In North America, a sideshow is an extra, secondary production associated with a circus, carnival, fair, or other such attraction.
Pigface is an American industrial rock supergroup formed in 1990 by Martin Atkins and William Rieflin.
Gwar, often stylized as GWAR, is an American heavy metal band formed in Richmond, Virginia in 1984, composed of and operated by a frequently rotating line-up of musicians, artists, and filmmakers collectively known as Slave Pit Inc. Since the death of frontman and lead singer Dave Brockie in 2014, the collective has continued recording and performing without any of its founding artists or musicians.
The Jim Rose Circus is a modern-day version of a circus sideshow. It was founded in Seattle in 1991 by Jim Rose and his wife BeBe Aschard Rose. The sideshow, then called the "Jim Rose Circus Sideshow", came to prominence to an American audience as a second stage show at the 1992 Lollapalooza festival. although they had toured the Northwest and Canada and had several US TV appearances before this time. Rolling Stone magazine called the show an "absolute must-see act" and USA Today termed Rose's troupe "Lollapalooza's word-of-mouth hit attraction".
Erik Sprague, known professionally as the Lizardman, is an American freak show and sideshow performer. He is best known for his body modification, including his sharpened teeth, full-body tattoo of green scales, bifurcated tongue, subdermal implants and green-inked lips.
This Toilet Earth is the fourth album released by heavy metal band Gwar. Released on March 29, 1994, this album was to be one of their oddest and most bittersweet albums. It was the first Gwar album to be censored, due to their gain in popularity as a result of MTV exposure. The music and artwork is almost cartoonish when compared to the previous albums, and the instrumentation had expanded to include horns that reinforce the goofiness. An instrumental version of the song "Jack the World" was also featured in the Beavis and Butt-Head video game for the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo Entertainment System.
Ragnarök is the fifth album by the rock/heavy metal/punk band Gwar. It was released on October 24, 1995, on Metal Blade Records and contains the most varied vocal stylings of any Gwar album, with the majority of band members singing at least one track.
Alia Vulnavia Phibes is an American illustrator known for her slick, retro-inspired images, cartoons and pinups.
America Must Be Destroyed is American heavy metal band Gwar’s third album, released in 1992 as their second album on Metal Blade Records. The album’s lyrical content was inspired by controversy over obscenity charges against the band and an incident in Charlotte, North Carolina in which frontman Dave Brockie’s prosthetic penile attachment, "The Cuttlefish of Cthulhu", was confiscated by police officers.
Carnival of Chaos is Gwar's sixth studio album, released on March 25, 1997, by Metal Blade Records.
The Enigma is an American sideshow performer, actor, and musician who has undergone extensive body modification, including horn implants, ear reshaping, multiple body piercings, and a full-body jigsaw-puzzle tattoo. His tattooing process began on December 20, 1992, under the needle of Katzen the Tiger Lady, whom he later married, and has since divorced. To date, the Enigma has had more than two hundred tattoo artists work on him, with as many as twenty-three tattoos underway at one time.
Techno Destructo is a former character in the American heavy metal band Gwar, depicted as their long-term nemesis. The character was portrayed and created by Gwar co-founder Hunter Jackson.
A traveling carnival, usually simply called a carnival, travelling funfair or travelling show, is an amusement show that may be made up of amusement rides, food vendors, merchandise vendors, games of chance and skill, thrill acts, and animal acts. A traveling carnival is not set up at a permanent location, like an amusement park or funfair, but is moved from place to place. Its roots are similar to the 19th century circus with both being fitted-up in open fields near or in town and moving to a new location after a period of time. In fact, many carnivals have circuses while others have a clown aesthetic in their decor. Unlike traditional Carnival celebrations, the North American traveling carnival is not tied to a religious observance.
A freak show is an exhibition of biological rarities, referred to in popular culture as "freaks of nature". Typical features would be physically unusual humans, such as those uncommonly large or small, those with intersex variations, those with extraordinary diseases and conditions, and others with performances expected to be shocking to viewers. Heavily tattooed or pierced people have sometimes been seen in freak shows, as have attention-getting physical performers such as fire-eating and sword-swallowing acts.
Rosemary's Billygoat is an American heavy metal/hard rock band formed in Los Angeles' South Bay in 1991, consisting of singer Mike Odd, guitarist Neal Gargantua, bassist Pat Trick and drummer Paul Bearer.
Stanislaus Berent was an American performer who performed at many freak shows, including the World Circus Sideshow in 1941 under the stage name of Sealo the Seal Boy. He was known for his seal-like arms, which were caused by a congenital medical condition known as phocomelia. In 2001, Mat Fraser's play inspired by Sealo called Sealboy: Freak debuted.
Jo Weldon, commonly known as Jo Boobs or Jo Boobs Weldon, is a performer, author, activist, and educator based in New York City. Weldon's body of work centers around stripping and striptease. She established and runs The New York School of Burlesque and wrote The Burlesque Handbook. She is an advocate for sex workers' rights and freedom of sexual expression.
The California Institute of Abnormalarts - also written as the California Institute of Abnormal Arts and abbreviated as CIA - was a nightclub and sideshow museum located in North Hollywood, California. Owned and operated by actor-screenwriter Carl Crew and Robert Ferguson, the venue primarily hosted underground musical groups, performance art, movie screenings and sideshow acts including burlesque and freak shows. The club closed in July 2022.
Colette Miller is an American visual artist and performer. She currently lives in Los Angeles. Miller is best known for creating the Global Angel Wings project in 2012 and as a performer in the heavy metal band Gwar during its formative years between 1986–1987 Colette created the interactive street art project the GlobalAngelWingsProject in 2012 "To Remind Humanity that We are the Angels of this Earth". Miller has created and installed angel wings in countries and cities ranging from Kenya to Mexico to Cuba to Australia, Dubai, Moscow, Europe Japan, China earning her international and critical renown. In 2015, an image of a soldier walking in front of the artist's wings in Juarez, Mexico, was featured in Reuters and BBC News as the international photograph of the day. In 2022 she appeared on the ABC show To Tell The Truth.
