(Full disclosure: Jason Webber is a former employee of Psychopathic Records)
Shaggy 2 Dope is the George Harrison of Insane Clown Posse. He’s the quiet one…at least until you get him talking about things he’s passionate about—ICP’s Juggalo fanbase, music, and the Dark Carnival mythos that runs throughout ICP’s body of work, which—sorry, haters—is now approaching its third decade.
Otherwise known as Joey Utsler and “Tha Southwest Strangla,” Shaggy 2 Dope will be performing a solo concert at the Blind Pig on Wednesday, January 9. He recently made international headlines when he reputedly attempted to dropkick Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst while Durst was performing a show at a music festival where the two bands were both featured. In a Current exclusive, Shaggy reveals what REALLY happened that night.
Your most recent solo album, “F.T.F.O.M.F” reminds me a lot of the Beastie Boys’ “Paul’s Boutique,” because of all the quirky and obscure samples on it.
Oh, man. That’s beyond flattering. Thank you. I said to (the album producer) DJ Clay just the other day this album is going to be really appreciated one day. Don’t get me wrong; the record sold great, but I know it’s going to hold up and rediscovered by people as time goes by. I think it’s going to have mad longevity. All those samples were personally chosen by me. When I work with DJ Clay, I’m more of a “play the sample” guy, he’s more of a “play the music” guy. It’s hard to work in the studio like that if you don’t have the right chemistry, but I know we have it and it’s rare.
This is the first solo tour you’ve done for a while.
Yeah, man, I’m pretty geeked about it. I wanted to go out again sooner, but we had the new Joker’s Card to work on and when we work on a Joker’s Card, we totally shut down–no news, no radio, no nothing. We’re just totally focused on what we need to do. But now I get to go out and I can’t wait. (Violent) J is going out on his own solo tour at the same time. For both tours, if you get the VIP package, you get an exclusive EP of new material from that artist. So if you come see me, you get my EP; you go see J’s show, you get his EP.
On this solo tour, will you be performing ICP songs or just the songs from your three solo records?
Oh, yeah. I’ll be doing stuff from all of my solo records and everything in between. I have a lot of solo songs on ICP records, like “Birthday Bitches,” “We Belong,” “Get Off Me, Dog!” I’ll be dropping lots of ICP material.
Insane Clown Posse has a new Joker’s Card album, “Fearless Fred Fury,” dropping on February 15. Will you be performing any songs from this upcoming album?
I will not. To both me and (Violent) J, everything unfolds according to the Dark Carnival. Revealing something on a Joker’s Card before it comes out is just not something we do. When “Fearless Fred Fury” hits the street, it’s going to cause tremors. That record is pure magic. It’s amazing how it came together the way it did.
You help create one of America’s last true subcultures with the Juggalos. What do you say to a fan when they tell you your music literally saved their life?
You know, it’s hard. Really fucking hard. I know that probably sounds weird, but it’s really hard to accept. It’s just such an overwhelming emotional feeling to know that they’re getting that inspiration from something that came out of my mouth. What do you say when a kid comes up to you and his whole back is covered in tattoos of your face? It’s so flattering but how do you say “thank you” to something like that? We ARE Juggalos, so we try to do as much as we can for everyone in the Juggalo community. Everything we do is for Juggalos because we get that kind of love. We really lose our fucking ass monetarily doing this shit. Any other company or artist that could see what we go through to do all of this would just be like, “Yo! What the hell’s the matter with you?” That’s what makes us different from other bands. We don’t just say we care, we show our appreciation. People have told us time and time again, “You guys should be driving Lamborghinis and living in mansions,” but we’d rather put on the Gathering (of the Juggalos). That all comes out of our pockets, there’s no sponsorship there. I think for two years we came close to breaking even, but every year at the Gathering, we lose our ass. But it’s always Juggalos first, no matter what. We’re not trying to get props for that, it’s just true. But we never get noticed for that because we do it quietly a lot of times. The media doesn’t report on all the charities we give to, all the fundraisers we hold. They’re just focused on shit like me dropkicking Fred Durst. They don’t want to report that we raised funds to help a Juggalo who has cancer. We’re not called the most hated band in the world for nothing.
I hate to be one of those gossipy media types, but people really do want to know: What DID happen between you and Fred Durst a few months back?
OK, you know what? I’ve never told anybody outside of our immediate camp what exactly happened with that. No interviews, no nothing. But I’ll tell you 100% what happened. We were playing a festival where Limp Bizkit had also been booked; we were at a different stage at a different time of day. We had a great time, all the Juggalos turned out and we just tore that shit down. After we got done, we just spent the whole rest of the day and night just chilling. So me and a bunch of our guys were just checking out different stages. I didn’t know who was playing or anything. We sat down in the amphitheater for the main stage and Limp Bizkit happened to be on. There was nothing premeditated or anything; they were just performing. I love Limp Bizkit; Fred Durst is the shit, there was certainly no beef from our side. So, we’re watching them and there was this kid trying to get down from the amphitheater to the main floor part of the stage, but every time he’d go across, security would stop him. And we were like “Yo, we should hook this kid up.” I mean, we didn’t know who the kid was or anything; we just thought it’d be fresh to help him get to the main floor. So we all crewed up and walked all together, thinking we can push the kid through and then just turn around and leave. We tried like three times, but the kid couldn’t figure out what we were trying to do for him; he was pretty drunk. But anyway, we ended up pushing through and we were on the main floor. We were like five guys deep and then Fred Durst says, “I need some people onstage!” I had the idea of us trying to get on stage without using our credentials; no passes, let’s just do it like fans and see if we could ninja our way onstage. Security was really thick though, and everyone was all “We’ll never get up there.” So, I said to my crew, “Yo, man, if somehow we get up there, I’ll dropkick Fred Durst,” not thinking in a million years we’d ever actually get onstage. Well, we got up there and I’m thinking to myself “Awww, shit! I gotta show the crew. I can’t look like a bitch!” At that point I’m saying, “Yo, there’s no way I’m going to dropkick him for real.” I don’t know if your readers know this, but me and J were involved with professional wrestling for many years—WWE, ECW, TNA. So I said I was going to give him a “work” dropkick, meaning I’m barely going to touch him. The reason it looked so bad in those pictures was because Fred wasn’t “selling” the move—that’s a wrestling term for making it look like you’ve actually been hit hard. So now we’re over by the side of the stage and I’m still thinking “I don’t want to do it,” but you know, I couldn’t go back on my stupid ass word. I said, “OK, if he comes close to this side of the stage, I’ll do it, but otherwise I’m not going to run across the stage and fuck the show up like that.” But sure enough, he comes over to the side of the stage and I was like “Fuck!” so I did it. It’s so funny because I read a bunch of stuff online like “His pathetic attempt of a dropkick clearly misses!” But straight up—if I really wanted to dropkick his ass off, he would’ve went flying ‘cause he was not prepared for it whatsoever; he had no idea it was coming. He would’ve been on his back. But I intentionally didn’t hit him because I wasn’t trying to hurt nobody; I was just trying to do a silly wrestling dropkick. Of course, after I did it, security was all over me. One of our guys got beat up, but that’s what you get when you do stuff like that. I ain’t mad at nobody. I just violated a stage code. If I could go back in time and not do it, I would. Am I sad that I did it? No. I mean, whatever. It’s all good. In no way, shape, or form was I mad at any of the security, crew, or the venue. So that’s what happened with that.
Shaggy 2 Dope will be performing at the Blind Pig on Wednesday, January 9. 8 p.m. $20 (advance)/$25 (day of show). VIP packages available at psychopathicrecords.com, show tickets available at www.blindpigmusic.com.