Insane Clown Posse

Violent J (Joseph Bruce) and Shaggy 2 Dope (Joseph Utsler) grew up in Oak Park, a suburb on Detroit's northern edge, where they built a backyard wrestling ring with Utsler's brother John and a friend. Both were drawn to hip-hop acts such as 3rd Bass, the Beastie Boys and N.W.A. They performed briefly as JJ Boyz, then as the gang-affiliated Inner City Posse, before adopting the Insane Clown Posse name and clown makeup in the early 1990s.

Their records combine cartoonish gore, wrestling-style bravado and blunt humour with production that has swung between rap, rock and carnival organ. Much of the catalogue is organised around the Dark Carnival, a loose mythology carried across the Joker's Card albums, each one built around a lesson meant to change the "evil ways" of listeners.

They built this world largely outside the industry through their own label, Psychopathic Records. Their audience, the Juggalos, numbers in the tens of thousands and is one of the more distinctive fanbases in American music. The group's live shows are known for the spraying of Faygo soda over the crowd.

Insane Clown Posse have earned two platinum and five gold albums. By April 2007, Nielsen SoundScan figures put their catalogue's sales in the United States and Canada at roughly 6.5 million units, a scale unusual for an act built almost entirely on an independent label and a devoted underground fanbase.

The duo have also produced and starred in two feature films, Big Money Hustlas and Big Money Rustlas, and founded their own wrestling promotion, Juggalo Championship Wrestling, an outgrowth of Bruce's early years wrestling in backyard rings.