M.B. Mulkey has a rule about lyrics: if you’re not going into specifics, they don’t believe you. It’s a standard they hold others to and themselves to first. Their new album Gettin’ Hungry is full of the kind of details that make a song feel like it was written in your living room — a cat named Momo, a Spam can repurposed into a one-string instrument (aka, the Spam-jo), a love-slash-hate letter to Weezer. The kind of hyper-specific subject matter that could make you think, “Damn, are you me?”
If you’ve been around Raleigh’s folk punk scene long enough, you’ll quickly recognize M.B.’s excited and warm presence. They’ve spent the past year quietly building toward this release, one self-produced single at a time. It’s been an impressively DIY operation; tracked at home, mixed in headphones, reality-checked in the car. And that scrappiness is inseparable from what makes the music work.
What’s something you’ve been listening to lately?
M.B.: I’m seeing The Wonder Years tonight, so I’ve been listening to the album they’re currently touring, but that feels like a boring answer. A better one is Cherub Seraph, a local artist who just released two songs I produced. I don’t want it to come across as self-promotion, but they’re very good songs and worth the listen.
The new HappyHappy album [I’m Glad My Sisters Got One] has been really good too. They’re like a synthier, early AJJ but focused on trans issues; really good stuff. I’ve also been listening to a lot of Jeff Rosenstock lately.
I’m always trying to branch out into different genres. Right now, I’ve been getting into ’70s dance music. I’ve really been enjoying “Yes Sir, I Can Boogie” by Baccara. If anybody wants to reach out with recommendations in a similar vein to that song, I’m all ears.
When you first got into music, who was the first artist you remember either discovering that you just completely took on as your own and obsessed over?
M.B.: I grew up near Norfolk, Virginia, on the Carolina coast but close to the Virginia border, so we spent a lot of time up there. Every year, they put on something called Harborfest, a free festival that used to get really hip, happening bands. There was one year where Langhorne Slim & The Law were playing on the same day as The Head and the Heart, right when [the latter] were starting to take off and [the former] had just released The Way We Move. The Langhorne Slim set was at like 3 p.m., and there were maybe only 20 or 25 people sitting there watching.
There was a moment where he came out into the crowd and sang right in front of us, and he was such a good performer that I bought a CD and got a t-shirt right there. I didn’t realize he had solo material beyond the one album with his band. Afterward, I was checking out Langhorne Slim Facebook groups, asking if anyone knew which songs he’d played at Harborfest, because I could only find five of them on the album. Turns out he had, like, four more albums.
Whenever I find somebody with an extensive discography, I get so excited, which is part of why I’m constantly releasing music myself. I hope someday there’s at least one M.B. nerd who stumbles upon it all and thinks, holy shit, there’s so much here to listen to. Langhorne Slim is really what got me into making folk music in general.
And then Modern Baseball got me into the emo side. I put on Sports to fall asleep on a road trip, and I literally had a dream that I was seeing them play live. Unfortunately, I never got a chance to actually see them, but Langhorne Slim and Modern Baseball were two huge ones for me at different points in my life.
It sounds like lyricism is really central to what you love about music. Can you talk about that?
M.B.: Lyrics are truly my favorite part of music. I love it all as a whole, but when lyricism can be really clever and well said, it just tickles a part of my brain. One of my favorite bands of all time is Relient K because Matt Thiessen has such witty writing. Some of it is puns; it can feel corny, but there’s something about it. And that applies to Lil Wayne‘s punchlines, too. Any sort of witty lyricism, I love it.
I mentioned HappyHappy; there have been lyrics of theirs that just made me think, “Holy shit, this feels like me in another universe writing these.” I never want my own music to feel disingenuous. I never want it to feel like it’s not coming from a personal place. I saw a local band a couple years ago opening for World’s Greatest Dad — who are a fantastic emo band, by the way — and the chorus was basically just “I’m so sad, I have depression.” That’s all it was. And I was like, “This is the fakest thing I’ve ever heard.” I don’t want to make music like that. I genuinely do have depression and anxiety, and I will sing about those things, but if you’re not going into specifics, I don’t believe you.
Let’s talk about the new record. What was the process for putting it together?
M.B.: Similar to my first record, Dog, I self-produced everything. I love that process because it’s work-at-your-own-speed. I’ve always had trouble in a studio setting due to nerves, but when it’s just me and my guitar, sitting down for an hour to track a guitar take, I feel great about it.
The writing actually started around March of last year. I also lead something of a Hannah Montana double life — I do a lot of improv and sketch comedy with my group, Newt Work, which takes up a lot of time and energy. But last year I released an EP called songs post blizzard, which I was really glad to see make your year-end list, because it was literally just recorded on my phone.
That was the beginning of me releasing steady singles toward this album. “weezer rulez” was the first of those; my love-slash-hate ballad for Weezer. People had heard me play it live and kept asking where they could listen to it, so I figured it was time to record it. Then, later in the year, I released “Chomp n Chew” after persistent encouragement from Gil of Boygirl Rising. I’d written that one a couple of years prior and played it once at Schoolkids Records. Gil just texted me one day, randomly, asking about that song, and that was enough to make me go back and record it. Those ended up being the two main singles off the album.
