Frontman Kyle McDonald is gonna learn you somethin’ today …

Pouring a shot is easy. And drinking from the bottle, hell that’s something we’ve all been doing since day one. But to be a weed smoker, there’s far more to learn. Sure, you can poke a few holes in a can and call it good, but this isn’t high school anymore. To be an accomplished smoker, you must find another way.

Slightly Stoopid multi-instrumentalist and co-founder Kyle McDonald — the Mr. Miyagi of spliff development — is the right man for the job. After being discovered and signed to Skunk Records by Sublime’s late frontman Bradley Nowell in 1995, the SoCal dub-reggae act has built a unique culture with its fans surrounding the genre. The guys have never been shy about their love of cannabis during that time, either — they know their joints.

So who better to teach us how to roll one?

Slightly Stoopid
w/ SOJA, Zion I and The Grouch & Eligh
@ Red Rocks Amphitheater – Saturday, Aug 6, 2016

Step 1: Gather Materials

  • Rolling Papers
  • ’Crutch’
  • Grinder
  • Weed

“I mainly like Sativas, just because you can smoke ‘em all day long and not have your dick be put in the dirt. I mainly like the flavors, the fruity flavors, the orange phenos, grapefruit, cactus cooler — like tasty stuff.”

Step 2: Prep Work

“I’ll get the paper and roll it on both ends with my fingers without the weed, manipulate it. It’ll shape the paper to how you need it. Then I’ll grind my herb. A gram, or couple grams, at least. Always grind it.

Also, I’ll grab some scissors and make a crutch from whatever I can find. Usually from the rolling papers I’m using, I’ll cut it from the package. B-Real (of Cypress Hill), he has those Phuncky Feel Tips, they’re glass tips that work real good too.”

Step 3: Stuff It

“With your crutch on one end and both fingers to either side, fill it up with the grounded up herbs. Roll that up, try to get a nice roll, a good fold under the herb.”

Step 4: Lick It, Stick It

“Lick it, stick it, pack it with a pencil or some sort of pokey stabby thing, to where it’s dense like a cigarette, super round and perfect.”

Bonus: The Stoopid Technique

“On the one end where you put your mouth, I get it a bit smaller, and the other side coned out as much as possible — it helps it burn smooth. Ideally it goes from cigarette size on one end to gorilla finger on the other.”

Do you remember your first joint?

“Aww, yeah, it was so bad. It’s come a long way. It was like a crooked toothpick.

We went out on the road with Snoop Dogg a few years back and I had never rolled a blunt, I know he likes blunts, so I rolled him a couple. I learned how to roll those because of that. It’s a lot of licking. Now I roll them on the regular. That helped me with my technique.“
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On Spliffs ‘n’ Omelettes:

“Rolling spliffs, I always say it’s like making an omelette. Who’s gonna make the better omelette? You or somebody else? Who’s gonna know what you like and who’s gonna make it like you want it? You are.

I always think, whatever you put your heart at and you do it yourself, you’re gonna have a better product and result. You put the love into it and you know what you like. “
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Joint Alternatives?

“Lately I’ve been poking an apple to stick some orange bud in there. I call it ‘apples and oranges’ [laughs] — but when I’m not smoking out of my Johnny Applepipe, I roll a spliff.”
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What's good on legalization?

“I never had that mentality of what I was doing was wrong. I don’t think of it like that. Now that it is a little more easy going and not so frowned upon though, it makes smoking it easier. There’s other things out there the War on Drugs needs to worry about.”

cover photo: Crystal Osgood / @SoCalFotos