Woodstock '99 and the Gathering of the Juggalos
So I finally got around to watching Trainwreck; Woodstock ’99. I am obsessed with train wrecks, particularly of the pop culture variety and Woodstock ’99 holds a special place in my heart because in his 600 page memoir Behind the Paint Violent J writes that the ill-fated festival was the inspiration for the Gathering of the Juggalos.
Insane Clown Posse performed at Woodstock ’99 and, being part of the most disastrous festival this side of Altamont and the Fyre Festival, figured that they could do better.
Woodstock ’99 set the bar so low for multi-day festivals that even a pair of clowns like Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope could leap defiantly over it.
Insane Clown Posse’s music made it into Trainwreck but not the duo itself. I find that perplexing, given Insane Clown Posse’s notoriety and the way they have historically been synonymous with white incoherent white male rage, Woodstock ’99's unfortunate engine and demise.
It’s possible that Insane Clown Posse’s presence at Woodstock ’99 wasn’t noteworthy enough to make it into a three part docuseries. It’s also possible that the narrative around Insane Clown Posse has shifted so dramatically in the last decade, in part because of my book You Don’t Know Me But You Don’t Like Me, that portraying ICP and its fan in a negative, stereotypical light might come across as classist and cruel.
I was fascinated by the documentary in part because it reminded me so much of my first few trips to the Gathering of the Juggalos, back when it was held in the aptly named Cave-In-Rock, Illinois.
As with Woodstock ’99, there was a distinct sense that outside laws and rules did not apply at the Gathering of the Juggalos, particularly those involving nudity and drug use.
Also like Woodstock ’99, there were festival goers who went because they got into the spirit of the event and wanted to celebrate freedom and community. But there were also people who went because they wanted to get fucked up and fuck shit up in a Wild West realm with little in the way of consequences, legal or otherwise.
My first few years at the Gathering of the Juggalos were wild and chaotic and filled with drugs and debauchery. These were the years of the Drug Bridge, after all, and if the central presence of an infamous bridge where festival goers can procure any drug they might possibly desire says anything, it’s that bad, illegal behavior was not only permitted at the Gathering, it was implicitly encouraged.
Then something weird, unexpected but exceedingly welcome happened; this wild playground for overgrown man-children grew the fuck up, as did Insane Clown Posse.
The festival moved beyond facile shock and juvenile transgression and became a nice place for families and friends to gather yearly to celebrate their community and the freedom that comes with being a proud outsider with zero interest in fitting in.
It helped that at the heart of Insane Clown Posse and the Gathering of the Juggalos lie not crazed nihilism but rather the mythology of the Dark Carnival, which implores acolytes to be good people and follow the golden rule and try to make the world a kinder, fresher place.
That was fatally lacking in Woodstock ’99. It was supposed to be about peace, love and music. Instead Woodstock ’99 was as nihilistic and destructive as Insane Clown Posse were supposed to be in the darkest, most paranoid recesses of the public imagination.
The catalyst behind Woodstock ’99 wasn’t an honorable desire to pay tribute to an iconic moment in the counterculture; it was pure greed untethered to anything resembling a coherent philosophy.
The rioters of Woodstock ’99 didn’t want to send the world a hopeful, optimistic message; they wanted to burn that fucker down for the sake of it. Woodstock ‘99 poignantly and pathetically attempted to impart an unmistakable moral message by staging a candlelight vigil for Gun Control.
Gun control is, of course, an important and relevant issue. It’s not video or music piracy or bullshit like that. But ostensibly making Woodstock ’99 all about gun control felt random, cynical and pandering.
Woodstock ’99 wasn’t about shit but greed and rage. So it’s not surprising that the raucous revelers responded to the organizers’ flimsy attempt at conveying a social message with rage and violence.
It didn’t help that rumors ran wild throughout the entire festival that a big-name act would perform after the final listed act, Red Hot Chili Peppers. Sha Na Na was actually scheduled to perform after the Chili Peppers but Bowser saw how chaotic things had gotten and told his bandmates, “This is a bad scene. Let’s dip, dip, dip, dip, dip, dip, dip out.”
Woodstock ’99 never had the chance to grow up or evolve. It was such a nightmare that it fundamentally killed Woodstock as a brand, as evidenced by the absence of a fiftieth anniversary concert.
The Gathering of the Juggalos, in its current incarnation, ironically embodies the ostensible spirit and values of the original Woodstock more than the 99 concert that retained its name and little else, beyond poor planning.
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