LOCK UP YOUR DAUGHTERS DIANE CLUCK BEARLESQUE XXBOYS PAUL ALEXANDER THORNTON YO! MAJESTY QUEER ZOMBIE MUSIC LESLIE AND THE LYS TITS&TATTS GOING OUT STAYING ALIVE Issue 1 - Autumn 08
£2
ISSUE 1 Autumn 08
Editor: Sophie Holmes Website/Events: Lucy Elliott Design: Jen Davies, Emma Faulkner Text: Louise Cowley, Fanny Supreme, Jodie Taylor, Kate Wozza, Jack Dawes, Soxy Music, Frida la Chufflets, Alex Robertshaw Images: Photography: Charlie Blackledge, Gerald Moore, Kael T. Block, Jocelyn Bain Hogg, Laura DeWaal, Manuel Vasson Illustration: Alex Thornton, Dana Krusche, Kyla Ring, Cara MacLeod, Roger Tits, Frida La Chufflets Contact: info@lockupyourdaughtersmagazine.co.uk www.lockupyourdaughtersmagazine.co.uk Myspace: www.myspace.com/lockup_yourdaughters Facebook: groups/LOCK UP YOUR DAUGHTERS MAGAZINE Printed by Montgomery Litho Group, Glasgow
ETHAN From a series of car shots, part of the XXBoys project. Founded by Kael T. Block, the project explores and documents FtM transitions oering a fresh and sexxy take on trans boy identity (page 37).
CONTENTS
Leslie and the Lys
Yo! Majesty
5-8
31 - 32
Rude Britannia
XXY
9 - 12
33 - 34
Diane Cluck
Queer Zombie Music
13-16
35 - 36
Louise Welsh and ZoĂŤ Strachan
XX Boys
17 - 20
37 - 38
Paul Alexander Thornton
Barry Stilton
21 - 26
40
Bearlesque
Comics
27 - 30
41 - 46
What is there left to fight for? There’s a righteousness that desperately clings to issues in the name of so-called feminism. Idealists spending obscene amounts of money and energy creating ‘spaces’ where queers are free to frolic and prance and take up arms against anyone with a sense of humour. They’re justifying censorship through a patronising paternalistic ideology aimed at those they feel their ‘community’ protects. Getting their knickers in a twist about petty in-party politics while misogyny still plagues the media and in many parts of the world it is still deemed acceptable to subject women to supreme acts of violence. I think we may have lost our way… There are too many knee-jerk opinions and to much unconstructive criticism flying around this scene of armchair-anarchism, an entire population who is up for picking a fight but is actually doing very little. Feminism and queer politics has become a bandwagon, a massive 4x4-fuck-truck tank of a campaign demanding that we all march to the beat of the same drums and crushing any diversity that crosses its path. Cocked, loaded and trigger happy, taking aim at anyone with a difference of opinion and silencing anything with a fresh take before it’s even had a chance to speak. All the while billing itself as liberalism. How is this liberal? Don’t get me wrong, I do admire and am grateful to those who have gone before and who continue to fight, whose work has actually made a difference and given us the freedom to enjoy our identities. So let’s run with it! I say down with misery let’s enjoy them! What are we all so afraid of? So, what is there left to fight for? Well there’s plenty, but lest we pick our battles wisely and stop wasting our time criticising each other the whole thing will be shot to shit and we’ll just have to start over. Let’s truly diversify, with strength, intelligence, grace and let’s do it with style. Cheer up lovelies, it’s already happened. LUYD x p.s. Do you want to hear a dead short racist joke? Bernard Manning
LESLEY AND THE LYS Gold spandex adorned self-proclaimed ‘cewebrity’ Leslie Hall talks troupes, gems and the bind that is an immobile-mobile gem sweater museum.
Can you give us a little background? How did you spend your time before you found your gem vocation? Before my gem sweaters I was painting horse’s portraits and watching TV. Now I paint a lot less but still watch a lot of TV. My need for gem sweaters and singing songs about my dance moves have been top priority. Who makes up your troupe? Tell us about the Lys… My back up singers are always changing; I’m a lot of diva to handle and they never wanna work as I hard as I want them to. Currently Dj Dr. Laura from Philly and Mona Mega Bonez from Boone, Iowa. They are really great because they can’t sing or dance but they don’t care cause they know they look good and love doing it. What sort of effect does being a ‘cewebrity’ have on your output and direction? Cewebrityhood is not only a growing, powerful medium but also has a TON of advantages. The notion of being discovered by someone and them making you a star is completely bogus, it’s about self-promotion and a good product. Of course I doubt my CD is ever available to buy at a Target store but then again do I care?! Rumour has it that you converted your ebay purchased RV into a mobile gem sweater museum, is this true? Can you tell us some more? Yes it is totally true. However I did all this amazing converting and the RV stops running. So I have an immobile-mobile museum, which completely defeats the purpose. The UK’s brimming with charity shops stocked full of abandoned gem sweaters could you maybe combine a tour with a mission to come salvage some? I am planning on touring UK come fall of this year. YOU HAVE NO IDEA how excited I am. I can’t wait to educate British people and fill them with my lady jams. Is there anything you want to say to your followers in the UK? I am coming for you and your children. I wanna dance in my gold pants get you groovin’ then keep on movin. Cause I gotta lot of meat to greet you with and you’ve got a lot of villages of gem babies. Want more? www.leslieandthelys.com
pictures: Laura Dewaal
Dogging, Furries, Japanese men who enjoy dressing as French maids and being bossed around a country pile by matronly dominatrix. Suffice to say, it’s an entertaining read.
