An Introduction:
After my best friend Greg moved to London in 1985, I noticed that several odd phrases began to creep into his lexicon. As we walked down Kings Road together and spotted a punker with a fully-erect, magenta-colored mohawk over a foot high, Greg called out to him, “Fab riah!” I could figure out the meaning of fab easily enough, but riah? As we cruised the infamous Brompton Cemetery and a particularly delicious-looking piece of gay male eye candy came our way, Greg would whisper furtively to me, “Vada the carts!” “What the hell?” I asked Greg, and he said he was speaking Polari, and that it meant Check out his basket! Greg explained to me that Polari was a slang – a gay code, if you will -- developed by London queers in the 1950’s so that they could openly cruise and dish in public without being obvious. Since Greg was well-known for his tall tales, I just sort of shrugged it off as one of his endearing eccentricities, but then I began hearing other English queers uttering phrases like “I’m trolling for trade in the cottages”, “I need to slap my eek” and “What a naff omi-polone” – which Greg informed me were Polari phrases. So I did a bit of research (in the library, back in the days before the internet) and sure enough, Greg wasn’t pulling my leg. I even discovered a song by Morrisey about it, the lyrics of which I include in this webliography. Now, almost 25 years later, words like trade and cottaging are part of my every day gay vernacular and I no longer even think about their origins. For this webliography assignment, I’ve decided to update and expand my original research on this fascinating little tidbit of gay cultural history
First, a Definition, from Wikipedia:
Polari (or alternatively Parlare, Parlary, Palare, Palarie, Palari, Parlyaree, from Italian parlare, "to talk") is a form of cant slang used in the gay subculture in Britain. It was revived in the 1950s and 1960s by its use by camp characters Julian and Sandy in the popular BBC radio shows Beyond our Ken and Round the Horne, but its origins can be traced back to at least the 19th century. There is some debate about how it originated. There is a longstanding connection with Punch and Judy street puppet performers who traditionally used Polari to talk with each other. Polari is a mixture of Romance (Italian or Mediterranean Lingua Franca), Romany, London slang, backslang, rhyming slang, sailor slang, and thieves' cant. Later it expanded to contain words from the Yiddish language of the Jewish subculture which settled in the East End of London, the US forces (present in the UK during World War II) and 1960s drug users. It was a constantly developing form of language, with a small core lexicon of about 20 words (including bona, ajax, eek, cod, naff, lattie, nanti, omi, palone, riah, zhoosh (tjuz), TBH, trade, vada), with over 500 other lesser-known items.
The Wikipedia site goes on to discuss the following aspects of Polari: Usage, Decline in use, Contemporary usage, Entry into standard English, Polari glossary, Polari in use, Is Polari a language?, Bibliography, References, and External links.
Like it does for most subjects, the Wikipedia site provides an excellent, thorough starting point for anyone wanting to know more about Polari. It also has a very good glossary.
I will now provide additional sources in alphabetical order.
Baker, Paul. A Dictionary of Polari and Gay Slang. Published by Continuum International Publishing Group, 2002 http://www.amazon.com/Fantabulosa-Dictionary-Polari-Gay-Slang/dp/0826459617(accessed 24 March 2009)
Baker, Paul. Polari -- The Lost Language of Gay Men. Published by Routledge, 2002 http://books.google.com/books?id=yxHz97AvesUC&printsec=frontcover&dq=polari(accessed 24 March 2009)
As you can see by the above citations, there are actually a couple of books published about Polari (the only ones -- as far as I can tell – both written by the same guy, one for academia, one for the mass audience.). According to Amazon.com, A Dictionary of Polari and Gay Slang explains how “Polari has been the secret language of gay men and women throughout the twentieth century. But more than a language, Polari is an attitude. From the prisons and music halls of Edwardian England to Kenneth Williams, American GIs in London, and the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence, Polari has been used to laugh, bitch, gossip, and cruise. Like all slang, Polari is an ever-changing vocabulary. Derived from words used by criminals, circus artists, beggars and prostitutes, it also employs elements of Italian, Yiddish, French, rhyming slang, and backslang. Since gay liberation, lesbian and gay slang has become less a language of concealment than a language of specialization, though the tradition of camp remains. A carefully researched and entertaining read, The Dictionary of Polari and Gay Slang presents a lexicon of Polari and a more general dictionary of lesbian and gay slang. If you don't yet know what vada the bona cartes on the ommee ajax, parkering ninty, a Mexican nightmare, or a nellyectomy are, then this is the book for you.” The Google Book Search website states that Polari -- The Lost Language of Gay Men “examines the ways in which Polari was used in order to construct 'gay identities', linking its evolution to the changing status of gay men and lesbians in the UK over the past fifty years.”
