bongzilla

As you can hear,” Mikey “Muleboy” Makela croaks between coughing jags, “I haven’t stopped or slowed down at all. And I’m not stopping, even for this interview.” ¶ The Bongzilla bassist/vocalist (and former guitarist) is sputtering out his response to Decibel asking whether liberalizing attitudes and growing decriminalization/legalization across the United States and around the world have changed his relationship with the leafy green substance his band have circled their professional and personal wagons around since, well, forever. ¶ “Well, it’s not legal in Wisconsin, but here in Madison they’ve decriminalized it to where you can carry a quarter-pound legally and you can smoke legally on private property,” he elaborates. “I also quit drinking, which has increased my smoking amount. [Laughs] I’ll eat about 300-500 mg of edibles a day, plus smoke half a gram of shatter and maybe a quarter or an eighth of weed a day. So, it’s not like I’m doing crazy, crazy amounts. The biggest change for us is that it makes life easier on tour—not that I can remember what touring is like—because in legal and nonlegal states alike, you can get really good marijuana anywhere.”

In direct contradiction to Muleboy diversifying his intake portfolio and increasing the amount of THC easy-riding into his system, he and his bandmates—guitarist Jeff “Spanky” Schultz and drummer Mike “Magma” Henry—have amazingly managed to belie the stereotype of lazy stoners baked out on the couch with red eyes and Cheetostained fingers. Bongzilla’s newest and fifth full-length, Weedsconsin, continues the tradition of hazy stoner doom fronting pot puns, smoking songs and reverence for head shop culture with probably the rawest, sludgiest and dirtiest offering of their stash. (“We had a running joke in the studio, calling ourselves the ‘All-Bong Brothers Band.’”) Bongzilla took advantage of the first wave of the pandemic to finish the album, and being off the road for a year has allowed them to maintain a regular practice schedule with the result being a creative flurry, including the christening of their own imprint, Gungeon Records.

“When we first got back together [after a hiatus from 2009-’15],” Muleboy hacks, “in the first two or three years, we probably wrote three songs because [ex-bassist] Cooter Brown was living in Minneapolis, Spanky lives in Green Bay, and when we would get together, it was to practice for shows or tours. Cooter left, I started playing bass, and we were on tour for three days when COVID hit. Suddenly, we were getting together twice as week, every week, and we wrote Weedsconsin, a 7-inch for Wake Brewing, then a split with Tons. We’re also doing a Gungeon split 7-inch series with us and Boris, Bridge City Sinners, Weedeater, Dopethrone and possibly Pig Destroyer. I just got high and started calling friends one night. There was definitely a silver lining to that crazy COVID cloud.”