RUDE BRITANNIA? The sex scandal involving Max Mosley is by far the most amusing sex scandal of recent months. Me, the president of Formula One’s governing body, in a hotel room, with five prostitutes? Meee, the son of Oswald Mosley, leader of the British fascist party, getting turned on by women dressed as Nazi concentration camp guards? Certainly not Your Honour. The News of the World may have been sent a videotape, and indeed M’lud, they may have alleged that there were Nazi overtones to my S&M fun but I’ve been doing S&M for years, and there’s nothing wrong with it. If you, my narrow-minded chum, do think there’s anything wrong with it…well then you must just be out of touch. Yeah, but the whole Nazi thing? That is a bit weird, don’t you think Max? Then again, who are we to censure someone for wanting to be flagellated by mock concentration camp guards in stockings and suspenders? The behaviour is uber-kinky yes, and would probably be labelled as sick by the Daily Hate Mail, but isn’t it a little morally superior of us to condemn what someone does in the comfort of their own rented apartment? As long as he isn’t hurting anyone, right? What is sexually deviant behaviour anyway? Isn’t it whatever anybody thinks is deviant at a particular point in history? Homosexuality used to be illegal. It was seen as shameful, depraved, deviant, perverse. Although homophobia is still a lamentably present force in modern society, homosexuality certainly does not hold the golden chalice of mysterious perversion that it once did. Some people may not like it, but few people nowadays would consider it to be sick and morally reprehensible.
Hmm, so what’s next? S&M? Autoerotica? Yeah, these habits are decidedly fruity, but they are not that shocking anymore. Bizarre sexual practice sells tabloids, but is it actually interesting any more? The writer Tim Fountain thinks so. His interest in the topic is demonstrated by his own sexual record: 5,000 male conquests and 40 female to date (he is 40 years old). Impressive though this statistic is, Tim was worried that it might also be a bit weird. This worry drove him to spend two years researching and writing Rude Britannia, a book that led him all round Britain in search of crazy sexy people doing crazy sexy things. Rude Britannia is funny and rich in material. Dogging, Furries, Japanese men who enjoy dressing as French maids and being bossed around a country pile by matronly dominatrix. I could go on. Suffice to say, it’s an entertaining read. Via Skype (Fountain lives in Glasgow but is currently in France), I ask him if there was anything in particular that drew him as a writer to what he was observing. ‘The minutiae, my interest in that is what distinguishes my book and the way I see the book. The devil is in the detail’. Fountain notes that British men seem to share this writerly attention to detail. The difference between their preoccupation and his, however, is that they all seem to be obsessed by mundane details, the parking around the brothels and the cleanliness of the rooms as opposed to the quality of the prostitutes, for example. As a writer, he is keen to point out that this reduces the glamour and heightens the comedy of the British engaging in naughty sex.
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Indeed, for a book solely about sex, it is a deeply unsexy read, ‘I didn’t set out to make it erotic, or to not make it erotic. If you view sex from the outside, it looks ludicrous’. This perspective is repeatedly utilized in the book; Fountain is continuously looking for the absurd. He finds it, but he often also finds unpleasantness and uncomfortable sadness. There’s Everard for example, a man who has four life-size latex dolls but not the selfconfidence to believe he will ever have a real girlfriend.
Fountain admits that some things disturbed him greatly. There is a telling section when he goes to Manchester to visit a female prostitute, all in the name of research, but he cannot face going through with it. Or rather, he cannot face the lives of the prostitutes, the glib justifications of the men who regularly visit them or, for that matter, Manchester itself. ‘This is the hard, dirty ring road of Manchester, a road which people simply use to avoid somewhere and get somewhere else and looking at the area around Salon Twenty Four it’s hard not to see it as a metaphor for the girl’s lives. These are women used by people to get where they want to go. The girls don’t have real names, they don’t have real relationships and they don’t have real hope. I can’t walk through that door’ (Rude Britannia, p.111). However, on the whole, Fountain found British people getting up to a bit of harmless, kinky fun. In seeking out deliberate, organised unconventionality, Fountain found nothing but amusing conventionality. ‘The people in the S&M club wanted to embrace their dark sides, but they did it in such a conventional way. When do you decide that the flogging bench is for you? The minute you go to a sex club, sex becomes less exciting. The communal element makes it less sexy’. I asked him why he thought this was. ‘Because there is less reality involved. It is all rehearsed, premeditated role-play’. He elaborated about the contradiction at the heart of these well-meaning, safetyconscious sexual communities. ‘The community is there to celebrate and practice the behaviour, but the minute you join the community, the behaviour becomes much less exciting’. This observation is a perceptive one yet Fountain offers no explanation for this bittersweet irony. Meanwhile, Max Mosley is cashing in. He is preparing to sue the News of the World for libel after winning £60,000 in damages from them for invasion of privacy. It’s not all bad news for the tabloid either; the £1millon cost of the legal battle with Mosley is more than compensated for by the additional revenue the story has generated. Everybody’s a winner. The Mosley case sheds light on the irony at the heart of Rude Britannia. It demonstrates that it’s not the unusual sexual behaviour itself that is the issue: lots of Britons indulge in stuff like S&M and dogging. As long as no-one gets hurt, people can do what they want, dress up how they want. It’s something a bit different, something for the weekend. It’s not that unconventional, it’s not that deviant, it’s not that weird; it’s not even that interesting. No, the real issue here is privacy. Mosley was compensated because his privacy was invaded. It’s not what these people do; it’s how they do it. It’s the fact that they take sex out of the private sphere, i.e. the bedroom, and place it in the public sphere, namely the platform that is the Internet. The reason why this unconventional, daring sexual behaviour becomes less interesting and less fundamentally sexy is because it’s not so secret anymore. Privacy provides escape from other people. It shields us from their gossipy whispers, their prying eyes, their safety regulations and their parking obsessions. It also allows us the freedom to dress up as Nazis if we choose to. Secret sex is the sexiest sex, whether it’s between two people engaged in a forbidden office affair, seven people engaged in a sadomasochistic orgy, two men in a public toilet late at night or simply, between the bed-sheets. Nobody else knows what you’re getting up to, except you, and that’s what makes it fun.