BBC. Polari - British gay slang. http://www.bbc.co.uk/dna/h2g2/A1153946 (accessed 25 March 2009)
Although this entry appears early in this webliography because of its alphabetical nature, it’s actually one of the last I’ve accessed for this project, and I realize now that I’m scraping the bottom of the www barrel on this topic. There’s not much on this website that not equally well-covered on the other pages I’ve discussed. I’ve also noticed another annoying pattern that I’ve encountered before when doing web-based research: That is, many sites seem to simply cut and paste information from other sites, so what appears to initially be a plethora of information ends up being literally the exact same stuff.
Denning, Chris. http://www.chris-d.net/polari/ (accessed 16 March 2009)
This site provides another excellent overview, with a particularly superb bibliography featuring books, magazine articles, films, TV programs and songs. From this site, I was reminded of the fab scene in the film “Velvet Goldmine” in which the characters speak Polari, complete with subtitles. It is hilarious!
Morrisey. Lyrics to the song "Piccadilly Palare" from the Bona Drag album. http://www.lyricsfreak.com/m/morrissey/piccadilly+palare_20096014.html(accessed 16 March 2009)
Leave it to the Grand Old Queen of Post-Punk to write a song about Polari (which he spells “Palare”). I’ve never been a huge fan of Morrisey or the Smiths, as I find his melodies too cloyingly repetitive and his reticence about his sexual orientation frustratingly annoying. Yet, his lyrics often speak for themselves so I guess I should give him a break!
"Piccadilly Palare"
Off the rails I was, and Off the rails I was happy to stay
GET OUT OF MY WAY
On the rack I was, Easy meat, and a reasonably good buy, A reasonably good buy
The Piccadilly palare, Was just silly slang, Between me and the boys in my gang
"So Bona to Vada. OH YOU, Your lovely eek and Your lovely riah"
We plied an ancient trade, Where we threw all life's Instructions away
Exchanging lies and digs (my way) Cause in a belted coat
Oh, I secretly knew That I hadn't a clue
(No, no. No, no, no. You can't get there that way. Follow me...)
The Piccadilly palare Was just silly slang Between me and the boys in my gang
Exchanging palare You wouldn't understand Good sons like you NEVER DO.
So why do you smile When you think about Earl's Court ?
But you cry when you think of all The battles you've fought (and lost)?
It may all end tomorrow Or it could go on forever In which case I'm doomed
It could go on forever In which case I'm doomed
Polari words used in this song :
bona - good
drag - clothes
vada - see, look at
eek - face
riah - hair
Polari Magazine. http://www.polarimagazine.com/02feb09/02-03.html
Although not specifically about the Polari language, this very slickly-produced magazine appears to be an Out-like glossy targeting the GLBTQ audience and is available online only. Only on its second issue, the magazine looks quite good, if you like this sort of thing. The above link goes to the Table of Contents.
Quinion, Michael. “World Wide Words” http://www.worldwidewords.org/articles/polari.htm(accessed 16 March 2009)
This site provides information on how Polari was repopularized in the 1960’s during the BBC’s Golden Age of Radio Comedy, a period in which several shows featured characters who spoke Polari, including Goon Show, Take It from Here, Hancock’s Half Hour and Round The Horne. According to Quinion, the latter show “always featured a pair of screamingly camp young men: ‘Hello, I’m Julian and this is my friend Sandy’, overplayed by Williams and Paddick to an extent which robbed it of much of its latent homophobia (particularly as both were known to be gay), though I cannot imagine a similar duo being allowed anywhere near a BBC microphone in this supposedly more permissive but also infinitely more sensitive age. These two spoke in a slangy language which was virtually incomprehensible to anyone hearing it for the first time, though by repetition week by week a mental glossary could be constructed. ‘How bona to vada your eek!’ was a recurring expression; there were references to ‘butch omis’ and to ‘omipalones’; they always ‘trolled’ everywhere, though their ‘lallies’ weren’t up to much of that; things were ‘naph’, ‘bona’ or sometimes ‘fantabulosa’.” The site also features a short Polari lexicon.
