Music / Bizaar Bizzar

Witnesses now tell us thousands upon thousands of people are emerging from sewers everywhere, their faces are painted and...and they look like clowns...

Bizaar and Bizzar are a Distinct Double Album by the Hip-Hop act Insane Clown Posse, released on October 31, 2000 as two separately sold discs to be their final releases on Island Def Jam Recordings. The albums were produced at the same time the duo was writing Tales from the Lotus Pod, the debut album of Dark Lotus, their side project with Twiztid, and ICP were riding high off the success of The Amazing Jeckel Brothers when Violent J got the idea to make the Sixth Joker's Card a Double Album about death, one album about Heaven and another about Hell, separately released.

The only problem was that they didn't want to release the Sixth Joker's Card albums on Island/Def Jam,^note Island merged with Def Jam after signing ICP, so ICP wasn't feeling the atmosphere with the new executives, as, on Island, they stood out as one of the only Hip-Hop acts on the label, but on Def Jam, they were just another rap act, and while Island was excited to work with ICP, Def Jam didn't care about marketing them. so they would have to come up with two completely different, unrelated albums to give to Island so they could release them on the same day. Additionally, through their contract with Psychopathic Records, Island had already reissued Twiztid's debut album Mostasteless, and would also get to distribute Twiztid's second album, Freek Show, on the same day as ICP's Bizaar Bizzar albums, which would more than complete their Island contract.

On top of the Troubled Production, ICP had gotten into beef with Sharon Osbourne, the wife of Ozzy Osbourne and manager of a Nu Metal band called Coal Chamber, who had been touring to support ICP on the Amazing Jeckel Brothers tour, alongside Krayzie Bone, Twiztid and Mindless Self Indulgence. The audiences would wind up demanding refunds on shows with Coal Chamber, whose Nu Metal style didn't mesh well with the Hip-Hop favoring audience. ICP made a business decision to kick Coal Chamber off the tour, lying to the band and claiming it was due to equipment problems. The attendence significantly improved. However, Osbourne threatened to sue ICP for breaking their contract, and eventually confronted them on The Howard Stern Show, where ICP admitted that they really kicked Coal Chamber off the tour because the audiences hated the band's music. On the show, Osbourne bet ICP $50,000 that their next album would not even sell 200,000 copies and told them that their careers were over. Violent J agreed to the bet, predicting the album would sell 500,000, although the bet officially stood at 200,000.

The combined sales of Bizaar Bizzar ultimately wound up at 400,000 copies, exceeding the number Osbourne predicted. However, Osbourne never paid off on the bet, although Violent J has said that she didn't even have to pay him directly, and that she could simply donate the amount to a charity in his name, she never even did this. While the albums were profitable, though, the actual release was a bit of a disaster, as the two albums were titled so similarly, had practically the same cover and were released on the same day, so they could get confused with each other and some people ended up accidentally buying two copies of the same album. The confusion between the two albums led to the ICP albums selling less than Twiztid's Freek Show, which was released on the same day, and Violent J later admitted that releasing three albums on the same day for Juggalos to buy was a mistake.

The albums featured a Rap Rock sound and Bizzar spawned one of ICP's most popular singles, a Cover Version of the Sly Fox New Wave Music hit "Let's Go All the Way", while Bizaar had another popular Rap Rock single in "Tilt-A-Whirl".

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Track listings

Bizaar:

1. "Intro" – 2:07
2. "Take Me Away" – 4:39
3. "Fearless" – 4:14
4. "Rainbows and Stuff" – 4:11
5. "Whut?" (featuring Twiztid) – 4:55
6. "Still Stabbin'" – 4:03
7. "Tilt-A-Whirl" – 3:58
8. "We Gives No Fuck" – 3:39
9. "Please Don't Hate Me" – 4:18
10. "Behind the Paint" – 4:33
11. "My Homie Baby Mama" – 4:09
12. "The Pendulum's Promise" – 5:33

Bizzar:

1. "Intro" – 1:55
2. "Bizzar" (featuring Twiztid and Esham) – 3:36
3. "Cherry Pie (I Need a Freak)" – 4:33
4. "Questions" (featuring Esham) – 5:44
5. "Mr. Happy" – 4:43
6. "Radio Stars" – 4:33
7. "My Axe" – 3:52
8. "If" – 3:39
9. "Let's Go All the Way" – 3:35
10. "Let a Killa" – 4:56
11. "Juggalo Paradise" – 3:41
12. "Crystal Ball" (featuring Twiztid) – 7:52

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Bizaar and Bizzar exhibit examples of the following tropes:

