Sign in or 
Share this
Great Milenko
The Great Milenko - 1997
With few options, ICP was trapped. They didn't want to produce more of their Joker's Cards albums on Jive, since Jive had shown them the flaw of industry politics. They were building their own Psychopathic Records, and they felt they could secure their own distribution the way they wanted it. But being on contract prevented them from doing this.
Hollywood Records had caught wind of ICP's accomplishments, and found out about it's disputes with Jive. Hollywood offered to buy Jive's contract out giving ICP the option to finally be free of Jive, but ICP was reluctant when they found out that Hollywood Records was owned by the Disney Corporation. Hollywood executives assured the group that Disney owned many media outlets, and that each one was distinct from the whole (such as Miramax films, which puts out, among other things, horror and gangster films). Confident in the new partnership, ICP treaded forward, willing to give this new contract a shot over their current situation.
There they produced the 4th Joker's Card album, "The Great Milenko". The Great Milenko was not only a fitting chapter 4, but compositionally it was excellent. Some Juggalo fans to this day attest that The Great Milenko is their best work ever (although I beg to differ). A cult hit in every sense of the word, ICP even produced music videos for this new album, for the songs "Hokus Pokus", "How Many Times?" and "Halls of Illusions". All of which were shot down by major video stations, such as MTV, sticking true to the lack of support by mainstream media for the clowns. Special guests include Alice Cooper, Steve Jones of the Sex Pistols and Slash, illustrating the darker nature ICP's music to those unfamiliar with them.
The Great Milenko plays the part of a magician sideshow within the Dark Carnival, and he tricks his viewers into the acts of malice and greed - a necromancer of sorts, acting not on dead bodies but dead minds and hearts. Tracks such as "Halls of Illusions" illustrate beautifully the need to resist the temptation to do wrong at the expense of others, as in the song victims are taken through an illusionary exhibit of all the great things that might've happened had they never gone about their wicked ways, before being dragged down to Hell. Other tracks such as "Hokus Pokus", "House of Horrors", "Southwest Voodoo", and "Boogie Woogie Wu" are standard clown fare, still evolving lyrically and musically, with catchy beats. Two songs stick out as being frontpieces for their existing fans, the Juggalos, "What is a Juggalo?" and "Down with the Clown", both promoting pride in supporting the band. "How Many Times?" is a more serious song, showing diversity of the group, and willingness to take the Joker's Cards into more serious social issues. A line from the song, for instance, attacks the failures of public schools (one of many diverse points the album touches on)...
"How many times did I walk in and just sit? And have to listen, and learn all this bullshit? Learning history and science, fucking wait. Knowing that, will that put food on my plate? Can I walk into McDonald's, up to the counter, and tell them you can make limestone from gunpowder? Will they give me a cheeseburger if I know that shit? Fuck no, fuck you and shut your fucking lips." Another noteworthy track, Hellalujah, mocks televangelism. The song, spoken from the part of the phoney preacher, flaunts the extravegances and abuses of televangelists, and the song ends with the corrupt preacher taunting the viewers... "You still buy everything I sell, and I'm living well... see you in Hell." Perhaps the most important track on the album though is the one that seems almost out of place. The final track, "Pass Me By", plays the part of foreshadowing the direction of the Joker's Card saga, and perhaps helping to illustrate the importance of it. In the song, the glory of heaven in the afterlife is illustrated in only a way the clowns can conceptualize it. The chorus anthem hails the simple message:
"Hey, we all gonna die. But I'm not gonna fry. Even though most never try, I'm not gonna let this Pass Me By, no."
In the final verse of "Pass Me By", there is a warning to the wicked that you're not going to see this granduer of heaven if you continue about your ways. In few other tracks of their career are ICP more obvious about the true intentions of their story than in The Great Milenko's "Pass Me By".
Despite all their hard work on the 4th Joker's Card, "The Great Milenko" is pulled from shelves on the day of it's release. Southern Baptist coalitions boycotted Disney on it's remote involvement with the Ellen television show, a sitcom depicting the lifestyle of a Lesbian. Disney, in a move to clean up it's act, finds out what Hollywood has been doing with ICP, and tries to sweep it under the carpet to improve company image. ICP, on the other hand, doesn't accept this. The ensuing label debate creates a huge scandal for Hollywood records, and this is perhaps one of the biggest times for publicity of ICP. Many people are hearing about ICP for the first time ever, in a media frenzy, and what they hear is: "novelty band 'Insane Clown Posse', consisting of two white rappers who look like KISS only in clown face paint, get dropped for trying to put out an obscene album through Disney". Naturally, considering the paradigms involved, this began a tsunami negative publicity, that exists to this day. The rap scene wouldn't take them in because the only other white rappers of the time were the Beastie Boys, and ICP in no way fit with them. The popular media wouldn't take them in, seeing them as a novelty act ripoff of KISS, and the same went for rock, who at the time rejected rap/metal fusion acts. Ironically, rap/metal fusion became the genre to take the music scene by storm a couple of years later with the rise of acts such as Kid Rock - who ICP worked with and influenced firsthand as peers in Detroit, as we saw in Carnival of Carnage - and Eminem - who has his own sordid history with the clowns.
Music labels left and right began a bidding war for ICP, expecting a huge public spike in sales for The Great Milenko re-release, after the media publicity boom. Reportedly, Disney wasn't interested in letting the trouble-making clowns go, they wanted to bury their careers to continue to cover up for the scandal, demanding 2 million dollars to release them. It's a famed story that Alex Abbiss (ICP's manager) walked into Disney corporate offices and threatened to "bring in the Juggalos to burn down Disneyland" if ICP was not released from their Hollywood contract.
Amazingly, after the incident, there was a breakthrough in negotations, and Island Records signed away ICP for a substantially lower sum.
The Great Milenko went on to become certified platinum entering it's second year, and gained the accolade of being the longest running hip-hop/rap album in Billboard history. Keep in mind that during these years, ICP was still recieving no MTV video play, and no radio promotion, yet there was unprecidented steadiness in it's fan base, the Juggalos. It maintained much of it's support touring, and it's label payed for a MTV timeslot to air "Shockumentary", which put the controversial group on television for a short period of time. This was perhaps one of the few real efforts a recording label had taken to pay for ICP's promotion, illustrating how much of ICP's notoriety and fame either arose from little besides their own hard work and uniquely dumb luck. Another promotion avenue for ICP came during this downtime, through involvement with the World Wrestling Federation and World Championship Wrestling. ICP, both die-hard wrestling fans, enjoyed the scene and it seems their fans typically shared the interest (despite having not been on wrestling television for a couple of years, Juggalo wrestling fans still carry Psychopathic signs to events to show their vocal support for ICP). Psychopathic Records grew as well, into a powerhouse that could provide the street team promotion needed to keep ICP afloat, as well as the merchandising and management of the Juggalo fanbase nationally.
StickyStoned |
Latest page update: made by StickyStoned
, Dec 23 2008, 6:07 PM EST
(about this update
About This Update
Edited by StickyStoned
1 widget added view changes - complete history) |
|
Keyword tags:
None
More Info: links to this page
|
There are no threads for this page.
Be the first to start a new thread.