Young, Hugh. “Lexicon of Polari” http://www.homeusers.prestel.co.uk/cello/Polari.htm(accessed 16 March 2009)
This is by far the most extensive Polari wordlist available on the web. It also extremely thorough and academic in nature, describing each word’s meaning, source, alternate spellings, pronunciation, part of speech, original language, and original form, with examples and comments for several of the entries as well. Probably too much for the casually interested reader, this site nevertheless reflects how Polari has indeed become a subject of serious academic research in recent years. From this site, I also learned that there are even Polari versions of numbers! (una, dewey, tray quattro, chinker, say, setter, otter, nobber, daiture. Sounds like my Spanish!)
YouTube. Round the Horne: Bona Ballet http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0I408B1jiw(accessed 25 March 2009)
I’m very happy that I was able to find this audio clip because I really wanted the viewers of this webliography to be able to hear Polari being used. This clip is from the British radio programme Around the Horne, featuring the very camp characters of Julian and Sandy. When these old radio programs were released on CD in the mid-1990’s, Polari re-emerged in a big way in the U. K. gay community.
Friday, September 8, 2017
Punk+Bear+Rock+Queer+Guru+Icon = Gary Floyd
INTRODUCTION:
In October of 1986, I had been living in San Francisco for almost three years. I was paying $295.00 a month for a little studio apartment next to a nursery school on Euclid Avenue, attending SF State -- finishing up the B.A. degree I had been nibbling away at for the past seven years -- and working as a parking lot attendant downtown for $13.00 an hour, which was really good money back then. I was really into the local music scene, hosting a weekly radio show at KUSF which enabled me to get into almost any gig I wanted to see for free, and DJ-ing a couple of nights a week at the Transfer bar in the Castro. I was fully “out” and my life as a young gay man in SF was pretty thrilling. Sure, the bath houses had closed down, and more and more skinny, sickly-looking men with purple blotches on their faces could be seen cruising the Castro. But the full enormity of the AIDS crisis hadn’t hit yet. At that time, although the early signs were evident in retrospect, we just hadn’t yet realized how bad it was going to get, so most of us kept on “playing” with youthful abandon. The HIV test came out in early 1986; I took it in July and tested negative. When I went back three months later for a follow-up, I tested positive. 26 years old, and I honestly never thought I’d live to see 30, such was the state of things then . . . Yet life did go on.
Early in 1987, while listening to KUSF, I heard a song called “Freight Train” by a SF band w/ the unusual name of Sister Double Happiness. The lyrics, belted out by a man with a BIG bluesy brawlin’ bawl, spoke directly to me and my fears as a newly-sero-converted HIV+ man:
I wake up in the middle of the night
My skin’s like a block of ice
Hot sweat pouring out of me
I got the plague of the century
It’s like a freight rain
It’s like an airplane
It’s like a hurricane
Taking me away
I was good as I could be
My skin smooth as ivory
I swear to God I hardly messed around
That modern plague put me into the ground
It’s like a freight rain
It’s like an airplane
It’s like a hurricane
Taking me away
I call my mama. she said “Don’t come home.”
Mt friends shun me. I’m all alone
Before they touch me they put on gloves
C’mon people, I need some love
It’s like a freight rain
It’s like an airplane
It’s like a hurricane
Taking me away
(Lyrics by Gary Floyd / Music by Ben Cohen)
Turns out the band was playing later that week at the VIS Club, so I called the station and got myself put on the guest list.
When the band came to the stage, I was immediately struck by the lead singer, Gary Floyd. For one thing, he was really cute – or at least I thought so. Husky and hairy, just the way I like ‘em. (This is well before the “bear” phenomenon had started, mind you.) Another thing – This boy could sing! Also, it became clear to me by the end of the night – from his lyrics as well as his stage manners -- that he was gay and not at all reluctant about exploring queer themes in his music and stage show.
Thus, a fan was born. I pretty much became a SDH groupie that night, and since they played their hometown quite often, I was able to attend a LOT of their gigs. I managed to get backstage early on, flirted w/ Gary, and ended up “going home” with him one night after a gig. Our sexual dalliance eventually morphed into a friendship that continues to this day.
What I didn’t know about, in those early days of our friendship, was Gary’s colorful punk-rock past – and of course, I couldn’t know where our lives would take us in the future. For this project, I’ve decided to let Gary’s words (printed in blue) speak for themselves, as much as possible, so that you can get a sense of why I think Gary is an important figure in gay cultural history.
