Photo: juggalogathering.com

Where else but in the sick and twisted world of the Insane Clown Posse would the thought of fans beating each other senseless with oversized boxing gloves, getting body slammed by grapplers of the Juggalo Championsh-- Wrestling circuit and virtually drowning in almost 2,000 gallons of soda be viewed as a fun-filled three-day weekend? Scheduled for July 13-15 at the Seagate Center in Toledo, Ohio, the Insane Clown Posse fan convention, better known as the Gathering of the Juggalos 2001, will feature performances by those horrorshow harlequins Shaggy 2 Dope and Violent J, as well as ICP label mates Twiztid, Marz, Vanilla Ice, Suicide Machines, Myzery, Dark Lotus, Organ Grinders, Psychopathic Rydas and Three 6 Mafia, according to ICP's publicist.

As was the case last year — and as continues to be the case with the allure of ICP themselves — music is only half the total package. Championsh--Wrestling matches, BMX and skateboard demos, Bizaar Bizzar beauty contests, and the joining in (un)holy matrimony of a Juggalo and a Juggalette are slated as non-musical attractions. Fan participation in the form of "Faygo Armageddon," in which fans blast the contents of 4,000 two-liter bottles of the clowns' favorite beverage at each other through four giant water cannons; a 50-person skatepark; and an auction of rare ICP merchandise and memorabilia are also planned.

Panel discussions and Q&A sessions, dubbed Hype-Ass Seminars, featuring ICP, Twiztid, Marz, Blaze, JCW stars and Psychopathic Records execs Alex Abbiss, Jumpsteady and Bill Bill, are among the festivities as well.

More info on the festival can be found at www.juggalogathering.com.

• Insane Clown Posse
• Twiztid
• Vanilla Ice
• Three 6 Mafia

Vanilla Ice
Photo: Dean Karr

All-femme hard rockers Betty Blowtorch are living every under-30 recording artist's dream: to have the world's most famous pre-Eminem white rapper bust a rhyme about his supposedly substantial privates on your own song.

"Size Queen," a track on the Los Angeles band's forthcoming album, Are You Man Enough?, includes a rapped interlude from Vanilla Ice regarding his allegedly impressive manhood.

Bianca Butthole, Betty Blowtorch's lead vocalist and bassist, said the Iceman "was recording in the same studio that we were. We bonded a little, and we asked him, 'Do you wanna talk about how big your di-- is on our record?' He said, 'Sure.' "I asked him if he could rap over [the track]," she continued, "and he said he can rap over anything. And he could!" "He describes it as almost 10 inches tall," Butthole said. She then recited an excerpt of Ice's verse for "Size Queen": "'Open your legs, I'll make you cream/ I'm like a waterfall/ You know I've got it all/ A long white di-- almost 10 inches tall." Vanilla Ice couldn't be reached for comment.

Betty Blowtorch are a more hard rock and heavy metal-oriented version of the strictly hardcore punk Butt Trumpet. Butthole is joined by fellow former Trumpeters Sharon Needles (guitarist/vocalist) and Blare N. Bitch (lead guitarist). Drummer Judy Molish joined from the band Bobsled With Needles.

A year and a half ago, Butthole and Needles decided to regroup as Betty Blowtorch. "Since we didn't have the name Butt Trumpet, we didn't have to follow any sort of punk-rock thing, like what we were stuck in before," Butthole said. "The humor is still there, because we're a bunch of funny gals. But we have guitar solos now! We wanted to play rock: Growing up, we were into Black Flag, but also into Kiss and AC/DC." Are You Man Enough? is due May 15 on Foodchain Records.

• Vanilla Ice

Vanilla Ice spent a night on ice in Florida after being arrested Wednesday following a dispute with his wife, according to the Associated Press. He was released from Broward County Jail in in Fort Lauderdale on Thursday on $3,500 bail.

The "Ice Ice Baby" rapper's night in the cooler came after he put his hand over his wife Laura's mouth to "shut her up" while the two were driving on Interstate 595, according to the news service. Vanilla Ice (born Robert Van Winkle) told police he pulled out some of his wife's hair to prevent her from jumping out of their truck's window, the report said.

"We had a heated argument," he told the news service. "That's about it. I would never hit my wife or any girl or anything like that. I love my wife, I love my kids, my life's fine, everything's good, no hitting, no drugs." AP reports that Laura Van Winkle told police she was afraid for her safety, and that their children witnessed the incident. Police told the news service that prosecutors have three weeks to file charges.

After his 1990 smash, To the Extreme,, which featured the ubiquitous "Ice Ice Baby," Vanilla Ice came out with 1994's Mind Blowin', on which he adopted a pot-smoking gangsta persona. A late-2000 effort, Skabz, has yet to find a label.

• Vanilla Ice

The Iceman keeps cometh-ing back.

Florida's father of self-reinvention, Rob Van Winkle, is polishing up his Vanilla Ice handle and finishing off a new album, "Skabz."

The title, Van Winkle said, comes from "all the sh-- I've been dragged through. It didn't kill me, but it scraped me up, and now I'm healing."

Vanilla Ice, fans and "Behind the Music" aficionados may recall, hit big in 1990 with his pop-rap album "To the Extreme," which spawned the inescapable #1 hit "Ice Ice Baby." Ice then went on to reinvent himself as a pot-smoking gangsta on his next full-length studio effort, "Mind Blowin'," and a tattooed metalhead on his 1998 LP, "Hard to Swallow."