Rude Britannia is published by Weidenfeld & Nicolson and available to buy at all major bookshops or online. words: Fanny Supreme pictures: Jocelyn Bain Hogg
After I put my work in, my best work that I could, I satisfied myself that it wasn’t always the men that could write these great songs because I felt like I had done good work.
DIANE CLUCK When Diane Cluck gets up to play at Glasgow’s Nice’n’Sleazy’s she looks uncomfortable. Complaining of the blinding lights she steps down from the stage and stands amongst the audience. Seated at cabaret tables dotted around one of the anti-folk scene’s most commended song-writers is a pretty special set-up, this isn’t your standard Sleazy’s gig. Opening with Half a Million Miles From Home, we’re treated early on to Monte Carlo (an audience request at the Manchester gig for the same song was met by a shy apology – ‘I promised myself I wouldn’t this time’) making it hard not to feel privileged. Later, there’s the mesmerising Easy to be Around and the jagged vanished direction of My Teacher Died.
I ran through everything that was interesting to me. That had a lot to do with being in my twenties, it had to do with living in New York, it also had to do with, I do have to say, proving myself to the guys.’
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Since emerging in the early 2000’s Diane Cluck wrote prolifically, releasing six albums in as many years. Then fell beneath the radar. When I ask her about the present tour the reasons for this sudden exit become clearer. ‘When I was initially touring and booking shows I was doing a lot of the stuff. Even the recording and making the artwork for my CDs. I’ve kind of burned out on that way of doing things. It was really good for me and I actually found my ceiling for my capabilities and I also realised that it’s not a very sustainable way of doing things.’ From the hot-house school of song writing that is the New York anti-folk scene; its members seeming to write and perform ceaselessly, early burnout is somewhat inevitable. However, hindsight affords Cluck a fairly level take on the era. ‘At that time and I just did it, did it, did it and I made albums every year. Being younger and on my own and wanting to have products to show. You know like: “what have you been up to for the past year?” “well, I wrote these songs and I recorded this CD and look, here it is! This is what I have to show for it!” I don’t feel like that is so important to me anymore. I ran through everything that was interesting to me to do as myself, alone, for this period of my life. I think that had a lot to do with being in my twenties, it had to do with living in New York, it also had to do with the song-writing scene, which is a really inspiring environment, and had to do with, I do have to say, proving myself to the guys.’ Diane Cluck’s songs favour the personal over the political. Once quoted as saying songs can emerge involuntarily, often proving difficult to translate into words, her songs are frequently obscure, lyrics at once supremely revealing are also guarded and cryptic. The pull perhaps is in their ambiguity, that they are there to decipher. When I question whether it can be awkward to have people ask what they’re about she is surprised. ‘For whatever reason people have been pretty happy to sit with the songs and interpret them on their own. I don’t know if that’s something unique to what I’m writing or if that’s what music is for. I really like to let people sit with their own interpretations, I think it’s at least as important as what I was thinking up before it.’
Female musicians are often pigeonholed by their fans and critics, their gender dictates the way their work is perceived. An unspoken (although sometimes overt) responsibility for ‘The Cause’ is often projected, as though successful women are duty-bound ambassadors. Women cannot simply be asked about their music or art without that subtext. Does this ever become tiresome? ‘Everyone’s got attributes that make them distinct, they come along with having a body or being an embodied spirit but when someone comes along and singles it out and makes your whole life about it then it doesn’t really work. Like if you’re a female with an inclusive attitude then you’re a feminist or if you’re a female and you’re sexuality is inclusive then you must be gay or bisexual.’ This aside, women within the music industry often report on experiencing a derisive attitude from their male counterparts. There’s nothing like a healthy level of competition to help you raise your game but the pressure can also create an atmosphere of conformity where men draw up the rules. Women can either roll with it or be separated into the canon of ‘women’s’ music/art/literature/ whatever, a reality Cluck is familiar with. ‘I realised when I started song-writing that part of the competitiveness with men had to do with that I was a misogynist and that I’d grown up that way. Feeling that women’s creations generally weren’t as valuable. When I was beginning to write in some ways I took on more of a masculine energy than I wanted to sustain. After a while it was starting to impair and damage my female energy. I do feel like when I first started singing there was this idea that when women get up there it’s sloppy and emotional and it makes everyone really uncomfortable so when you get up there and sing about your emotions there has to be this “Yeah, it’s emotional but I’ve got it altogether, I can keep it all in check”. I’m balancing out, I’m not finding the need to try to be more of anything than I am, sometimes what I feel like are more feminine feelings, they don’t want to get up on stage and broadcast anything. After I put my work in, my best work that I could, I satisfied myself that it wasn’t always the men that could write these great songs because I felt like I had done good work.’ Diane Cluck seems to be one for going it alone; writing, recording, producing and, until recently, has always performed solo too. The present UK tour saw a branching out into a collaborative performance; she was originally planning to tour with a drummer, although the plan fell through when the dates were cancelled and then re-booked. Cluck says of performing with someone else that it ‘was so much better’ this subtle shift symptomatic of a much larger one, towards her music and towards life in general. ‘I’m just finding that I really want to be sharing a lot more of what I’m going through these days, emotionally and everything.’ This change of pace or outlook is perhaps not indicative of recovery from burn-out at all, more a settling-in now that the ‘proving’ part has passed. She speaks of taking a step back, ‘I don’t really feel like I’ve been much of a musician in the last couple of years. I haven’t put out an album of totally new stuff in three years. I’ve been doing other things. I’ve been gardening, going through a lot of great, enriching personal relationships.’ Gardening appears to have taken over from music and she becomes more animated while describing her garden than she has been for the entire interview. ‘To watch the garden I can only imagine what it’s like to have children.’ Kids? I’m worried I’ve over-stepped the mark. ‘I’ve been thinking about it for the first time over the last couple of years. I’ve been thinking about it a lot.’ She smiles.
