective, Insane Clown Posse aligned

themselves with a previously ignored group of people, a

margin of the population who’d never before been embraced

by American society at large: The teenage son whose alcoholic

father routinely beat his mom. The homeless high school

student. The child predator victim fi lled with vengeful rage.

The Southern white kid trapped among rednecks that identifi ed

with hip-hop more than freedom rock. The mother of three with

a restraining order against an ex, working at a fast food joint.

The class pariah about to snap.

This is all very serious stuff. But since the message comes from

the mouths of white rappers in clown makeup, there’s comic

escapism and humor therapy at play. This jovial softening is

evident during an Insane Clown Posse live performance. First

of all, Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope always spray soda pop

throughout the show, drenching their audience in a storm

of Faygo, a Midwestern cola brand that’s become a Juggalo’s

symbolic nectar. Second, a cavorting troupe of evil clowns joins

the pair onstage intermittently, like Broadway backup dancers.

Third, while singing about chopping off heads, Insane Clown

Posse also talk happily about butts, nuts, and sluts. It is all

very spectacularly absurd.

7

The Gathering is meant to be an underground catharsis.

Sometimes, this release has come through chaos. In 2000,

the inaugural festival took place in Novi, Michigan, at an

indoor convention center. About 300 fans rushed the stage

during ICP’s set, parking lot fi res burned, and pandemonium

collapsed a full-scale wrestling ring. The next year, after being

forced to relocate, the Gathering moved South to Toledo, Ohio,

where a mini melee broke out, the venue got trashed, riot cops

showed up with billy clubs, and someone punched a police

horse. Banned again, the Gathering set up in Peoria, Illinois,

where local law enforcement interfered with a young woman

publicly fl ashing her breasts, the booing crowd threw things,

and the cops responded with teargas. And that was just the

fi rst three years.

In 2007, the Gathering found its way to HogRock Campgrounds,

an ideal setting for self-contained rampage. Here, local

laws require no permits. Since the land is private property,

police can’t enter legally without probable cause or explicit

invitation, which fosters a kind of Wild West self-regulation.

For example, at the 2012 Gathering, a suspected thief from

Covington, Kentucky was allegedly caught stealing from his

fellow campers. They chased the individual away, while an

angry Juggalo mob exacted revenge on the car he’d left behind

(see page 40). Over the course of an afternoon, a rotating

cast of clown avengers painstakingly dismantled the vehicle,

pounded its chassis into a fl at metal hunk, and later paraded

the demolished heap around, a veritable head on a stick. That

weekend, Juggalos carrying auto part trophies, spoils from an

enemy discovered among them, became a common sight.

Funded and executed entirely by Insane Clown Posse’s

homespun label, Psychopathic Records, the Gathering has no

corporate involvement, no advertisements, no sponsorships,

and no mainstream infl uence. For a string of blissfully anarchic

summer days, HogRock mutates into an amusement park

shantytown refuge, a temporary sanctuary for underground

loyalists to be entirely free from the nagging constraints of

bills, laws, clothes, sobriety, marketing, judgment. Within this

unregulated freedom, there’s celebration, but there’s also

serenity. Dan’s gorgeously prodding Juggalo portraits, mostly

shot during the day, tend to capture these quieter moments—

the dirt, the exhaustion, the peace, the intimate interludes

between all the endemic physical and emotional extremes.

People, for once, at home.

Of course, there are naked people too.

When I met Knox, he was brandishing a rusty catalytic

converter from the destroyed car. He was hoping to sell it

outside the gates—he had to get money somehow. “I don’t

really have no real family,” he told me, his voice stripped hoarse

from days of dust and drinking. “All I have is Juggalo family.”

Then Knox added indignantly, “That’s all I want anyway.”

INTRODUCTION DANIEL CRONIN

It all started in a parking lot outside of a convention center in Portland, Oregon,

where Insane Clown Posse were performing. During the summer of 2010, I headed

there with my camera to see what it was all about and shot twenty portraits of

Juggalos. One of them, named Dave, mentioned that I should go to the Gathering

and take photographs there. I followed his advice and, fi ve months later, found

myself driving down gravel roads in southern Illinois.

The sense of community at the Gathering is overwhelming. It’s really easy to get

swept up in the energy of so many people who are excited to be in the same place

together. At some point, it really isn’t about the music anymore; it is about the

culture and camaraderie. People come here just for the sake of the atmosphere,

which is what sets it apart from other music festivals in the United States.

With three Gatherings under my belt, I have developed the utmost respect for

Juggalos. I see them as fans that have supported, added to, and nurtured this

DIY culture created by Insane Clown Posse. Unapologetic and fi ercely loyal to

each other, they will welcome you with open arms—as long as you’re not around

to judge or poke fun.

Every year, at some point during the festival while I’m setting up a shot, I hear

someone yell out, “Hey! Camera man!” It’s like clockwork. At the 2012 Gathering

I looked up from under my dark cloth to fi nd Dave walking toward me, all smiles.

He shouted, “I’m glad you made it back out for another year!”

9

11

UNVERKÄUFLICHE LESEPROBE

Daniel Cronin

The Gathering of the Juggalos

Gebundenes Buch, Pappband mit Schutzumschlag, 104 Seiten, 24x2850 farbige AbbildungenISBN: 978-3-7913-4752-3

Prestel

Erscheinungstermin: Februar 2013

Schwarzer Karneval – Innenansichten einer amerikanischen Subkultur Wer oder was ist ein „Juggalo“? An dieser 1-Mio.-Euro-Frage würden sicher die meistenTeilnehmer einer Fernsehquizshow scheitern. The Gathering of the Juggalos, ein neuer Titel imThemenbereich populärer Kultur, sorgt für Aufklärung. Juggalos nennen sich die Fans einer inden USA weit über die Grenzen des Musikgeschäfts hinaus bekannten Rap-Rock-Band namensInsane Clown Posse. Ihr Markenzeichen sind schwarz-weiß geschminkte Clownsgesichterund eine fast religiös anmutende Verehrung für ihre musikalischen Helden. Die Juggalossind eine eingeschworene Gruppe, die sich nach außen abschottet und ein ausgeprägtesGemeinschaftsleben pflegt. Einmal im Jahr treffen sich die Mitglieder beim sogenannten„Gathering“ (Versammlung), um ihrer Band zu huldigen. Der Fotograf Daniel Cronin hat als einerder ganz wenigen Außenstehenden Zugang zu dieser Veranstaltung gefunden. Das Ergebnissind einmalige Bilder von großer Eindringlichkeit und faszinierender Offenheit.