According to Van Winkle, "Skabz" is a combination of his previous identities, a style he describes as "metal molten hip-hop," while he will continue to use his pop-chart-topping moniker.

"I wanted people to know that I'm not really trying to run from anything or hide," he said with regard to keeping his Vanilla Ice alias. "Besides, the label isn't important. Look at Prince. He changed his name, but everybody knew he was Prince."

According to Van Winkle, his new album features a celebrity-laden cast, including Lenny Kravitz, producer Ross Robinson (who handled "Hard to Swallow"), and members of Insane Clown Posse, Soulfly, S.O.D., Wu-Tang Clan, Public Enemy and Slipknot, among others.

The Insane Clown Posse's Shaggy 2 Dope and Violent J have been confirmed as participants (see "Vanilla Ice Wrestles ICP For New Album"), and sources close to Chuck D and Professor Griff confirmed that duo's participation in the project.

But Vanilla Ice has repeatedly come under fire for embellishing his resume, whether it be fictionalizing elements of his biography in the interest of garnering street cred or naming Korn as a guest on "Hard to Swallow" when that band did not contribute to the disc (see "Vanilla Ice Lands New Deal"). As for the rest of his "Scabz" claims, it seems that Van Winkle may be stretching yet again.

While Van Winkle said that Kravitz will appear on the record, a spokesperson for the rocker said that while Ice and Lenny are friends and neighbors, Kravitz did not record anything for the album.

The denial from Kravitz's camp didn't appear to bother Van Winkle. "He's on it," Ice said. "He did some vocals on a couple of tracks, played drums, guitar, co-produced -- he's all over it."

As for Van Winkle's other guests, they include mainly former and associate members of said acts, including ex-Slipknot guitarist Josh Brainard, former Soulfly drummer Roy Mayorga, ex-S.O.D. vocalist Billy Milano and Wu-Tang Clan affiliate La The Darkman.

Producer Steve Evetts told MTV he worked on four "Skabz" songs, but he said that his associate Robinson did not produce any of the tracks.

"Skabz" boasts another current trend, namely lobbing battle rhymes at Eminem. According to Ice's management, the album will include a track dissing Eminem, who has taken a number of shots at Ice, including a criticism of his new, Slim Shady-like hairstyle.

Van Winkle hopes to have the album out early next year, although he is currently in search of a label.

Meanwhile, a reworking of Ice's breakthrough hit, titled "Ice Ice Baby 2001," has been released in Europe with a new video, and the track is spawning a wave of overseas interest in the performer.

Ice also continues to perform on a regular basis in the U.S. Dates in his immediate future include Jaxx in Springfield, Virginia on October 27; Jillian's in Raleigh, North Carolina, on October 28; and a Halloween show at Chicago-area nightclub Bourbon Street.

• Vanilla Ice

How eager is Vanilla Ice to land the Insane Clown Posse for his upcoming album?

Well, Ice will join ICP at one of the Detroit duo's traveling Juggalo Championsh** Wrestling matches on May 4 in Cleveland, Ohio. The tour finds ICP steering clear of its music and instead mixing it up with pro wrestlers such as Raven, King Kong Bundy, the Iron Sheik, and others.

Vanilla will not be getting pummeled by ICP, but rather will likely be filling in for ICP's Shaggy 2 Dope, who is sitting out some dates of the tour after injuring himself at a recent stop. When JCW rolled into Milwaukee last week, Shaggy fell from the top of a steel cage, breaking his nose and his cheekbone and injuring his neck as well.

In return for Vanilla's appearance at JCW, ICP has agreed to appear on Ice's upcoming album, tentatively titled "Bomb The System." Other potential guests being tossed around include Lenny Kravitz, Wu-Tang Clan affiliate La The Darkman, and Public Enemy's Chuck D with his bandmate Professor Griff possibly producing a pair of tracks.

Steve Evetts, an associate of producer Ross Robinson, will produce the upcoming Ice offering.

• Insane Clown Posse
• Vanilla Ice

The Offspring brought the recently-revived rapper Vanilla Ice onstage during its performance at last weekend's KROQ Almost Acoustic Christmas benefit show in Los Angeles, figuring he'd be an apt choice to help out with their hit, "Pretty Fly for a White Guy."

• The Offspring
• Vanilla Ice

For those cynics who believed that Rob Van Winkle, the artist best known as Vanilla Ice, had dropped off of the musical radar, his show last week at New York's venerable punk mecca CBGB's must have been quite a surprise.

• Vanilla Ice

Just when you thought you'd forgotten all about Vanilla Ice, the man behind the early 90s pop-rap hit "Ice Ice Baby," well, he's back.

In fact, he's just signed a deal to make an album titled "Hard To Swallow." We'll see how appropriate that title is when the album arrives. Spokespeople for Mr. Ice say that the album will boast guest appearances by members of Korn and the Bloodhound Gang, however Korn's spokespeople claim that their band is not involved in the project.

While Ice told "Rolling Stone Online" a few months ago that the album was a high-energy hip-hop effort, his record label now calls it "aggressive rock."

No word yet on a release date, but Ice is already on the road where he plays Eugene, Oregon on Saturday and the Arrow Space in Seattle on Sunday.

• Vanilla Ice