Nardwuar vs. Insane Clown Posse leads to allegations that the Human Serviette isn’t the Santa in tartan he seems

Nardwuar vs. Insane Clown Posse leads to allegations that the Human Serviette isn’t the Santa in tartan he seems

Who are you going to believe?

A tam-sporting treasure who’s universally regarded as a national legend in Canada—a country generally regarded as one of the most polite, compassionate, and generally decent nations on planet earth? Or a greasepaint-smeared former American jailbird who has no problem putting a weave in his nut hair, jizzing in your macaroni, and getting naked and walking the street, winking at freaks with a two-litre stuck in his butt cheeks?

The question is a relevant one considering what’s been going on between Vancouver’s Nardwuar the Human Serviette and the Insane Clown Posse’s Violent J.

While it might be stretching things to suggest the two have been beefing like Eminem and Machine Gun Kelly, or Mad Child and Snak the Ripper, they’ve definitely had a different view of reality.

And what’s not disputable is who started things.

Last week ICP MC Violent J guested on Wild Ride!, the new podcast from Jackass alumni Steve-O.

Pre-podcast, the big news was that Steve-0 would be apologizing for being a shithead the first time the two met. But when things got going it was Violent J who ended up coming across as the shithead. Well, sort of a shithead.

At one point the subject of Nardwuar came up. And that’s when Violent J suggested everything is not what it seems during the Human Serviette’s interviews.

First, some background.

As Nardwuar’s 196,000 Twitter followers and 1.83 million YouTube subscribers know, the greatest celebrity interviewer in show business often brings obscure records and various forms of rare memorabilia to interviews. Such items are tied into the obscure loves and obsessions of the artists he’s talking to. Think a Redd Foxx doll trotted out for Snoop Dogg. Or signed Joan Jett promo pic for Rico Nasty. It’s all part of a strategy that has made Nardwuar one of the most respected, not to mention bravest, interviewers, on the planet.

One of the big secrets of music journalism is that most artists despise the interview process. But not when they’re standing in front of Nardwuar. Think of another journalist who would have the, ahem, nards, to not only walk into an abandoned Texas warehouse for an interview with A$AP Rocky and his, ahem, posse, but win over the crew almost immediately.

Sometimes Nardwuar will give what he’s brought to artists as a gift. And sometimes he’ll use them as a way to get his interview subjects to open up and start talking. Note the distinction there. In case reading comprehension is a problem, when Nardwuar has a gift for someone, he announces it’s a gift. When something is presented as a conversation kickstarter, it’s not a gift and isn’t presented as such.

Now consider what Violent J. had to say to Steve-O on Wild Ride!. During his interview five years ago with Violent J and his ICP bandmate Shaggy 2 Dope, Nardwuar pulled out a Smiley record. Violent J evidently thought that meant it was Christmas.

As such, at the 45-minute-mark of Wild Ride!, the rapper said this: “I don’t want to say nothing bad about Nardwuar but I gotta tell you something. I remember he gave us a Smiley album, who’s a local Detroit rapper that we used to be fans of when we were kids. And he had some Smiley vinyl. We were like, ‘Oh my God!’ He gave it to us, we were like ‘Hell yeah.’ After the interview, he takes it back, man.”

To translate for the Juggalos out there who’ve done one too many whippets this morning, Violent J. suggested that Nardwuar is anything but the tartan-attired pop culture Santa Claus that he makes himself out to be. And that immediately got ICP fans reaching for the pitchforks, torches, tar bucket, and Southwest Voodoo chicken feathers.

Nardwuar took to his newly launched Twitch channel (which you can check out here) to set things straight. He posted a 40-minute video that explains what goes on in his interviews, including a crystal-clear explanation of when something is a gift and when it’s not.

“I thought that I explained everything,” Nardwuar says, reached by the Straight by phone at his Vancouver home. “Some of the comments from Insane Clown Posse fans, though, were things like ‘Fuck him—he takes back everything he gives.’ And ‘You gave gifts and you took them back—FUCK YOU!!!’. And ‘Fuck Nardwuar—he took all those gifts back. What a punk!’”

And there’s (admittedly unsubstantiated) evidence to suggest that the Juggalo harassment isn’t stopping online.

In the middle of talking to the Straight, another phone in Nardwuar’s house rings, at which point you hear the muffled but menacing, “I’m looking to speak to Mr. Motherfucker.” (For the curious, Nardwuar politely says “I think you have the wrong number” and then hangs up the phone.)

Returning the issue at hand, he says, bluntly, “I don’t take back my gifts.”

He adds: “And the interview is Nardwuar vs. Insane Clown Posse. It’s not Nardwuar gives gifts to Insane Clown Posse for 25 minutes.”

Still, gifts were given during his Insane Clown Posse interview five years ago, and they were not reclaimed as soon as the camera went off. One of them was a promotional Sir Mix-a-Lot keychain that Nardwuar dug up with help from the staff at Neptoon Records. As ICP are fans, the gift was not only appreciated, but evidently kept close at hand.

“Some other ICP fans sent me a link of Shaggy on a podcast a couple of weeks ago emptying his bag. And one of the things in there was the Sir Mix-a-Lot keychain that I had given to them five years ago. He’s kept that keychain for five years, and out of the blue he pulls it out of his bag before any of this even started.”

That alone should prove that Nardwuar doesn’t take back everything—or anything that’s given as a gift. But as the message was clearly not getting through, Nardwuar posted a second video on his new Twitch channel called “Case Closed”.

Nardwuar notes that if there’s anything he’s shown someone (as opposed to given) during an interview that an interviewee decides they have to have, he’s happy to help.

“If somebody afterwards says ‘I know that record you showed me is your own, but I’d really like to get a copy of it’, tell me and I can phone up Avi from Beat Street Records and try and get it for you. If Violent J. really liked it, I could have helped him find a copy. It’s weird that, five years later, he remembered the record that wasn’t a gift. But I don’t think he remembered about the gifts that I gave him. And he didn’t remember that his bandmate took the keychain.”

The good thing about all this? That would be that the two members of Insane Clown Posse were evidently listening, even though the Juggalos of the world haven’t been.

This morning either Violent J or Shaggy 2 Dope sent Nardwuar, not to mention the greasepainted Juggalo army, a message on Twitter.

Just a little misunderstanding. Much Clown Love!

— Insane Clown Posse (@icp) January 29, 2021

And Nardwuar also took to Twitter to squash the beef.

Thank you so much to Insane Clown Posse for helping ‘clear the air’ around #giftgate and putting this behind us ! Doot doola doot doo… Woop Woop ! https://t.co/5C0sdZnK9G

— Nardwuar (@nardwuar) January 29, 2021

Now you know who to believe. So stop Tweeting “Fuck you”, and calling Nardwuar’s house to ask for Mr. Motherfucker.