Girls, the band, has quite a back story — no actual girls in the band, cult life, shitty parents, drugs, etc. The record is really good — early Elvis Costello CHANNELED. I had always wondered about the first line from the first song “Oh, I wish I had a boyfriend, I wish I had a loving man in my life. I wish I had a father, and maybe then I would have turned out right.” Seems a dramatic intro to a first record, but there’s real autobiography in there. Leave it to timing (see previous post about Hunx and His Punx) to have a new NSFW music video for said song premiere today. “Lust for Life” features Hunx and his erect junk being used as a microphone to lip synch by a twinky bed mate. Of course, Pitchfork features the video and talks about the boobs and the “schlong” but doesn’t mention that it’s Hunx’s. This is the link to the video, remember: NSFW!
In our post-Gravy Train!!!! world, there are two solo off-shoots that I’ve been closely watching. Hunx And His Punx seem to get a lot of attention and The Younger Lovers (headed by Brontez, formerly known as Junx) tends to be the other side project. On the surface, they are both doing similar things: whiny, charged classic punk with nods to girl groups and the Ramones. However, a quick glance at the Hype Machine shows 10 Hunx posts and 2 for the Younger Lovers (and just to be clear, those hard numbers low low low for The Hype Machine, TPR is NICHE AUDIENCE, I love you). It’s a shame, really–where Hunx has perfect style, a delish set of limited 7″ singles and is fascinatingly slutty (see: twitter), Brontez writes his own songs, plays all the instruments and he makes his own print zine (Hunx’s songs are written by No Bunny). You could say Hunx is like Kim Zolciak, and Brontez is like Kandi Burruss…J/K. I’m not knocking Hunx – he is delivering the punk rock goods, but their paths split when you take a look at their agendas. Whereas Hunx is looking to get laid and party, Brontez is looking to find community (you don’t make Fag School, his zine, unless you are looking to meet people). Both fit into the spirit of Rock ‘N Roll, but you can’t forget that as a black queer punk Brontez has higher stakes. His hysterical essay in BUTT Magazine #26 was just as horny as Hunx, but there was considerable longing for other black punks in his large U.S. city and there weren’t any. Struggle makes the hustle, being wronged makes better songs and you can hear it. Yes, some of you might want to look past race, but if you count brown folks at indie shows you’ll be done really quickly–the only recent time I’ve seen a direct racial line between artists and fans is when I noticed all the MINI-MY-A’s at the last M.I.A. show I went to. Not even TV on the Radio brings out the black folks. There are cultural barriers between being brown and being punk, and to think otherwise is to be more post-racial than current reality allows. On The Younger Lovers’ “Newest Romantic” LP, casual fly-aways and runaway hooks co-mingle in deeper ways than just appropriation of punk’s historical sounds. He’s got some real angst in there and considering the swing of the hate-pendulum every time queers get a little more on the books, the authentic thrash of an underdog is raw power. Stream and download my fave track from the record below and keep up with Brontez at his blog, Newest Romantic.
I can’t tell you how bad I wish I was going to be in NYC the week before Pride. BUTT magazine just announced two pre-Pride Celebrations. The first one, called BANG, will be at The Knitting Factory with performances by Salem, Hunx and His Punx, and Sissy Nobby (more on Sissy Nobby in another post). The 2nd party will be at at Terence Koh’s gallery, Asia Song Society (ASS), and it will be a queer video film fest. They have just anounced an open call for submissions, and will be accepting films until May 20th, the show opens on June 19th.
I am really happy that after all this time, former Gravy Train!!!! homo Hunx has his solo project up and running. Two seven inches have been pressed, the new music video (above) is pretty cute, and the bloc of songs over at the myspace are all very good. Songwriting credits are listed to NOBUNNY, and if you go over to his space, the Ramones/Screeching Weasel influence is all over his shit. Anyhow, you might think this is Pansy Division all over again, but so far these songs are just girl-group enough to make me jump on the bus. The 7″ for “You Don’t Like Rock N’ Roll” has scratch-off cover art, and you know I got one!!
