On August 2, while OutKast headlined the second night of Lollapalooza in Grant Park, Bongripper capped a two-day DIY bash called Gnarfest with a free set at the Illinois Centennial Monument in Logan Square. The local instrumental doom band stood at the head of the broad steps that lead to the monument, its column at their backs. Hundreds of fans filled the stairs and lawn around and beneath them (or sat atop the monument’s high marble base), nodding their heads in slow unison as Bongripper plowed through “Into Ruin,” the grim, lumbering 28-minute track that closes 2014’s Miserable.
But almost in spite of themselves, Bongripper occupy a prominent place in Chicago metal—and increasingly, in metal at large. Dellacroce says about 11,000 people have downloaded Miserable since the band released it as a pay-what-you-want download via Bandcamp in July (it’s now $5). According to Bandcamp chief curator Andrew Jervis, Miserable was among the top-selling Chicago albums on the site last year, both in number of sales and in the total amount fans spent on it. Bongripper have sold a fair amount of vinyl too—the first pressing for Miserable was 1,000 copies, and the double LPs sold out in three days at $22 a pop.
“Our early stuff was like bad high school metal—Slayer rip-off shit and whatever,” Dellacroce says. “It ended up turning more kind of like grindy tech-death metal kind of shit.”
“Every practice, instead of playing songs, we just did improv doom,” Dellacroce says. “Then we ended up recording an album and got a few crappy shows and played some shows that people didn’t like.”
“Everything about our track record should scream that no one should listen to us,” Dellacroce says.
“I’m really lucky that this has worked out this way,” Petzke says. “I get to hang out with my best friends every week, play music that I really like, and now, on occasion, fly to cool places and play for people who are equally stoked about the things we’re doing.”
