Mortimer Leech & The Widow’s Bane: A New Lease on Death

An Interview with Gov. Mortimer Leech, or a truly Orphean journey into enlightenment, via the Pueblo jail, goat yoga and wheatgrass.

Maybe it’s the centuries of politics talking–or it could be just the constant tinnitus ringing in his dead, hellbound ears–but The Widows’ Bane‘s Governor Mortimer Leech doesn’t have much sympathy for our current commander in chief.

“Well, he’s pretty lost himself. He doesn’t even know what goat yoga is,” Leech explained to me in a recent interview, talking on a borrowed Uber driver’s cell phone on his way to see his current (and one of many) parole officers. “He’s like I was two weeks ago – before my stay in the Pueblo jail there. That’s what… that’s what he’s like. And a bad imitation at that, mind ya!”

“He’s like I was two weeks ago…. And a bad imitation at that, mind ya!”

Governor Mortimer Leech on President Donald Trump

Perhaps a little perspective is in order here. The Widow’s Bane was once a mighty ship – a ghost ship, really (though the story changes almost as often as the shot glasses in Gov. Leech’s hands of a night) – that trolled the coast off of Oregon for centuries, led by Leech and manned by a crew of lost souls interned there at the hands of their loving and murderous wives until it wrecked, leaving the undead crew to try and make their way on dry land.

So Leech and fellow shipwrecked zombies Rutherford Belleview, Franklin McKane, Madame Reaper, Jimson Crockett, Abracham Lynch, and Iron Mike formed a band and used the ship’s name, eventually ending up in Boulder, where they’ve built a solid reputation for great live shows and wonderfully eclectic, Eastern-European based, polka-soaked shanty music – despite Leech’s megalomania and endless need for drugs, hookers, and booze.

Don’t miss this must-see show at the Bluebird

The Widow’s Bane is playing a rare, must-see show at Denver’s Bluebird Theater this Thursday night, March 7, and the Governor has promised, in an exclusive story that he’s provided to us at DenverThread.com, to make this particular show one for the centuries. Read on to see what may be in store – but you’ll have to get to the Bluebird this Thursday to see what he’s really got in mind.

Mortimer Leech–bandleader of one of the afterlife’s most famous and long-lasting bands The Widow’s Bane–is referring to his most recent misadventure here in Colorado, current home base of the centuries-old, and long dead gypsy-punk death-polka band. On a quest for drugs and prostitutes – as functionally necessary for Leech as breakfast and coffee are for the likes of you and me – he found himself a few weeks ago in jail in Pueblo, Colorado, where he remained for just shy of two weeks. According to the band’s manager, Gasoline Lollipops’ frontman Clay Rose, the Pueblo cops were holding Leech “…until he blows nothing but zeroes – which may be a while, knowin’ that misbegotten SOB.”

And, while the jailing of a rock star with a pedigree – and downright longevity – like that of Gov. Mortimer Leech may sound pedestrian–or even boring–to the average citizen, he assured me that this particular stay not only changed his life, but may have also changed the course of human history – for the better (at least as far as he’s concerned, satanic and soulless capitalist politician that he is).

“You see,” he explained, “My cellmate down there was this fellow–he called himself Bobby G.–right? This fellow, this Bobby G., he taught me the ways of goat yoga. His name’s actually Karl, but he’s been empowered by some Swami or some such, and he’s been qualified to give transmissions in the realm of goat yoga.”

Goat yoga, indeed.

“Yeah I was down there smoking meth with some whores,” he explained. “And, uh, y’know, the cops come through the hotel door – as they normally do – and I threw some money at them, and they weren’t having it.”

“So the whole thing is still baffling to me – how I ended up in jail,” he grumbled. “But there I was with Bobby G – a.k.a. Karl – and he turned me on to the wickedness of my ways. And he gave me a way out.”

“Lucky for us, down in Pueblo, the jails are just full of goats and chickens and all kinds of livestock,” Leech continued, “and I didn’t like it. It was like Midnight Express down there.” Referring to Oliver Stone’s classic of American Cinema helped bring to mind a particularly vivid, alarming vision, one I’m certain I don’t need to explain. I asked him how the goat yoga and his cellmate affected him, one of the most heralded fiends of undead rock in the world, or at least in the western US.