pictures: Charlie Blackledge
words: SH www.charlieblackledge.co.uk
‘About half of all Scottish female writers are lesbians, how did that happen? Is it more than in the population at large?’ Zoë Strachan
LOUISE WELSH AND ZOË STRACHAN During its early nineties ‘pop’ overhaul, Scottish literature, with its iconic poster boy ‘Renton’ and all his waster mates, became synonymous with edgy-gritty-cool. Now that Ewan McGregor’s swapped the habit for a light-sabre and Pete Doherty’s become the new pin-up for heroin chic it’s time to move on. The next phase of Scottish writing is upon us and it’s finally getting a wee bit queerer…
Welsh’s debut novel The Cutting Room, a dark and alluringly sinister tale set in Glasgow was awarded John Creasey Dagger and the Saltire Society First Book Award. It was followed by the period novella Tamburlaine Must Die a fictional glimpse into Marlowe’s last days. It depicts a16th century fraught with scandal, filth and betrayal, exactly as it should be. Her latest novel The Bullet Trick saw Welsh return to Glasgow and the present. Billed by Kate Atkinson as ‘an electrifying journey to one man’s heart of darkness’ it charts the demise of conjurer William Wilson, down on his luck and destined for tragedy. Tipped as one-to-watch by Scottish Review of Books editor Colin Waters, Zoë Strachan also has an impressive literary reputation. Her debut novel Negative Space, shortlisted for the Saltire Scottish First Book of the Year Award, is a poignant portrait of Stella’s grief and healing following her brother’s sudden death. Her second novel Spin Cycle, set in a Glasgow launderette, presents a delightfully seedy slice of Glaswegian life. Deeper, darker and more ambitious than its predecessor it allows Strachan’s talent more freedom to roam. The development of a queerer element within Scottish Literature is exciting, made even more so by it’s being led by female writers. During a tour of their west-end flat Louise Welsh stops at one door and becomes rather excited, explaining that this is ‘her room’. In keeping with the rest of the house the large broom-cupboard, albeit with a window, is lined with books. So this is your… I’m lost for the right word: studio? Office? ‘Oh, no’ Welsh tells me ‘it’s just my room, I’ve never had my own room before’. This lack of pretension extends to their work. Although both have an unmistakeable reverence for writing and literature neither strive to sex up the actual means. ‘It’s a really long, hard slog, every sentence every paragraph, it’s not always a pleasurable process’ Welsh seems to be similarly inclined. ‘You have to be professional, and you have to be organised. When I was attracted to writing that wasn’t how I viewed it at all, it’d be marvellous; you’d break off from the endless party you were having in one room to go off and just jot a few things down, pure works of genius then you’d come back and continue with the absinthe.’ Clearly the first thing you must do before calling yourself a writer is shelf the fantasies. I urge anyone to read Welsh’s The Cutting Room and to view Otago Street’s innocent seeming second-hand bookshop in the same light. The fact that their fiction is embedded within an actual and present location contributes to the pleasure to its reading. Glasgow arguably plays a stronger a role in both writers’ books than some of their main characters. I wonder how much of their writing draws on real life. However, both authors are quick to stress that this is something they strive to avoid. Strachan comments that if autobiography does ever feature it’s as a ‘spring-board to fiction, I wouldn’t be at all interested in writing about my experiences’. Surely though, the writer must seep in on some level and Welsh admits that personal qualities can exert an influence; ‘all the characters that I like of course have exactly the same politics as me. I couldn’t have a positive character that was a Tory, it couldn’t happen, maybe that’s a failing actually.’
