Oh no… I have another idea.
This was my favorite idea.
Fall Out Boy had just announced So Much For (2our) Dust, the second leg of the So Much For (Tour) Dust tour. While figuring out which dates I was going to be able to make it to, I was also staring at photos of the llamas from Fall Out Boy’s seventh studio album MA N I A. It’s never a question of “Can I pull this off?” but, “How do I do it?” I’m stubborn and I had a hot glue gun, a dream, and I was ‘bout to go Tonya Harding on the whole world’s knee.
MA N I A is my favorite Fall Out Boy album. Originally, the album started with the EP Llamania by the fictitious band Frosty & The Nightmare Making Machine consisting of the fictional members Frosty and Royal Tea: two llamas that star in many of Fall Out Boy’s music videos for their album MA N I A. I saw these two llamas and there was no doubt in my mind that I was going to be them for the upcoming tour… but how was I going to make it functional?
At this point, I was keeping new costumes a secret from friends until I debuted them, so unfortunately, I have no progress photos of this build. These are my favorite costumes I have made, so I’ll do my best to illustrate my process.
The main recognizable features of Frosty and Royal Tea are their faces, but the original llamas are full head to toe costumes. There is no trace of the person inside, but there is some sort of visibility screen in the neck of the llama for the wearer. I knew there would be no way to be able to get into a concert with a full “mask” covering my face, and I didn’t want to have any issues enjoying the concert myself. I had already made my Cluck-Cluck Boy jacket at this point, so I was taking inspiration from that build. I wanted the llama faces to be better defined than just being the hood of a jacket, so I made the llama heads into hats (easy to remove if needed), and easy to wear and rock out with while on.
See Cluck Cluck Boy tutorial here!
The goal for the faces was to be more 3D than just being painted on. I glued soft green floral foam onto the bill of the hat and carved it to create the snouts of each llama. Green floral foam is soft, easy to manipulate, and lightweight, making it much easier to wear on my head for an extended period, as opposed to using sculpting clay. I did use a very small amount of sculpting clay to add finer details, such as the very tip of Frosty’s snout and the outside detailing of the horns on both heads. I referenced as many photos of Frosty and Royal Tea as possible and rewatched the music videos to see the llama heads from every angle. I recreated broader silhouettes; Frosty has a longer snout while Royal Tea has a shorter but wider one. Once satisfied with the general shape of the sculpted floral foam, I glued a heathered pale beige felt material on top of the foam and front of the hat for the skin of their faces.
Next, I created their unique eyes. Each llama has a very different set from the other. For Frosty’s eyes, I painted the inside of scrap pieces of plastic packaging, I painted the iris and pupils first, and the whites of the eyes over that. Painting the back of plastic results in the eyes looking glossier as opposed to the visual texture of dried paint. I glued the eyes in place on the hat on the felt and glued more felt pieces to drape over the plastic eyes to create eyelids and under eye creases. Frosty also has very prominent eyelashes, so I cut up pairs of my own falsies and glued them in place under the top eyelids. For Royal Tea’s eyes, I painted some circular pieces of cardboard black for the base. I used leftover pieces of floral foam that I wrapped in the same pale beige felt to create large brow bones to mimic the shape of Royal Tea’s dark deep-set eyes. I painted details like mouth lines and nostrils to give the faces depth, bringing their sullen dispositions to life.
Each llama also has their own set of horns that are very different from the other’s. I was worried about adding any weight on top of the hats, but I wanted to make sure the horns were textured and visible. I accomplished this by making them out of thin foam sheets and air-dry clay. First, I cut circular sectors out of foam sheets and rolled them into cones — this took some trial and error until I got them to be the length and width I wanted. Frosty’s horns are straight and narrow, but for Royal Tea’s I ended up doing 4 mini foam cones for each horn and tiered them in a way to create the rounded horn shape. I glued a very thin layer of air-dry clay to the molded foam cones, then used a small wire brush to create texture on the surfaces. Once dried, I used acrylic paint to color the horns yellow and gray, followed by a coat of mod podge acrylic sealer spray. E6000 epoxy glue was used to secure the horns on top of the respective llama hats, followed by a quick ring of hot glue to immediately hold them in place while the epoxy dried.
Next, I added the fabric for the fur on top of the head which would be the same material used for the body of the jacket. This would cohesively match the jacket to the hat. I used the same method of deconstructing a soft shag blanket as I did prior for my Cluck-Cluck Boy costume. I was familiar with the material and knew it would give that soft fur-like texture that I wanted for these llamas. I purchased the same blanket I used for the prior project, but in white and gray. I unstitched both blankets to pull apart the fur fabric to be able to use for the llama jackets.
I wanted these llama jackets to be styled like an oversized puffer jacket, so I purchased two purple oversized fleece jackets for the base. I chose purple jackets this time so the inside lining would be in theme with the colors of MA N I A. I did a similar technique of drawing a pattern onto the fabric from tracing the jacket I would use as the base. You can accomplish this by tracing a larger shadow around the body and arms of the jacket onto the back of the fabric to cut out, pinning the cut fabric to the existing jacket, and sewing it on to the exterior of the fleece jackets. The fur-like fabric will hide all the stitches from sewing, and honestly a little hot glue can go a long way to attached pieces that may be harder to sew.
I glued pieces of the same fur-like fabric onto the exterior of the hat, which filled in spaces around the llama faces and horns, completing the uniform look. Both Frosty and Royal Tea have ears on either side of their heads, so I free-handed teardrop shapes out of the thin foam paper and glued more of the same fabric onto it to create the ears. I attached the ears onto the hats right under where the horns sat. I also sewed a clear bra strap to each side of the hat under the ears to work as an adjustable chin strap, which kept the weighted hat on my head during wear.
Since the llama head hats were going to be the star of the costume, I wanted the rest to be simple and comfortable. I used my Cricut to cut out iron-on letters to spell out “Frosty” and “Royal Tea” and ironed them onto purple tank tops. I purchased white and purple sweatpants to finish the “fluffy” and comfortably oversized look for the llama costumes.
I also cut out more iron-on material to add “MA N I A” letters to detail the back of both jackets. During the first leg of So Much for (Tour) Dust, the only song Fall Out Boy played off MA N I A was “Last of The Real Ones.” I hoped for more of the purple album for the upcoming tour, but regardless I was excited to rep my favorite album in my new Frosty llama costume. My partner, Madi, helped complete my llama vision by wearing the Royal Tea costume I made to the first show of the second leg of tour in Portland, Oregon.
During the Tour Dust shows, lead singer Patrick Stump has a window of time to play whatever comes to mind on piano. On the first date of (2our) Dust, to a surprise to everyone including perhaps himself, he did a beautiful stripped-down medley of “Young And Menace,” the first single ever released for MA N I A. Bewildered, my friends and I were screaming, rejoicing, crying, and there I was in the pit dressed as a llama from the forgotten album. This was a warning and a promise of more insanity to come for the rest of the second leg of the tour.
Madi and I wore the llama costumes once again for Fall Out Boy’s sold-out Madison Square Garden show in New York City, which ended up being professionally recorded and available on the streaming site Veeps. There I was again, immortalized into the show as a llama, dancing and truly being young and a menace.