OVERVIEW
Gary Floyd is San Francisco's own living, breathing punk rock icon, and deserves major credit, not just for being such a talented and prolific artist but for being an openly gay front person of a punk band in Texas in the late seventies/early Eighties. And this he boldly did as the powerhouse vocalist for legendary hardcore punk band The Dicks, a self-described “commie faggot” blues-derived, hardcore punk band who released their brilliant, rage-fueled first single, Dicks Hate the Police, which is now viewed as a timeless, punk classic. After The Dicks' demise, the tireless Gary Floyd, who has lived in San Francisco for the past 35 years, went on to form Sister Double Happiness, Black Kali Ma, The Gary Floyd Band, Hard Ride and currently the raw blues/country Gary Floyd and the Buddha Brothers.
(Out, Loud and Proud . . .)
CHILDHOOD ~ Pre-Austin
When I was a little kid in Arkansas, some people moved next door to us and I was a little third grader and they had this teenage son who was a weirdo, sort of beatnik guy and he had a huge picture of the Mona Lisa hanging in his room upside down and he was an artist and sort of different from the other kids in that town and he was a big influence on me. There were obviously some wild seeds in me and he was the water that made them come alive. Being gay... I always knew I was gay, although I always had little girlfriends and stuff. They were just like sisters to me to prevent any un-gay ways of acting. I tried to create some façade to hide that. A school that was pretty much newly integrated and seeing the same bigotry towards people of color and the same sort of nightmarish feeling that I was getting from these people and having to hide, because I wasn't open nor did I come out until I left school. Also, the radical sort of music in those days. All of those things gave me a feeling of being a little bit different and you start to cultivate your own ideas and sometimes maybe they become a little more radical when you feel sort of alone. I'm not trying to make myself seem pitiful or feel sorry for myself... they were miserable years in the fact that, at school, I was hated. I was popular as sort of a class clown but I suffered because I did really bad in school, I hated it but I also knew that something was happening that I was going to be all right. Sometimes, those feelings can produce a lot of positive things. You don't really know it, always, but I sort of had an inkling of it because I knew I'd get out, someday.
I got drafted 1972. I'm 45 years old. But I had prepared myself from seeing people slaughtered and what I felt was a really unjust war against the North Vietnamese and the Vietnamese, in general. I'd developed a lot of very strong political ideas and I had signed up, when I registered for the draft, as a conscientious objector and I was accepted. So, when I got drafted, I had to do two years of alternative civilian work so I was placed in Houston. I moved to Houston in '72 and I worked as a janitor in a charity hospital, which was a job that they offered as alternative work. I worked there two years and that's where I came out and started doing lots of LSD -- which I don't do anymore nor have I for years -- but that's where all the things started happening that happen to young people when they move away from home. Then I moved to Austin. Suburban Voice . . .)
AUSTIN ~ Punk, The Dicks, Being a “Commie Fag”
"Mommy, mommy, mommy..." bawled Gary Floyd to start The Dicks' classic 1980 single, Dicks Hate the Police, a warning that "you'd better stay out of my way... I've had a bad day." The Dicks had two incarnations -- the first, based in Austin, TX, featured Gary, guitarist Glen Taylor, bassist Buxf Parrott and drummer Pat Deason. The band moved to San Francisco in '82 but only Gary ended up making it a permanent move and he started a second version of The Dicks with guitarist Tim Carroll, bassist Sebastian Fuchs and drummer Lynn Perko. This lineup stuck until the band's breakup in '86 and Gary and Lynn moved on to the bluesier Sister Double Happiness. (Suburban Voice . . .)
Almost all the really good bands in Austin were either fronted by or had gay people in the band. People were pretty open about it then. It wasn't like people were trying to hide and the other thing about it was that people weren't really making a big deal about it. They weren't getting up and giving speeches for gay rights but they were just sort of being themselves and that was really wonderful. That's extremely refreshing. And after years of also not fitting into gay bars, because with mohawks and bleached hair and being fat was another thing that was very unaccepted -- all of those sort of mixed in together -- I really didn't like the queer bar scene. So Raul's [the primary venue for Austin’s late-70’s punk scene] fit all those things. It was really wonderful. Queers were really obvious in the scene and the people that weren't, if anybody didn't like it, we'd tell them we'd beat the shit out of them. Get a bunch of queers to beat your fuckin' ass. It usually never came to that. There was always a lot of mutual respect. (Suburban Voice . . .)