There’s a daring present in both authors’ work that chooses to explore ideas many others prefer to skirt. It seems however, that to allow their own sensibility to inform or forge a message in their writing would detract from their actual stories. Strachan explains ‘you might have an agenda that you want your work to be in tune with but I don’t think I’ve ever written anything to try and get a particular message across. If the characters are behaving in ways which are believable and idiosyncratic then it’s not as simple as “this is good” and “this is bad”.’ As with complex issues there is always a multitude of opinions, it cannot serve to try and appease them all but it must be at the back of all writers’ minds, Welsh: ‘You walk a very close line, it’s up to people’s opinion as to whether you manage to stay on the right side of the line or not because we all draw it in a different place.’ There must be a satisfaction in hearing your work deconstructed, terrifying at times while at other times bemusing. Stachan recounts an incident where one interpretation saw the ending of Negative Space, Stella’s first lesbian experience and her sexual awakening, as a metaphor for Scotland’s devolution ‘I’m writing a sex scene!’ she laughs, ‘It has nothing to do with the founding of the Scottish Parliament!’. Their approach to criticism seems as pragmatic as their approach to writing, Welsh explains that you have to be almost business-like about it ‘You want to write; if you get a bundle of shit reviews you may not be able to do that next time’. Although it’s clearly hard to hear negative things said of your characters, Strachan remarks that it’s often superficial. A judgment based on a character’s deed or role in society can lead to a snap decision. ‘I was asked “Why do you write about these bad, immoral women?” and well, there’s a stalker and a prostitute and someone who commits manslaughter so on the surface they seem bad but on a deeper level they are trying to draw up their own moral codes. I was really horrified, I like the characters.’ Welsh describes a similar scenario whereby many critics are offended by the sex depicted in The Cutting Room (the main character Rilke has a catalogue of casual sex). The irony they fail to grasp is that the book’s core taboo is the trafficking of women, their enslavement for sexual purposes. Rilke’s acts are merely consensual encounters, the most ‘offensive’ aspect of which is that they are between two men. This however is very telling and I can’t help but share Welsh’s suspicions when she attributes people’s dislike of Rilke as nothing to do with his character but rather a reaction to his sexuality. Welsh: ‘I think he’s a lovely person. It did feel like somebody had said something horrible about one of your good friends, you want to step forward and defend them. It was a surprise, you have to let it go and get used to it.’ Staring up at their library I notice a few doubles and I’m reminded that here are two prize-winning authors in one relationship. Is there a jostling for elbow room? Competitiveness? I imagine there’s a strict no ‘shop-talk’ policy enforced but it appears to be the opposite. Welsh identifies Strachan as her best critic and reveals that, although it’s infrequent, when they swap work they go somewhere public to feedback ‘because then no-one can cry’. Strachan qualifies that you do need to be careful ‘make sure feedback occurs on a certain level, not too much’. So maybe there is a tension that comes from both being part of a profession that’s so close to home. Welsh briefly explores the idea of being with a scientist, their knowledge serving as a massive expanse of pre-digested research; a whole unexplored field. However, the dream’s extinguished pretty sharp. ‘To be with somebody that wasn’t interested in literature or who didn’t want to talk about books, that would be really difficult’
words: SH pictures: Charlie Blackledge www.charlieblackledge.co.uk
PAUL ALEXANDER THORNTON If you wheel out an old TV, plug the pins into an up and coming artist and you see 80’s retro, 60’s psychedelia, David Hockney, Peter Blake, photographs, portraits, Alice in Wonderland, animation, Trapdoor, kaleidoscopes, felt-tips, Fab-lollies, Jimmy Hendrix, Sgt. Pepper, dancing shoes, Rubix cubes, Quentin Blake, finger-paint, fine art and colouring books then you may have just jacked a feed from Paul Alexander Thornton...
The 24-year-old artist and textile designer works with felt-tips to create complex, vibrant patterns infused with energy. Arguably his most compelling pieces mash up geometric shapes with stunningly realistic portraiture. Paul Alexander Thornton has been rampaging into the music and fashion scenes with artwork for the ‘beat up ska/swing soulful punk aesthetic’ that is The Ghost Notes, new designs for the Dr. Martens label and handpainting print patterns on model’s legs for Rodnick’s 2008 Autumn/Winter collection at London Fashion Week. We wanted to find out more… So, what’s next? Right now I’m working on a series of drawings that are bigger than most of my previous work, on a square canvas (or piece of paper) about 1 metre x 1 metre, using a circle as the base for each piece. I’m really into the idea of having a basic geometric shape that you build on. The new pieces are bigger and more detailed. They take longer and are more mathematical in the composition and should hopefully be more of a spectacle. I’ll be showing them at Stolenspace at some point this year. Tell us a bit about your portraits? What inspired the ‘Victorian Women’ compositions? I really like ornate, decorative art and illustrations and Victorian Britain was all about that and the fashion trends which seem equally amazing to me. It’s a big influence on my work so I suppose I wanted to try and make that more apparent. I’m really inspired by the way Daedelus takes his influence from the industrial revolution and brings it into his music and image. Although I wasn’t happy with those two drawings, it was a nice idea so I might come back to it in the future in order to do a better job of it.
