Professional wrestling attracts all sorts of characters from all walks of life. Violent J of the rap duo Insane Clown Posse (ICP) is such a man. Despite the controversies, J and Shaggy 2 Dope have carved out a unique brand of hip-hop culture. But he wants to go further with his Juggalo Championship Wrestling (JCW) promotion.
Slamwrestling.net first met J at NWA 75, where he was managing the tag team duo “The Brothers of Funstruction.” We sat down with the 52-year-old Violent J to discuss how ICP and pro Wrestling mix.
“We’re a wrestling gimmick. We should be a tag team. We are a tag team. You know what I mean?” he said. “But look at us. It’s like fully influenced by the theatrics of pro wrestling. You know, we grew up on wrestling, and especially if you listen to our old interviews, they were more like wrestling interviews. They were more like promos. You know, we just love pro wrestling.
“Sometimes, if I have anxiety and the world is moving too fast for me,” J continued, “I just throw on some old school WWE, WWF, you know what I mean? Watch that s*** and I feel better. You know what I mean? It’s like my escape.”
This leads to JCW, which has been performing for over 26 years. We asked J to describe to people what made him bring the promotion to fruition.
“When we started JCW, our only goal was to entertain the Juggalos,” he said. This is the dedicated fanbase of ICP who have followed the band for years, akin to “Deadheads” who follow The Grateful Dead.
“And we did that for years and years and years, but now today, our goal is to entertain all wrestling fans and show the world how good of a wrestling show Juggalos can put on,” he added. “Because most of our rosters…we’re obviously Juggalos that own a promotion. It’s called Juggalo Championship Wrestling to the day we die. So Juggalos are the ones behind this promotion, and we want to show the world how good of a promotion we can actually operate.”
JCW has mostly toured with ICP at their concerts, and J explained the dynamic. “It’s like JCW is usually the opening act for ICP, the wrestling happens first, and then a concert begins.
“But we’re doing more and more [of] just JCW shows. You know, from day one, from the day we started, there was always both. There was JCW performing right before ICP goes on, and then it was also several tours that were just JCW,” J added. “We do both, and we always have, from the beginning, we’ve been a nationally touring company from day one. You know, from New York to LA, we play everywhere, and sometimes it’s the support act for ICP. Other times we perform just the JCW show.”
But as to the vision of what JCW can bring, Violent J has been absorbing the ideas from other promotions, like the aforementioned National Wrestling Alliance. “Going to NWA was a huge blessing, because I got to see their operation from the inside,” he said, “and it inspired me for several reasons. It inspired me because I saw basically the amount of production they had is pretty much the same as that JCW has always had, except NWA gets all this coverage in the wrestling media, in the internet wrestling community.
“It gets all this love and written about, it [gets] reviewed and all that. And JCW doesn’t get anything, you know? And so when I went there, I got to really look at their production, and I’m like, ‘Why is it that this seems to be the same size setup that we have, except they’re getting all this attention from wrestling fans that we’re not?’” J recalled. “And it’s simple, because all we ever focused on was Juggalos. So going to NWA helped me realize that we have all the capabilities to bring this show to wrestling fans everywhere.”
“Going to NWA was a huge wake-up call for me, and going to MLW [Major League Wrestling], and then eventually going to GCW [Game Changer Wrestling]; it really fired me up and lit me on fire and had me say, ‘Man, we can do this. We can do this the way they’re doing it,” he concluded, “and probably just as good. Because we have all this experience of doing it, we just never focused on anything else but the Juggalos, you know? And now that we’re all jugglers and we consider ourselves seasoned veterans at this s***, let’s try to take it mainstream.”
And part of that strategy involves bringing Vince Russo into their production.
No stranger to wrestling controversy himself, the former head writer of WWF/E and WCW has been involved with ICP since back in the day, and J explained their relationship. “I’ve known Vince Russo since ICP was with the WWF in ‘98 or ’99, and then we worked with him again in WCW, and we’ve known Vince Russo for several years,” he said. “And I listened to his podcast [Vince Russo’s The Brand], and I listened to him talk about wrestling, and he says certain things, like the way he phrases himself. Sometimes he says, ‘I don’t write wrestling. I write a TV show.’ But I know Vince Russo loves wrestling.
“I wanted Vince Russo to look at that product. So, I bugged him for weeks and weeks and weeks, asking him to look at the product and to give me his thoughts on it,” J continued, “And I wanted him to consider coming aboard, you know, but that wasn’t easy in the beginning.”