Mommy, mommy, mommy
Look at your son
You might have loved me
But now I got a gun
You better stay out of my way
I think I've had a bad day
I've had a bad day
Daddy, daddy, daddy
Proud of your son
Got himself a good job
Shoot niggers and Mexicans
I'll tell you one thing, it's true
You can't find justice, it'll find you
It'll find you
People tell policemen
They've met their match
Down in them desert sands
The Dicks won't catch
Dicks hates policemen, yes, it's true
You can't find justice, it'll find you
It'll find you
Mommy, mommy
Look at your son
You might have loved me
But now I got a gun
You better stay out of my way
I've had a bad day
Mommy, I've had a bad day (Lyrics by Gary Floyd / Music by Glen Taylor)
The punk scene in Austin was really good in the fact that a lot of the best bands were fronted by queer men and they also happened to be sort of big queer men. So that was an advantage right there. And people wouldn't automatically mess with us cos we were sort of redneck queers in a way - redneck in the fact that we were big and we didn't really want to take any mess with anybody about it. And we were very lucky because the punk scene was very open minded there. And there was me and there was Biscuit from the Big Boys and (gay) others who were fronting these other bands. And I also had these three tough straight guys who were in the band with me and they gave me a lot of confidence. (laughs) I might be saying something a little different if I had three little rosebuds in the back of me. We were very lucky there and the frat-rats hated us a lot more for being punk than for being queer. (Out, Loud and Proud . . .)
Saturday Night at the Bookstore:
One of the Dicks’ most outrageous songs, and one of my favorites, is a song titled “Saturday Night at the Bookstore.” In it, Gary furiously berates a suburban married man he sees with his wife at a Safeway supermarket on Sunday morning, whose dick he had sucked the night before through a glory hole at the local adult bookstore, and who now won’t even acknowledge Gary’s presence. Gary end the song crooning “I’m in love with a glory hole . . .”
It was a very free, pre-AIDS time in the early Eighties. Most straight guys were getting blow jobs in video Stores, sneaking out from the wife and letting guys do what their wives wouldn't. Nobody thought much of it. But if you ever saw one of these creeps on the street, they acted like "Faggot, stop looking at me!" So, I wrote a little song about it. We never did it live until we started playing again a few years ago. It was a moment-in-time song. I still hum it sometimes.
Wayne: I'm especially fond of "Saturday Night At The Bookstore”. Though I may be a forty-something, married man of 20 years, I remember adult bookstores in the late 70s. They were amazing! And you're telephoning me from one?
Yes, yes! Nothing's changed! Nothing like an old glory hole to say "welcome home"! (Adams)
Gary on Divine and John Waters as an inspiration for some of his more feminine costumes from the Dicks era:
Any fat guy in drag was sort of Divine-ish. I loved to dress up back then, and the idea of making a punk crowd feel uneasy was always a wonderful way to spend the evening. The early John Waters movies from the 70's and early 80's were ground breaking and so fresh and new. Now he makes tired stuff, but I still love him. (Floyd)
Sister Double Happiness ~ Being a Bear From a 1991 review of SDH’s Heart and Mind LP: The ferocious rock-music disc would rank as one of the year's standouts even if Floyd weren't a self-pro-claimed "big fag? But he is, Blanche -- the first openly gay gutbucket hard-rock vocalist ever signed to a major label. He walks as fiercely as any queen and as ruggedly as a pitbull. His sexuality provides a perspective, but it is rarely the subject of his songs. The LP opener, "Bobby Shannon" is a queer but hardly gay blues tune about a dog devotee of the Indian monkey god Hanuman. But when Floyd turns a pained eye on the desperate state of the planet in "Ain't It a Shame," ozone depletion and police brutality are joined by the specter of a boy hungry for risky sex. With dread overtaking lust, Floyd warns, "Your kicks aren't safe. You leave it to fate. You got a dangerous machine." Floyd unleashes an entrancing vocal on "Exposed to You," a nearly unhinged plea to a youth who offers sex but won't return love . . . "Hey Kids" [is] a raging anthem about the costs of the closet. Floyd offers encouragement to "the kid whose light has been covered" and a warning to the businessman who has "waited so long to make the love you need" that "some private moment may come back.. .and be handed to you gently or else thrown in your face." The last verse offers love to a sick friend and rage that he's been denied the care he needs. "Hey Kids" is the first rock song about both outing and governmental inaction over AIDS. (Block)
Hey kids in school
I'm talking to the ones whose light's been covered
Having to play by the rules
That some old man a thousand years ago discovered
Oh boy, but I wonder why
Why they're messing with you
In the very same way they messed with me
A long long time ago
Hey Mr. Businessman
I see you every day in your pinstripe running
You never did understand that
When all those lies start burning
Oh boy you're gonna wonder why
Why you waited so long
To make the love you need
'Cause it should have been done
A long long time ago
Oh, in these days when my freedom is up for discussion
And you hold my future in your hands
Some private moment from your past
Might come back at you brother
And then the truth like poison
Will be handed to you gently
Or else thrown in your face
Hey friend of mine
I know you're sick
But with love you can recover
Oh, I wanna take you in my arms
And I'll yell out loud that I love you like a brother
Oh, boy, but I wonder why
Why they've waited so long to give you the care you need
'Cause it should have done
A long time ago
(Lyrics by Gary Floyd / Music by Ben Cohen)
I felt very akin to the bear movement because I never really liked gay bars, per se. I met this one guy who told me there was a bar in San Francisco called The Lone Star where big guys; more blue-collar, worker-type guys hung out. So I went there, and I befriended many people. and I got very involved with it, and I liked it a whole lot. My connection with it is, um, I look like one, I guess!
