Been There/Done That

Carnivolution

by Holly Otterbein

Every second Fri., 8 p.m., $7, Ellen Powell Tiberino Memorial Museum, 3819 Hamilton St., 215-386-3784, www.tiberinomuseum.com

Sometimes things are a little too civilized for my taste. I want less frosted-tip pretty boys and more smelly lumberjacks; less Whole Foods and more foraging; less Making Time and more sword-swallowing heathens drinking that freedom wine. Carnivolution, a six-hour musical freak show, is just what the shaman ordered to cure that 9-to-5 kink in my psyche.

The Tiberino family, a Philadelphia powerhouse of artistic talent, hosts the party in their West Philly home/art museum, The Ellen. Named for the family's late matriarch, the gallery is one part Swiss Family Robinson and one part Michelangelo, with a heaping spoonful of voodoo. The paintings, sculptures and murals of mother Ellen and her survivors (husband Joseph, daughter Ellen and sons Gabriel, Latif and Raphael) are political, sensual and cover every damn millimeter of their five-building labyrinth. I step into one room and find a Catholic shrine with hundreds of crosses pinned to the wall. The next room is all animal busts and naked chicks.

Did I forget to mention the masochistic clowns and the carnie band outside? Sorry, but that's how it goes at The Ellen: You meet one flowy-skirt-wearing lady and she leads you to the tree house, where you dance to local Zappa-worshipping band The Hydrogen Jukebox. Then you look to the stage, where a septum-pierced punk staples money to his forehead and a Bettie Page look-alike shakes it topless. If you're not ready, it'll leave you running home to that civilization you thought you were too cool for.