Is there a story behind the ‘Silas’ portrait (centrefold)? Yeah, basically he’s one of my most long-standing friends and he has always had the most extravagant fashion sense. I’ve always wanted to have a series of works that are simply portraits of friends and people that I associate with. The idea is inspired by David Hockney because it’s something he has in his work and it’s really nice being able to use an artist’s work to get a really personal insight into their lives. I did it around the same time as the Victorian women portraits and I drew all three of my (at the time) flatmates... Silas, Derek and Richard but I wrote something crude on the portrait of Richard so he asked me not to show it. Because Silas has mad fashion sense it also overlapped nicely with my fashion illustration influences. What’s your starting point for your patterned pieces? Going back to the first 10 or 15 pattern pieces that I made it was all about just working freeform, there were no pre-planned compositions. The original idea came from being interested in synaesthesia, (a condition where people experience perceptual overlap from sensory stimulaition; tasting sounds or hearing colours etc) and trying to draw what I imagined to be a visual interpretation of music. Mainly music by Aphex Twin, Venetian Snares and Squarepusher but there were a few other music artists that inspired those drawings as well. Nowadays though I’ve moved on a lot from that approach and I take a lot of influence from tattoo artists as well as being interested in Escher’s work, Vincent Van Gogh and 60’s psychedelia, I’m bringing a lot of other influences in so it’ll be interesting to see how those drawings change. How do you think the media you work in contributes to the pieces you create? What makes you favour the media you use over more traditional ones? I’m not sure... I guess I just love the aesthetic that you get from using biros and felt-tips. It probably comes from the limitations of the mediums, for example the way you use colour with felt-tips, it ends up having the same effect as pointillism sometimes, the colours get mixed up when you try to focus on them but if you look close they are all separate. Biro has got to be the most under-rated art medium it’s really versatile. How do your commercial projects relate to your other work? My drawings are really stylised, my goal would be for people to be able to instantly recognise my work without it being too formulaic and it’s the same approach when I do prints for fashion so the two go hand-in-hand very easily. Would you say that you are influenced more by artists you admire or the kind of culture you find yourself surrounded by every day? That’s a difficult one. I think that we are always absorbing everything around us, so I like to always be listening to music, looking at art, making art or talking about all those three things. I reckon if I spent my time listening to Britney Spears and watching X Factor my illustrations would definitely suffer! Is there anything you would like people to know about your work that they wouldn’t ordinarily know? I have a drawing next to original Lucian Freud’s and David Hockney’s in a personal collection, I don’t see why anyone would know that and I’m really proud of that fact so I guess that would be my answer! To see more visit www.paulalexanderthornton.com / www.myspace.com/paulalexanderthornton
Louise Cowley
BEARLESQUE If you go down to Vauxhall today, you’re sure of a big surprise... Performing a regular slot at London’s Vauxhall Tavern - ‘we’re like pan’s people for Vauxhallville’ the hairy dudes of Bearlesque keep crowds riveted with their healthy blend of humour and joyful implementation of their sexual subculture. And, of course, the sight of grown men in short shorts and nipple tassels cavorting to sumptuous musical numbers always pulls the punters. With their hirsute spoofing of cabaret and ‘very touching sensual balloon dance’, the Bearlesque Boys are giving a hot jazz injection to the already burgeoning Bear scene. Bears are becoming rapidly more visible, redefining their community with some very creative terminology: Cubs, Otters, Wolves, Pandas, Red Bears, White Bears. The exciting depth of the Bear identity provokes questions. Like, if a ‘Goldilocks’ is a Bear’s fag hag, does this mean a Wolf ’s fag hag would be a ‘Red Riding Hood’? And, more importantly, why is the mainstream media not catching on? For a strongly heteronormative society, the British entertainment industry is massively predicated on the image of the camp male. It seems that there is no problem with visibility of a certain type. Perhaps it is the Bears’ blurring of the lines that is the harder thing to swallow. This is not just men strutting around in lavish costumes but hairy, masculine men (at least in appearance). Furry, heavy-set dudes dancing, prancing, and scantily clad. Bearlesque proves that ‘you don’t have to be thin, or have a good voice, or be really good at dancing to entertain people’, and not in the way demonstrated by buffoons like John McCririck. Bearlesque follow through their manifesto with a delightful and intelligent charm, and we were lucky enough to chat to founding member, Luke...
‘Bearlesque’ is a great name - in fact, so great that it makes me wonder whether the name or the concept came first? In this instance, it was the concept that came first. The troupe came about after the Bear Beauty Contest in 2005. A few of us had entered it for a laugh. There was a talent round in it, which turned out to be so much fun, that after the contest was over, we decided we’d like to see how far we could go with it. We formed a troupe and performed our first show at Duckie (Royal Vauxhall Tavern) in April 2006 under the banner “CaBEARet”. Shortly after that the name evolved into Bearlesque. We’re not shy about abusing a pun or two...
Upcoming shows: 22nd August Bollox at Legends (Manchester) 29th August Club Smooch at Komedia (Brighton) 30th August Night of Lamour at Soho Revue Bar (London) 30th August Bear Quest in Blackpool 31st August Candy Box Burlesque at the Glee Club (Birmingham) 6th September Duckie at the Royal Vauxhall Tavern (London)
If Bearlesque had their choice, where/for whom would you like to perform? Personally I’d love to perform for the England Rugby Team, but as a troupe we’re happy performing for anyone. In terms of venue, Wilton’s Music Hall would be amazing. It was the first place that the CanCan was performed in the UK. The Sydney Opera House would also feature. What’s been your favourite moment of your Bearlesque career? Probably performing at the Latitude festival. We put on a few shows and a male “boylesque” workshop. The crowd reaction was incredible. We had women coming-up to us for months afterwards telling us how it had made their partners feel more confident and sexy in the way that they looked you can’t get a better compliment than that! Do you buy in your nipple tassels and accoutrements or are you DIY ‘til I die? Are there any particular retailers you would recommend to aspiring burlesquians? It’s a combination really. Because we don’t drag-up for the shows, we have to customise men’s clothing a lot. With the tassels (or pasties) we tend to make our own from scratch, though I will admit to being lazy and buying some from Ann Summers - they just need a little bit of tarting-up for the stage! If you had set up Bearlesque at an earlier stage in your life you could have called it Cubaret. At what age did you discover your bear identity? That’s one pun we haven’t used yet and I’m stealing it. I was probably about 18/19 when I realised I liked the bears - though at that stage I couldn’t grow a beard for love nor money. I’ve always been built more for comfort than speed though.