• Affably Evil: "Mr. Happy" is a cheerful little song about a friendly (if slightly-odd) fellow that really, really loves people. He just also happens to consider gruesomely murdering people the ultimate expression of love. The fact that he appears to be singing this song to a group of children simply adds a whole other layer of creepy to this already-disturbing track.
• Buffy Speak: "I'm Mr. Happy and I ride a bike, ching! / I don't have a seat I just sit on the pipe thing!"
• Dissonant Serenity: "Mr. Happy", the happy Serial Killer, who's happy, happy, happy as he murder, murder, murders you.
• Distinct Double Album: Bizaar and Bizzar were released on the same day with practically the same cover and similar sounding names.
• Emergency Broadcast: Bizzar opens with a news broadcast, which is upgraded into a nationwide emergency broadcast in its sister album Bizaar.
• Hidden Track: "The Pendulum's Promise" and "Crystal Ball" aren't really 22 minutes each. "Pendulum's Promise" is actually about 6 minutes and "Crystal Ball" is about 8 minutes. However, each album ends with extensive fucking around in the studio, including Yo Mama jokes.
  • "JUST when you thought it was over! Here's a little something from Vanilla Ice himself!" "Your greasy ass, camel cock breath momma is so fucking poor, she gotta suck cock for crack!"
• New Sound Album: Both albums are more Rap Rock-oriented than The Amazing Jeckel Brothers, pushing the Rock sound further than even The Great Milenko on "Tilt-A-Whirl" and "Let's Go All the Way".
• Palette Swap: Both album covers featured the same spiral background. The Bizaar album cover features question marks. The Bizzar cover features eyes.
• Real Life Writes the Plot: Violent J got the idea to record a cover of Sly Fox's song "Let's Go All the Way" after buying a compilation of New Wave Music on cassette at a gas station. There's a Take That! towards Sharon Osbourne because of the bet they made. There's a Take That towards Kid Rock because he'd recorded a couple songs dissing ICP^note after Shaggy 2 Dope dissed Kid Rock first, on the 1994 solo song "Fuck Off!", where 2 Dope rapped, "I won't mix no rap with rock & roll, like somebody else I know!", Kid Rock dissed them on two songs from Early Mornin' Stoned Pimp, "Ya Keep On", where Rock raps, "don't call me Joe, 'cause the Joes I know can't even flow", referring to Joe Bruce (Violent J) and Joe Utsler (Shaggy 2 Dope), and "Freestyle Rhyme", where Rock raps, "is there anything wacker than a wicked clown? Nope" and the end of "Please Don't Hate Me", where Violent J reveals that the person he'd just left a phone message informing them of having had sex with their mother was Eminem came as a result of their real-life feud.^note During the release of The Slim Shady EP, Eminem, who was influenced by ICP, gave them a flyer saying that ICP, as well as House of Krazees, the group that became Twiztid, Esham, Kid Rock and dozens of other popular Detroit rappers, might appear at Eminem's release party. Violent J pointed out that this was deceptive, because ICP hadn't agreed to appear at Eminem's release party, or even been asked, and when Eminem informed them that this was his way of inviting them, Violent J flat out refused in a way that Eminem perceived as a diss towards him, which Violent J later admitted may have been more disrespectful towards Eminem than he'd intended, Eminem subsequently rapped in a radio freestyle, "Fuck ICP! Buy my CD!" ICP responded by redubbing Eminem's then-recent hit "My Name Is" as "Slim Anus", starting a long-running feud between Eminem and ICP, which D12's Proof helped bury in the mid-2000's. Eminem later rapped in the 2013 song "Wicked Ways" that he was a cross between Skylar Grey, Tyler, the Creator and Violent J, a Call-Back to when he'd previously described himself as a cross between Marilyn Manson, Esham and Ozzy Osbourne in the lyrics to 1999's "Still Don't Give a Fuck".
• Rock Star Song: The narrative of "Radio Stars" is that ICP are trying to get a radio hit by writing songs in several Pop styles which we hear rhe results of as Glam Rap, Pop Punk, and the Boy Band are all parodied.
• Sampling: The introduction to Bizaar sampled the Theme Tune to John Carpenter's Escape from New York written and performed by Carpenter himself. However, since either ICP didn't license the sample, or Carpenter's licensing agreement for the sample of his music didn't extend to streaming services, the intro track is not available on streaming services.
• Special Guest: Officially, Esham and Twiztid are the only Guests on the two albums. However, during the Hidden Track on "Crystal Ball", Vanilla Ice turns up to deliver the final Yo Mama joke.
• Stepford Smiler: As indicated by his name, Mr. Happy is all smiles and cheerfulness... even when killing people.
• Troubled Production: On top of having to complete two albums at once to get out of their Island contract due to not fitting in at Def Jam Recordings, and having to win a bet with one of Rock's most powerful business people, Mike E. Clark quit working with ICP after producing these albums, over a disagreement in regard to the artistic direction ICP was going to take on the Sixth Joker's Card. He came back later, but many fans felt that his absence hurt The Wraith: Shangri-La and Hells Pit albums.

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