Insane Clown Posse — “Miracles”

10Apr10

On the weekend, I occasionally like to post a YouTube video of a song I like, as an easy way of duck out of actually writing anything. First, I don’t like this song. And second, it makes me think — not in the way that Violent J and Shaggy 2 Dope intended to make me think, probably, but I’m compelled to share a few thoughts, in the form of play by play.

0:11: A commenter at the Onion’s AV Club pointed out that the Insane Clown Posse’s use of white pancake makeup over visible facial hair basically puts them in the Cesar Romero school of makeup application. Personally, I like it: It says, “Hey, I’ve got a life outside of the Insane Clown Posse.” Of course, I’m not sure what that would consist of. Cesar Romero played other roles besides the Joker. I’m pretty sure Shaggy 2 Dope and Violent J spend 90 percent of their time either rapping or backyard wrestling.

0:35: Violent J’s fat-guy casual outfit becomes wholly visible. With his all-white untucked shirt and calf-length shorts, he looks like the singer of Smashmouth at a Caribbean wedding. Fat guys need a new casual outfit. The untucked shirt/calf-length shorts combo is basically the male muumuu.

0:47: Shaggy 2 Dope appears between a giant pregnant woman’s legs, giving the impression that either she’s giving birth to him or he’s her tiny obstetrician.

0:49: “I’ve seen shit that would shock your eyelids,” asserts Shaggy 2 Dope. If we have to figure out which part of the eye is most shock-prone, I’d nominate the eyeballs, which actually perceive things, rather than the eyelids, which don’t. More to the point, though, neither the birth of his kids, the sun, the moon, the earth, Mars, the Milky Way nor fuckin’ shooting stars strike me as particularly shocking.

0:55: Wait — the Insane Clown Posse has seen UFOs? Back up — shouldn’t we spend a little more time on this one, rather than quickly moving on to hydrological matters and seeds germinating? Don’t bury the lede, guys.

1:07: “Fuckin’ rainbows, after it rains. There’s enough miracles here to blow your brains,” says Shaggy 2 Dope, miming shooting himself in the head with a handgun. Suddenly, the links between rainy Seattle weather and Kurt Cobain’s suicide become more clear.

1:09: Violent J complains that he fed a fish to a pelican, only for the pelican to try to eat his cell phone and run — not fly — away. This is certainly strange, even irritating. But miraculous? Maybe Violent J forgot to mention that his cell phone was made out of a living fish. That might lift things into more magical territory.

1:22: “Music is all magic. You can’t even hold it.” Except if you’re still buying CDs or vinyl instead of downloading from the iTunes store, I guess, in which case, you can hold it. “It’s just there in the air,” finishes Violent J, who then just nods silently for a second and lets his thought sink in, like he’s blown his own mind with sheer profundity.

1:25: The words “RECOGNIZE MIRACLES?” pop onscreen. “Do you?” asks my girlfriend. “Miracles are phenomena that can’t be explained by science.” I think the Insane Clown Posse recognizes miracles the same way Alanis Morissette recognizes irony.

1:34: “Pure motherfucking magic!” I can’t overemphasize how much I want this to be the Insane Clown Posse’s new career direction: expressing positive messages in nevertheless profane and idiotic ways. I want this so badly, I volunteer to ghostwrite material for them. I came up with a couplet celebrating religious diversity earlier: “Muslims get down five times a day / if you were on your knees more, you’d be fuckin’ gay.”

1:50: The best and most-quoted part: “Water, fire, air and dirt,” says Violent J. “Fuckin’ magnets, how do they work?” finishes Shaggy 2 Dope, throwing up his hands in angry frustration, like a man who’s suddenly realized he has no idea how magnets work. “And I don’t want to talk to a scientist. Y’all motherfuckers lying and getting me pissed.” I’m not sure when Shaggy 2 Dope has ever been lied to by a scientist. Maybe he’s a global-warming denier or a creationist. Anyway, scientists take heed: When you phone the Insane Clown Posse household, save yourself some trouble and ask to speak to Violent J.

2:03: Shaggy 2 Dope mentions having seen 15,000 Juggalos together. This interests me because they earlier mentioned having seen 85,000 people together, which I presumed to be concert attendance figures. I still think this; I just don’t think it refers to Insane Clown Posse concert attendance figures. Maybe they went to see Coldplay or something.

2:10: “I seen a caterpillar turn into a terrible CGI butterfly.” Wait — I might not have gotten that quote quite right. Or did I make it more right?

2:15: Now we see the duo’s children, who, one hopes, won’t be allowed to actually see the video they’re in. The Insane Clown Posse may have mellowed and become more attuned to the miracle of life with fatherhood, but one suspects that dropping MF bombs around their children and constantly dressing them in Juggalo makeup is more likely to attune them to the miracle of Child Services.

2:40: Violent J now mentions having seen ghosts. Again, can we spend more time on this paranormal phenomena instead of glossing over it quickly and moving on to normal phenomena such as the midnight coast?

2:53: “There’s magic everywhere in this bitch,” says Violent J. I wish he’d said “There’s magic everywhere all up in this bitch.” It would have made it ten times better. Why didn’t he say that? I have to call this a rare lyrical misstep.

3:00: “It’s all around you, you don’t even know it,” adds Shaggy 2 Dope, giving me a sudden Swingers flashback. This Insane Clown Posse video is so money and they don’t even know it. If by “money”, you mean “unintentionally comedic”.

3:22: Where the hell are these guys, anyway? A clock tower in outer space? An oil refinery in heaven? This seems like it would be a good place for a climactic fight scene if this were an action movie. Let’s put your backyard wrestling experience to work, guys. Violent J, you dangle off that ladder like you’re going to fall through the clouds into the troposphere. Shaggy 2 Dope, you backflip off a trampoline and break your neck.

3:53: Shaggy 2 Dope must be a father now, because he dances exactly like Cliff Huxtable. That may settle the child-of-giantess vs. tiny obstetrician debate.

4:10: A spaceship presumably carrying the Insane Clown Posse (and presumably a spontaneously forming, miraculously occurring spaceship rather than one built by lying scientists, of which these guys emphatically do not approve) leaves Earth orbit and rockets straight into the sun, which immediately goes nova. Video over! That is a miracle!

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