Me and my girlfriend actually call each other ‘bear’ as a term of endearment. Do you think that it is a common/natural thing for people to compare themselves to animals? In a similar way, I often call my partner a filthy pig, stinking rat or disgusting beast. Oh, hold on. No, you do it in a nice way, I guess it’s not that similar actually. We do hear it a lot. What surprised me more though was the amount of straight men that get called bear. Bless ‘em, but it can lead to some awkward questions for them if they’ve been to see one of our shows with a few mates! You guys are very funny and likeable in your introductory movie. Is it part of a bear’s nature to be cuddly and nice? I suppose there are grizzly bears that are supposed to be grouchy. We’re just really lucky in that we enjoy what we’re doing so much - it keeps us in good moods. When things get too stressful though, we tend to vent at each other - but we all know it’s never meant. We’re all total cuddle-sluts though - so bring it on! I always think that if I was a gay guy, I would be a bear, and I would fuck twinks. Do you think that you would identify with any particular lesbian subset if you were a dyke? I like to imagine I’d be a proper hardcore dyke, that could lift cars and fix engines, but I know deepdown that I’d be far more femme - take someone like Amy Lamé - absolutely gorgeous and always dressed beautifully. I’d totally chase the butch ladies though! Do Bearlesque have any upcoming gigs planned? I hear there’s a modest gathering in Brighton on 2nd August... Yes indeed, we’re doing a wee post-Pride show in Brighton on the 2nd, in the Hobgoblin pub - that’s on London Road, on the parade route. We’ve also got shows coming-up in Manchester, Blackpool and Birmingham - full details are on our myspace - www.myspace.com/bearlesque. These are in addition to our regular spot on Thursday nights as a part of Vauxhallville at the Vauxhall Tavern. Fact: There are many terrible gay films out there, which we watch despite our better judgement. What is your favourite awful gay film? Bring it On. It’s the gayest film out there and I’m in love with it. I want to be able to do those routines! After that it’d be Drop Dead Gorgeous. It’s amazing!
For more information visit: www.bearlesque.com www.myspace.com/bearlesque
words: Jack Dawes photo: Manuel Vasson illustration: Dana Krusche
YO MAJESTY!
At the Thugs n Hugs and Luckyme party Port Vella, Barcelona June 2008
Yo Majesty! Are sexy, strong dykes with lyrics that matter. Their myspace rages, “Hip hop has become overrun with lyrics that are anti-women, anti-gay, pro-bling and frankly, boring. It’s all about them, and none about you – YO! MAJESTY ain’t having it.” Desperate to see if they could live up to their impressive manifesto, I was excited when I heard that Yo Majesty! were playing at Sonar festival, and even more excited when I realised I would see them sooner in a more intimate gig. The cosy atmosphere of the Port Vella venue worked to our advantage, as we got to sit out on the balcony with Yo Majesty’s Jwl. B & Shunda K, have a smoke and hang out before the gig. I had to totally stop myself gawping: you just don’t get girls like that in Glasgow (though I’m going to stay optimistic). The set was fast and furious, as mirrored by the crowd’s elated bouncing. The ladies were unhindered by technical hitches, responding to repeated sound problems by running into the audience and spitting raps in faces. An electric gig from hot girls with hot politics: I’m totally in love. www.myspace.com/yomajesty4life
Frida La Chufflets
XXY Intersexuality might just be the most neglected topic in the history of literature and the arts, but in moving image its rarity is even more apparent. It’s pretty much impossible to name any film that has addressed the issue without being relegated to the realms of obscurity; a sad fact when you consider the taboos cinema has broken over the decades. Lucia Puenzo is treading new territory with her accessible debut film, XXY. A taut emotionally poetic essay it is the coming of age story of Alex, a fifteen-year-old hermaphrodite who lives in a remote part of Uruguay with her parents. Alex’s complex sexuality surfaces when she meets Alvero, the son of a surgeon and his wife, old family friends invited to stay at their house. The film’s strength and beauty lies in its exceeding the base sensationalism it might have fallen into given the subject matter. Its contours are formed around the familiar experiences of adolescent love. The
teetering, potentially explosive atmosphere that holds court throughout is generated by Alex and complemented by raw, disturbed handheld camerawork. Puenzo doesn’t shy from the static silences, allows them to resonate, they penetrate scenes as she focuses intently on her subjects. The narrative avoids focusing exclusively on Alex and shifts between characters, illustrating the turmoil and uncertainty that seeps into the lives of all involved. The nature of Alex’s relationship with her Father, equally as that of a son as it is of a daughter, underscores perfectly the deep-rooted ambivalence that arises when the very basis of someone’s identity exists in limbo. The pressing question throughout is how Alex should choose to define her identity. Should she continue taking the hormones and undergo surgery, allowing her to become a full ‘woman’, or should she remain unchanged, destined for a life of marginal sexual identity? In the film’s most dramatic sequence the slow, lyrical pace that dominates throughout is interrupted when Alex’s stroll on the beach becomes loaded with threat. On hearing rumors some local boys confront Alex, intent on brutally establishing the truth. Yet once again Puenzo’s treatment is delicate, tactfully avoiding any easy visual titillation which would cheapen her highly charged subject matter. Ines Efron’s deeply affecting performance as Alex, at once feral and animalistic, is also intensely sexy, depicting an attractiveness that transcends gender; a body loaded with desire. Through the scaffold of a simple adolescent love story, made complex through intersexuality, Puenzo has certainly created one of the most stunning films of the year. What’s more, she may have single handedly rescued gender ambiguity from the periphery of cinema.
Jodie Taylor
QUEER ZOMBIE MUSIC From this year’s release of Bruce LaBruce’s Berlin-gaypolitical-zombie-porno film Otto; or Up With Dead People, to 1991 butch biker zombie flick Chopper Chicks in Zombie Town, queers and zombies have a lengthy and illustrious association. Surely it’s high time to spark some interest in a long-neglected genre… Here’s a selection of the best: Zombie Killer by Leslie & the Lys In 2006, the truly astounding gold-lamé-and-gem-sweater diva Leslie Hall brought us a zombie anthem for the millennium with Zombie Killer. Full of useful instructions about how to survive a zombie apocalypse, the song was re-released this year featuring vocals from Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. Check out the shiny new video full of technical wizardry and armies of zombies (but sadly missing the original chorus of zombie children imploring us to shoot them in the brains). Listen to the original version on www.myspace.com/lesliehall Zombie Werewolf Feudin’ Blues by Houmousexual Tells the tragic tale of gay dandy-zombie/rockabilly-werewolf love thwarted by feuding families. In a jaunty rockabilly blues ditty. Written for the soundtrack of the short Amazing Graves filmed in the Glasgow Necropolis in 2006. Tragically not available to listen online, but you can see the trailer for Amazing Graves on youtube.