“Well, it’s turned me around completely!”

“We had a little garden out there,” he continued, “where we grew some wheatgrass, right. And so he turned me onto wheatgrass enemas! The health benefits of wheatgrass enemas! So we were doing daily wheatgrass enemas and yoga with the goats there and it just aligned my chakras all together! And it woke me up to a higher purpose. I must say – much, much higher.”

As you might imagine, the questions abounded here about whether one who’s not only undead, but who’s been in league with the Dark Lord Himself for so long, could actually benefit from a life-affirming practice, or even has chakras anymore? Leech was kind enough to let me – and us – in on the schism.

“… apparently, I do have a soul.”

– Mortimer Leech, on the condition his eternal condition is in.

“I mean, I guess I’m qualified to talk to you now since I’m a graduate of Bobby G’s goat yoga program,” he explained, excitedly, “and, apparently, I do have a soul.”

“My body died, so long ago, and I was reanimated,” he continued, “by the Dark Lord himself. I mean by Madame Reaper! Madam Reaper brought me back to life! And – in enduring such, I’m guessing, they – they put my soul back into my body on loan.”

“So I’ve got a slowly decomposing body,” he gurgled, “which used to house a soul on loan from the Dark Lord and Madame Reefer. But – you see – the goat yoga has freed me up from that. The goat yoga has made my soul – is giving me autonomy over my soul once more.”

He continued, initially peacefully, but then with a voice rising softly to an excited, almost terrifying whisper: “And now, you see, now with that and with my – uh – all of my attributes that I had before, I’m on course to becoming the next messiah!”

Not surprisingly, I was shocked into speechlessness at this claim. But then, reminded of Leech’s insufferable and gargantuan ego and his own universe-sized megalomania, I receded to a sarcastic calm.

On course to becoming the next messiah

“Amazing, really,” I said. “So, a Messiah for our whole plane of existence, I’m guessing – for everyone? Or only for those who follow the goat yoga and partake in the wheatgrass?”

“Well, only for those that would – y’know – those that are smart enough to grasp what I’ll be laying down,” he explained.

No surprise there.

“You see, I had – I had my sights on the presidency. But that’s well under hand now. I don’t even have to worry about that,” he said, bringing his usual giant political ambitions into perspective. “The second most humble man in the world is taking care of that enterprise. But the world is still in need of leaders you know!”

How will Leech and his bandmates bring this new messiah-ship to the world? I was also curious.

“… they’ll leave with an ass full of wheatgrass and a brain full of goat yoga!”

– sounds so romantic, no?

“Oh well – one show at a time, really! So I’m gonna continue performing on a platform that I had before,” he ejaculated, “but now I will be instructing the audience in the ways of goat yoga and wheat grass enemas!”
“So, you see, they’ll come for entertainment,’ he went on, veritably panting at this point, “and they’ll leave with an ass full of wheatgrass and a brain full of goat yoga!”

Leech went on to explain his overall platform, which – as usual – is based on the most despicable and discompassionately conservative form of capitalism.

“Well you see, most people that are gravitating towards goat yoga, well, they’re ignorant, dirty liberals – right? Maybe even socialists,” he whined. “So I’m going to infiltrate their world by mastering what it is that’s most dear to them – the goat yoga!”

“I will have what they need, and I will dish it up with a good healthy side of capitalism,” he feverishly uttered, almost in a desperate gasp, “and that will put the world back in balance, ya see.”

And what, exactly, can the lucky audience expect to get from this uber-revivalist event, considering that leech had to spend nearly two weeks with Bobby G. to get it? Apparently much more than a cleansing, according to the governor.

“Everybody’s half-assed these days, y’know? Nobody wants to actually do the work,” he opined, “they just want the five dollar version of it! And – well – we got the twelve dollar version down there at the Bluebird Theater on March 7. And they can come – and that includes a free wheatgrass enema and a session of goat yoga with yours truly!”

Certainly sounds like something no-one should miss – at least no one over sixteen.