WHY I'M BADASS: Matthew J. McBride

There comes a time in every journalist's career where it is better to just ask the questions and let the interview subject answers without any input from the interviewer. No fluffing the questions, no investiture of personality. Just bare bones and break-neck. This is that time.

However, it wouldn't be a WHY I'M BADASS interview without a little preamble, so I offer you this.

I took his advice - over there on the right! ;)

He is a warrior-poet. A slab of tenderized meat riding a turbo-charged hell-hound. He is force of nature. He's younger than me, and looks it, yet he's got kids older than I am. He's a drug laced gumbo of hubris, audacity, and pure maniacal genius with a generous helping of bonhomie.

Put your mitts together for Matthew J. McBride, total badass.

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JHJ: Why are you badass? Please explain your badassery.

MJM: I’m badass because I once had to fight five guys at the same time—then went to work the next day with five broken bones in my face and used a chainsaw for ten hours in the heat. After that, I wrote a letter to the newspaper about the Chief of Police and the Prosecuting Attorney and I publicly humiliated them for turning a blind eye to the law. In fact, I’d like to do it again. Sheriff Chris Heitman, of Maries County, Missouri, you, sir, are a pussy for not doing your job. PA Terry Delany Schwartz, you are nothing more than a piece of sweaty ball sack lent.

JHJ: What’s the most bad-fucking-ass thing you’ve ever done?

MJM: I once outran the police on my motorcycle and the deputy was going so fast trying to catch me that his sirens blew off the cop car and he was forced to reattach them with duck tape. I parked my bike in a friend’s garage and called my wife to come and get me. After that, we drove through town drinking beer in her Tahoe and laughed as the cops searched for me.

JHJ: How many weapons do you own (not including your hands)?

MJM: Everything is a weapon. As a badass, everyday I’m surrounded by weapons. Any common household item is a weapon when you’re a badass. You can kill a man with a newspaper if you know how, and I do. Ink pin? Weapon. That stapler over there, yeah, try coming after me once I staple your eyes shut. A can of hairspray = weapon. Why? Because I’ll mace you and then I’ll set your face on fire. I collect hardback books and I’ll hit you in the teeth with the spine if I have to.

JHJ: Even badasses have a soft side. A mark of a true badass is to be able to admit his or her love. What do you love without stint or reservation? (If you say “My kids” or “My cat” you are not badass. Those are given. Be bold.)

MJM: I love shotguns, chainsaws, and hand grenades. That’s about as soft as my badass exterior will allow. If a badass does have a soft side, then he is not a true badass, he is a candyass—and nobody likes a candyass.

JHJ: What’s the most badass book ever written?

MJM: FRANK SINATRA IN… oh, wait a minute. I’m going to go with WINTER’S BONE. Although KNOCKEMSTIFF was pretty badass. Damn. They both had a profound effect on me. Coin toss.

JHJ: What’s the most badass movie you’ve ever seen?

MJM: THE MATRIX was pretty badass, but so was PULP FICTION. Damn, again. My inability to choose just confirms what I’ve already suspected. 100% BADASS. Only a true badass would have trouble deciding which is more badass.

JHJ: When you’re out and about, being a total fucking badass, what music do you listen to?

MJM: iPod. At the gym or on the motorcycle, it’s hard shit. Lamb of God, Pantera, Bullet for my Valentine, Atreyu, Job For A Cowboy. When I’m out and about, doing other badass stuff, its hip-hop or gangster rap. With a shitload of bass. I like to try’n blow my 12-inch Kicker Competition subs apart.

JHJ: You ever kill a man? Describe how you’d kill your worst enemy. Make it good.

MJM: Not yet—but when I do, I’ll cut his head off with a chainsaw and he won’t like it. Then I’ll do a burnout in the pool of blood that forms around his headless body with my crotch rocket. After that, I’ll pound a shot of gasoline and drink motor oil through a funnel.

JHJ: How would you dispose of his/her body?

MJM: I’d crush the bones and snort the dust, then burn the skin and eat the meat.

JHJ: When you’re at the Badass Cave, cold chilling with your significant other(s) – and you guys are going to drink and feast and get freaky. Describe that badass night – your meal, your music, your drink. Getting your badass super-freak on. Don’t be shy. We’re all freaks here.

MJM: A perfect badass night would begin with the consumption of alcoholic beverages. We’d begin by riding waverunners on the river, because we live on a river. More alcohol would be consumed, I’m sure of this. We also live on a farm, and since we kill our own meat around here, I’d throw steaks, venison, or chicken on the grill—along with an abundance of bacon, which I have in strong supply. More drinks.

In the background I’d set the mood with Old Blue Eyes. We’d eat and drink as the sun dropped behind our barn like a big orange ball. Then I’d carry her upstairs and throw her to the bed and ravage her time and time again like the true badass that I am. Post coitus, I’d step onto the back porch and howl at the moon as I fired a shotgun into the pitch-black night.

JHJ: The haters got lucky and caught your badass self by the border. You’re about to be hanged. What are your badass last words?

MJM: Hey, that almost happened to me once—but, well, because a true badass never gives up, I’d attempt a parliamentary procedure and stage a filibuster to drag the process out as long as I could—give my brain time to formulate a plan. I’d begin by insulting them ... Fuck you guys. And fuck your shitty water! I couldn’t even drink it. I mean, all I did is brush my teeth with that shit back in the hotel and I got sick. Seriously. I don’t get it. What’s wrong with the water around here anyway? I mean, you bastards drink it all the time and it doesn’t hurt you. By this point, I’d either come up with something even more badass or I’d swing—but I’d be doing it in style.

A true badass would never go down without a fight.


JHJ: So, you write books, do you? What’s your work about and how is it badass?

MJM: I just had an eBook published called FRANK SINATRA IN A BLENDER. It’s badass because I wrote about a Private Detective named Nick Valentine and in the first paragraph he snorts a line of Oxycontin at a crime scene. He carries a shotgun and a chainsaw. He orders three drinks at a time and strippers love him. That’s badass.

JHJ: Where can we buy that bad mama-jama?

MJM: Here is a link to the author page on my publishers website. Speaking of badass, be sure’n check out a book by my pal Scott Phillips called Rum, Sodomy, and False Eyelashes. Now that title is badass.


JHJ: Thanks for playing. You are totally badass.

MJM: Thanks for having me and I know.