Zombie Love Song by Thunder Thighs Electro disco beats from these two Minnesota ladies (label-mates of Scream Club and Nicky Click) compel a reconsideration of the inherent hotness of the undead: “Don’t eat the brains from my head/Can’t we just make out instead?” Zombie love song downloadable from www.myspace.com/thunderthighsgirls Zombies! Organise!! Zombies! Organise!! from Boca, Florida exist to ferment revolution amongst their zombie brothers and sisters against their human oppressors. Armed with crunky white-girl rapping over bleepy keyboards and toy drum machines, Zombies! Organise!! are clearly the vanguard of an imminent undead uprising. Remember: “You’ve got nothing to lose but you gr-gr-graves/ they’ve got nothing to lose but their br-br-br-brains”. Zombie Manifesto downloadable from www.myspace.com/zombiesorganize
So all that remains is for queers to march zombie-like towards the dance-floor, Thriller video impersonations mandatory. Who’s with me? Greeeughghghg. Uuuuurrrghghgh. words: Kate Wozza pictures: Jack Dawes
36
‘When you celebrate the scar it heals the wound.’
XXBOYS
XX Boys, founded by Columbian photographer Kael T. Block in 2003, is a photography project ‘about a new generation of FtMs. XX Boys wants to show the world the awesome diversity of trans boys, trans of all shapes, styles, colors, sexual orientation, physical appearance, journeys.’ Starting out by documenting his own transition, Paris based Kael explains how photographing himself gave him the reassurance he needed, ‘a way to re-appropriate my own body and to celebrate it.’ He describes the inspiration for the project as coming from a lack of representation of FtMs ‘in all stages of transition, and a diversity of identity and experiences.’ Since it began he’s travelled the world photographing FtMs and exhibiting work in a variety of venues; from high-profile galleries to personal shows to public spaces. Kael gave us some background on the project and where he sees it headed. ‘As a young, isolated FtM, and a bit scared by the experience I was about to live, I needed role models, I needed to hear stories, to see others like me and to feel supported by a community. I wanted to share the empowering experience of being photographed with other FtMs - this is something I do with nonFtMs as well. A lot of people can have a hard relationship with their bodies; the body is strongly tied to identity, to a sense of self-confidence. When you celebrate the scar it heals the wound. Today the XX Boys photo project has evolved with the forthcoming website; there will be videos, links, writin’, a zine, a forum, plus articles about FtMs, musicians, photographers, filmmakers, there’ll be projects about FtMs, personal XX Boys profiles and XXX pictures. While the website will be in English the texts will be translated into Swedish, Spanish, Dutch, German and French. I took a little break to consider what I wanted the project to be, how to improve it, make it accessible to the most number of people, also, to make it positive and fun is a priority. I’ve seen people complain everyday, be sad about their condition, be angry against society, judge other people’s actions, and I hear and understand all that, but it needs to be turned in to something productive. XX Boys is political, artistic and communitarian, it’s important for me to keep these three aspects balanced. I want it to be a place where one can talk about queer politics and another can talk about his wife and dog, and no one judging the other. ‘I photograph people whilst travelling; I receive a lot of emails from FtMs all over the world who want to model. When I come to a city I photograph every one that registered. On the new website the FtMs who want to model for the project and share their experience will be able to register directly through the site. There are no criteria; FtMs of all ages, colours, sexuality, politics are welcome to participate! I hope to raise money to travel everywhere and photograph FtMs all over the world. People will also be able to participate by sending videos, pictures to the photo contest, or art for the zine. XX Boys has received a lot of positive, supportive responses; from the FtM community, the queer community, from allies, gays, lesbians. I was really happy when I received an email from a boy who told me that the project helped their mum understand what he was going through. XX Boys pictures have been shown in queer and lgbt spaces, at art galleries and museums, at universities and also in the French subway; this might have been my favourite!’
www.xxboys.20six.fr www.myspace.com/xxboys www.kaeltblock.free.fr
photos: Kael T. Block
BARRY STILTON Everything got a little heavy in Lancaster - it’s such an intense place it can get crazy so once I caught up with Gok we hip-hopped over the pond to Old New York. They’re more laid back there and of course life’s always easier when you’re surrounded by a host of your nearest and dearest celebrity friends. We took in a couple of wheat grass shots and headed over to central park with Brangelina and the orphans. I’m not such a fan but Gok is a real brown noser - they got drunk and had a threesome with him one time and now he won’t leave them alone, it’d be embarrassing, but they are so cool things like that don’t even bother them. It seemed to me there was nothing out of the ordinary about Cher rollerblading around in a luminous leotard so tight her gynaecologist would blush to see her in it, I assumed she was trawling the park for sex. However I knew something was amiss when I saw Björk, concealed in the higher branches of a tall tree with a cross bow. I knew who they were after. “Brad, Ange; take the kids and get out of here. There’s trouble brewing” They gathered the flock and headed out of the park and not a moment too soon; Björk descended from her lofty bow like a ninja snowflake and Cher trundled over like a rattly old shopping trolley with a wheel missing. I took Björk out tout suite with a roundhouse kick and pretty nasty ha-du-ken. Gok had shoved Cher in a bush and covered her in mace.
For the complete lowdown in Lancashire; catch up with Barry: www.barrystilton.blogspot.com
illustration: www.pockettree.com
illustration: www.pockettree.com