For the actual recording process, I start with bare-bones tracks. Acoustic guitar and vocals first, maybe a melodica part if I can hear one early on. The melodica is all over this record, way more than any of my previous releases. There are ten songs on the album, and I think eight or nine of them have melodica. From there, it’s a lot of listening back over and over again, picking out what each song needs. I’m pretty good at isolating individual instruments when I listen to music, so I try to do that in reverse with my own work: hear the bare track and ask what bass line belongs here, would washboard percussion work here, things like that.
Is there a moment on the album you’re most proud of production-wise?
M.B.: The fifth track, “Unscathed (Good Grief)”. I have this instrument that’s been hanging on my wall for years. It’s basically a Spam can with a long stick and a single banjo string attached to the bottom. It makes this very twangy, percussive sound. I took it to a folk punk jam session once, and everybody started calling it the Spam-jo, so that’s what it’s known as now.
That song sounds happy but has pretty heavy lyrics. It’s the first song I’ve written about the loss of my cat Momo, who passed away about a year and a half ago. It really affected me, so I wanted something that lightened the mood a little. I think that’s part of what works so well about the AJJ side of folk punk, that somewhat upbeat sound paired with lyrics that, when you actually listen, hit somewhere personal. So I tuned the Spam-jo to E-flat and just let it rip, then threw some melodica behind it, playing the same riff. It sounds really good, I’m really happy with it.
It’s a lot of learning the hard way. A lot of it sounds great in headphones, but when I take it to the car, it sounds like shit, and I have to readjust. I’m using a drum pad for the first time on this album, and I’ve really tried hard to get an authentic drum sound from it. It makes me feel like a faker sometimes, being in a folk-punk scene with a lot of acoustic instruments.
Shout-out to everyone out there making a living in production. I just really want to learn how to do the whole thing myself, and I think the best way to do it is through making my own music.
I’d be remiss not to bring up Slugfest — the third iteration is coming up. You played the first one, right? You’ve seen the full trajectory.
M.B.: I was the very first artist on the first Slugfest. Nobody will deny that year was kind of a mess. There was a miscommunication with the venue about the PA system, so I ended up starting an hour and a half late. But last year was run so tightly, it was like a completely different festival. I’m so excited for year three. There’s an extra day added on so there are even more artists; it’s going to be fantastic.
HappyHappy is playing Saturday night, and I’m so hyped about it. They’re one of the artists I discovered through the Slugfest ecosystem. Myles Bullen is also on Saturday, who I just played a show with recently. Also, just a really great artist.
But beyond the lineup, Slugfest is just a really special thing, especially as a queer person in the South. Having these pockets — whether it’s one day, two days, or three days — of being surrounded by other queer freaks, I mean that in the best way, as someone who’s part of it. There’s a song by The Homeless Gospel Choir where Derek Zanetti lays out a vision of a queer, liberal utopian community. “No police because we’re all helping each other,” that whole vibe. When I listen to that song, Slugfest feels like the closest thing I’ll ever get to that. It’s the community’s family reunion. That’s really the best way to put it. And it’s where I finally felt like people genuinely connected with my music.
The first show I played for Ocean and their friends was the first time it felt like people really fucked with what I had to say. Ocean — who I hadn’t even really met at that point — yelled out “My pussy pops for M.B. Mulkey” in the middle of my set. That’s just how Ocean is; they’re just fantastic. But it was the first time I could tell people were genuinely relating to my lyrics, that they were that specific kind of queer person in the South who is actively pushing back, keeping queerness in the South rather than fleeing north. It’s a great community.
Who are some local or NC-specific artists you really love or want to shout out?
M.B.: Henry Luther is technically from South Carolina, but he plays constantly in NC, and I think he recently listed NC on his Instagram as well. He’s basically an NC artist at this point and has played all three Slugfests. Bobby’s Oar is another one I toured with last year. Fantastic folk punk singer-songwriter, and he also plays drums in Long Relief, who are a great band.
Pat Van Buren and Paul Petrol are both fantastic. The three of us released a split last year called Paul Van Mulkey, which I keep bringing up not to self-promote but because they’re both great local artists.
Cami is fantastic. Peytopia is fantastic. I also want to shout out my twin, who makes music under Great Horse; they just released an album called Henry.
Shotgun Princess and Miss Angel Bird are fantastic Richmond artists. Americans Abroad played the first two Slugfests and are also great. There’s also a really great emo scene in Virginia Beach, that’s where I cut my teeth as a youth. Padfoot is one of the best emo bands of all time. And I Fight Vampires.
Bruise Wheel, out of Winston-Salem, is a fantastic clown-folk punk band. Oh man, there are so many artists to name. And I’ll just say: Richmond and Raleigh both have fantastic scenes, and I’d love to see more show-swapping between the two capitals.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
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