Jim Lucio has always admired the unusual.
As a child, he developed a fascination with horror movies such as Night of the Living Dead. Now an adult, Lucio gives life to the oddities of his imagination.
For the past few years, Lucio has dreamt up and planned abnormal parties and concerts at local venues such as the Ottobar. He organized a huge pillow fight during a concert by the rock band Living Things.
Lucio was also the man behind last year's infamous Nightmare Before Thanksgiving Party, which featured women wrestling in a tub of cranberry sauce. Filmmaker John Waters was in attendance.
"I just like the idea of a celebration of weirdness or freakishness," Lucio said.
His newest event, the Freaker's Ball, is Saturday at the Ottobar. He thought of the idea a while back and is finally bringing it to fruition this weekend.
"I just come up with a name or idea for something and then work around that," Lucio said. "I thought of the name and wanted to turn it into a party."
Saturday's event is technically the second ball Lucio has organized. When President Bush was inaugurated in 2005, Lucio threw an Inaugural Bawl, and guests wore Nazi-style armbands with the letter "W" on them.
The Freaker's Ball is much less politically motivated and more of a party, Lucio said.
"There are so many balls where you think of debutantes and blue-blood parties that I have nothing to do with or any interest in attending," he said. "It's just an excuse to have a party for the other side. I booked bands that fit that bill."
The keystone to the Freaker's Ball is Ginger Coyote, a renowned figure in the punk scene for the past three decades. Coyote, who has shared the stage with the Ramones, Blondie and other punk luminaries, will be the ball's headliner and MC.
"I'm very excited to have her," Lucio said. "I kind of worked the rest of the night around her."
The ball starts in the midafternoon. Lucio enlisted five teenage punk groups for the show - most of which have never played a gig of this size before.
Lucio, a graphic designer for the City Paper, also runs a blog under his alias, Defekto. He needed a domain name, and "Defekto" just seemed to fit, he said. Now, more people are calling him by his alias than his real name, a fact he semireluctantly accepts.
"It kind of stuck, and people just started to refer to me as that word," Lucio said.
Recently, Lucio was at jury duty, and a woman approached him and asked, "Are you Defekto?'"
"I am, I guess," he responded.
Lucio promotes his events on his blog and MySpace site. He hopes the Freaker's Ball will be one in a series of balls he organizes in the coming year or so. He wants each one to be better than the last, he said.
"I just feel like I need to do something bigger each time."
sam.sessa@baltsun.com
The Freaker's Ball is Saturday at the Ottobar. Doors open at 3 p.m., and the show starts at 3:30 p.m. Tickets are $10 in advance and $12 the day of the show. The venue is at 2549 N. Howard St. For more information, call 410-662-0069 or go to theottobar.com.