J even defended some of Russo’s booking decisions. “You look at some of the crazy antics Vince Russo has done that he sometimes gets made fun of or whatever, for things like the Judy Bagwell on a pole match. That’s something I would have booked,” J laughed. “I would have put Judy Bagwell on a pole if I was in charge. Seriously, that’s straight out of JCWs playbook, that type of stuff. You know what I mean?”
As to the philosophy of and how Russo meshes with JCW, Violent J broke it down like this. “Humor, I think, plays a huge role in pro wrestling, and everybody wants to laugh, and I think we have a lot in common. I like his wild style writing, and I just considered it a dream. I didn’t think he would come aboard,” he said. “I want to start at the top and go for the top, you know. And if it doesn’t work out, work my way down. But the more I got to talking to Vince Russo, the more I started to believe it could become a possibility.”
“But I’ll tell you something, brother. Once, and I knew I felt like this would happen… once Vince came out and we worked together in person. We flowed so perfectly that I think for both of us, it alleviated any doubt or any fear in us working together,” J added. “I think once he came out on the road and we were able to communicate; not over the phone. not over text, but together in person, things went as smooth as can be, and they’ve been as smooth as can be ever since. And now me and Vince know how to communicate, and we understand each other more, and it’s a beautiful relationship.
Some would argue that Russo is everything that’s wrong with the wrestling business, and this is where Violent J defended the man as well as his decision. “You know, anybody who doesn’t like it. They say, ‘How could you work with Vince Russo?’ F*** you, man. Seriously. F** off. Because if anybody thinks I would ever work with somebody that could ever be damaging to this company, that I pour my heart and soul into this company. You know, if they think I would ever work with somebody or hand control, or the writing, the booking over to somebody that could actually damage my company. It’s giving me no credit. It’s insulting me. You know what I mean?
“To think I would be that stupid? I could let that happen. Obviously, to see me working with Vince Russo, they’ve misjudged Vince Russo. They don’t understand who Vince Russo is.”
If you don’t have the chance to see JCW in your area yet, you can catch them on their Psychopathic Records YouTube channel. “For the past 15 months, every single Thursday, at seven o’clock, we have a brand new episode on YouTube,” J said. “Everybody can find YouTube. You know what I mean? That’s why I like YouTube. It doesn’t have to be on a special app. It doesn’t have to be some subscription. Anybody that wants to see [JCW] Lunacy can go straight to YouTube and watch it there. We premiere a new episode every Thursday at eight, at seven o’clock, and anybody in the world can watch it. You know, as for our shows to see it live, that’s different. But I can tell you, the show coming up on November 22nd is free. It’s absolutely free, and we’re giving away turkeys to everybody that comes.”
He refers to the donation of food ICP has done over the years, and with Thanksgiving approaching in the United States, this will be a first for the wrestling promotion in the east Detroit, MI area at Harpo’s, featuring talent like The Brothers of Funstruction, “Hollyhood” Haley J, Vampiro, among others. “ICP has given away turkeys a lot of times, you know what I mean, but never in JCW,” J said. “JCW has done canned food drives. We’ve done Coats for Kids. We’ve done a lot of cool stuff, but this is JCW’s first time giving away turkeys.”
When you get past the clown makeup, the brash personalities, and the controversies, there is a sense of community, of belonging that is at the heart of what Violent J hopes JCW can achieve.
So how can people get past the Juggalo façade?
“If your mind isn’t open enough, if you’re not open-minded enough to accept people for who they want to be and what they want to wear on their face, then you’re probably not meant to listen to our music or watch our product,” J said. “But we’re all people at the end of the day. We’re all just human beings, you know, and we don’t judge. That’s the whole idea of being a Juggalo. Everybody’s included; nobody’s excluded. You know what I mean? Everybody fits in, everybody gets in.
“We don’t discriminate, we don’t hate. It’s all love; everybody’s welcome in the Dark Carnival. You know, that’s the whole idea of being a Juggalo,” he added. “We don’t look and stare and point at people. Everybody’s accepted, nobody’s rejected. You know what I mean, that’s the idea. And JCW is a reflection of the Juggalo world. It’s the same thing. It’s just in wrestling form, but we just want everybody to accept us for the product we put out.
I mean, it’s a good wrestling show. You don’t have to be a Juggalo, you don’t have to like our music. You don’t have to be an ICP fan to like what we’re doing. There’s a lot of minds behind JCW, not just mine and Shaggy’s. There’s a great deal of talented people running that promotion. There’s a great deal of very hard-working, very talented, very hungry individuals behind JCW pulling the strings, and I think everybody in the wrestling world should at least give us a chance to entertain you.”
Top Photo: Violent J talks Juggalo Championship Wrestling, Vince Russo, and entertaining all fans, not just the Juggalos. Photo Credit: Tommy “Milagro” Martinez via ZOOM
