Getting to Know… Gorilla Wizard | Interview 🎤

In the 302^nd Q&A in our Getting to Know… series, we get the inside scoop (and very colorful responses) from metal band, Gorilla Wizard.

“Well, for starters, our guitarist and main songwriter (who goes by the name of 🎙 Bertrum) is a 10,000-year-old gorilla who wields unfathomable magical power, so there’s that.” Um… thanks 🎙 Gorilla Wizard… we think. Never heard that 302 Q&As in on The Musical Hype! The metal collective provides more ‘musical clarity’ after that initial response: “Other than that, our unique blend of stoner, death, and doom metals usually does the trick.” Like our many other Getting to Know Q&As, we get the inside scoop on Gorilla Wizard’s genesis, goals, musical influences, and of course, current, and future musical endeavors. Our burning questions are colorfully answered by 🎙 Gaben (vocals), who apparently handles screeches, bellows, grunts, and moans… So, without further ado, let’s jump right into 🎤 Getting to Know… Gorilla Wizard: Interview No. 302!

For those who may not be familiar with Gorilla Wizard, what would you say makes you distinct or unique? How do you rock the audience’s socks off?

🎤 Well, for starters, our guitarist and main songwriter (who goes by the name of 🎙 Bertrum) is a 10,000-year-old gorilla who wields unfathomable magical power, so there’s that.  Other than that, our unique blend of stoner, death, and doom metals usually does the trick.  Either that or Bertrum simply magicked their socks off to use for spare banana storage.

Okay, let’s explore some juicy backstories. How did Gorilla Wizard form and what were some of the goals or visions you had early on?

🎤 Bertrum, being 10,000 or so years old, has undertaken a myriad of studies, hobbies, and adventures over the millennia, but most recently became intrigued with experiencing the low-end rumble of starting a metal band.  Through a mixture of magic, bribery, and brute force, Bertrum managed to coerce 🎙 Ry (bass), 🎙 Mikal (drums), and myself [Gaben] (vocals) to jam on his crude tunes, eventually joining us together into a semi-functional band.  Despite our best efforts, the concept of band-naming didn’t really resonate with him, so he named it after what he is: a Gorilla Wizard.

Our only goals early on were simply to capture the magic (pun intended) that we managed to conjure up in recorded form before Bertrum was imminently scheduled to enter one of his every-century-or-so hibernative states (also known as an ultra nap, or super slumber).

Let’s talk more about goals.  Have your goals or your perspectives changed since first starting out? What do your aspirations or goals look like now?

🎤 We’ve all learned that starting a band with an ancient gorilla (whose farts can sear the hair from your arm if you get caught in the blast radius) is a terrible idea.  But yet we keep coming back for more of that banana-sweet riffage.  It’s been a lot of work, but we’ve gotten Bertrum to really expand his musical horizons and explore even gnarlier forms of metal.  We’ve even encouraged him to share some of his heroic tales with us (via cauldron-huffing vision quests) and we’re really dedicated to getting some of those epic yarns out there.

Everybody is influenced by somebody else. Whom would you consider some of your biggest musical influences and how are they influential?

🎤 We definitely try to pull from a wide range of influences, and we try to make our songs as multifaceted as possible without disappearing up our own hairy buttholes in a prog-fueled autoerotic asphyxiation ritual.  In any given song, we can seamlessly explore the grody sludge of Crowbar, the soaring power of Dio, the depressive mope of Alice in Chains, and the crushing death of Entombed, amongst others.  We try to cherry-pick the best of the best from multiple genres and weave it into our 8-string-imbued tunes because we want our heavy stuff to smash as hard as possible and our melodies to be as infectious as we can get them.

Ah, the fun stuff.  What’s your craziest tour story or the wackiest thing that’s happened during a performance?  Feel free to be creative.

🎤 All our performances have some element of the bizarre when your band is helmed by a magical gorilla who can transcend time and space.  We’ve engaged in gratuitous orb-wielding, banana-chip-communion-wafer offerings, instrument-juggling, secret banana carving messages, all while enduring Bertrum’s potent stage-fright flatulence.

Up until this point in your career, what would you describe as your favorite song you’ve recorded or performed live? What makes that song special?  

🎤 All our songs are our warp-energy infused, celestial-space-deity-possessed babies, but thus far 🎵 “Smashosaurus” is a perennial live staple because it absolutely crushes while being incredibly fun to play.  Our 2021 single, 🎵 “Infinite Wave” might be our overall favorite though, as it took almost zero arguing to bring to fruition!  Plus, it’s catchy as hell.  However, some of our new songs are giving the “Wave” a run for its money! 

Is there anything else awesome, cool, or left of center the world should know about you? Secret talents or surprising tidbits?

🎤 Bertrum once concocted a potion from the detritus from under a couch seat cushion he found by the side of the road that made every word you hear turn into “orb” while neon yellow goo poured from your belly button.  Despite that, he’s an all-around good ape and we joke that he’s so well-liked that it should be six degrees of Bertrum, not Kevin Bacon.  Ry can throw a fastball in excess of 200 mph, but bursts into tears every time he does it, so the MLB won’t touch him.  Instead, he focuses on being a fantastic filmmaker and director (check out his work on our videos for 🎵 “Maple Crunch”, 🎵 “At War With Our Past Selves” and the forthcoming 🎵 “Trash Master”).  Mikal can feel each and every one of his hairs at all times, even while sleeping.  And boy does he love it.  He’s been known to lend his drum talents for multiple bands, such as Kaiju Daisenso, Favoritje, amongst others.  I once saw a goat and thought it was merely OK.  I do arts sometimes, scream sing and play guitar in Kaiju Daisenso, Saladin and Edessa.

Closing out, what is … Gorilla Wizard currently working on, promoting that you can share with us or want us to know about? We love secrets, but there’s no pressure. 

🎤 We are mere weeks away from releasing our new extended play presentation, 💿 White Knuckle/Black Magic.  It rips so hard doctors recommend listening to it while underwater.  It crushes so good, politicians have tried to destroy the masters because they fear its influence.  It is so damn tasty, multiple fast-food chains have been wining and dining us for cross-promotional marketing campaigns, all of which we’ve denied.  We’re doing this for the metals, folks, not for the munnies.  We already released a banana-riffic video for our first single, 🎵 “At War With Our Past Selves” and will be releasing a truly awesome video for 🎵 “Trash Master” when the EP drops.  Bertrum has even tried his hairy hand at music video direction with 🎵 “No Replacement For Displacement” which will drop within a couple of weeks!

Thank you so much for sharing and taking the time to answer these questions, and best of luck moving forward. 

In the words of Bertrum, “oooooooooooook.”

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Getting to Know… Gorilla Wizard: Interview No. 302 [📷: Brent Faulkner, Darkmoon_Art, Gorilla Wizard, luis2500gx, The Musical Hype, Pixabay, OpenClipart-Vectors]