Sister Double Happiness was the best band, as a unit, that I was in. And then The Gary Floyd Band, who've changed so much... there've been so many different people... the core was me, Danny Roman, and Jonathon Burnside. But the one unit that was really cohesive and I felt ties with was Sister Double Happiness, partly because of [drummer] Lynn Perko, who is, of course, in [Roddy Bottums' group] Imperial Teen now. She and I are like brother and sister, and we have been for so many years. I remember one time when we were doing really good in San Francisco. We were playing an acoustic show at the Great American Music Hall. This was during the days when I was really hanging out at the Lone Star a lot. Somebody came backstage. They looked sort of nervous and said, "I don't wanna get you upset, or anything, but there's about 30-40 bikers out there!" So I ran and looked out front, and it was everybody from the Lone Star! It was one of the best shows we ever did. It was really, really wonderful! So, whenever we'd play around, all the local bears would come, and usually somebody would come up and say. "We've heard of you." Then we'd either go fuck or become friends! Or sometimes both!
WAYNE: Has it ever been important whether or not you have gay people in your bands?
GARY: (laughing) You know, there are so few queers who come to our shows, I don't need the competition! I'd like to get several really pretty girls so all the guys would hang out with them, then I could pick up - sort of "mop up" - the queers if they wanted. (seriously) You know, the only thing I've ever cared about is the musicianship.
WAYNE: That's what I like about your songs. You don't deliberately force the gay issue. It either comes up, or it doesn't.
GARY: I've really tried to handle being gay in that very same way. Of course, everybody acts up a lot when they first come out, but there's a certain point that, to me, I don't see being gay as something unnatural or something bizarre. This is a real part of life. There've always been queers, and there always will be.
WAYNE: What do you like most in a man?
GARY: A big fucking fat dick with a long-shootin' load! (laughs) I think I most admire a man who can accept me without trying to change me. And also the dick with the big load!
WAYNE: A woman?
GARY: Sistership. Ninety-five percent of my best friends are women. I become their sister, and I'm very satisfied with that. I love that! (Adams)
Floyd has long been a vocal advocate of gay rights, sometimes angrily so -- on "Where Do We Run," from Sister's 1993 album Uncut, he sang: "I knew some tough guys who went out to have some fun/ They got a gay guy tried to shoot him with a gun/ That gay guy struck back and cut the bastards' throats ... they are weak, weak and going down." The same attitude pervades Black Kali Ma's "Gotta Keep Movin' On," which Floyd wrote in tribute to James Byrd and Matthew Shepard.
"If you think [San Francisco] is bad, just leave for a while," he says. "You get out of here, there's a lot of fucking racist, homophobic shit going on, sexist crap that goes on that even would shock the most politically incorrect people in this city." Referring to Shepard, he says, "Even if he'd gone up to them and said, 'Can I suck your dick?' " -- and here, his voice rises an angry octave -- "you don't kill people for that." (Athitakis)
ART
Throughout his career, Gary's expressions reached beyond music into a fantastic series of mixed-media creations. Avoiding the term "artist," Gary does Art. His pieces forge a stressed synergy between overt sexuality, spiritual insistence, and subjective violence. The initial impression is extreme; but, the subtleties that follow leave the viewer lilting in a simpler truth.
The medium, in Gary's words, "is what I can grab the quickest...pizza boxes, scotch tape, water colors, copied photos and diabetic test strips [...] What I save on psychiatric services, I spend on art supplies. I leave 90% of my personal crisis in the art, leaving the remaining 10% for me to carry myself." (Art of Gary Floyd )
ON BEING A “CELEBRITY”
I'm a big puss. I've gone up to people who were in bands that I liked and they were assholes, and do you know what that taught me? That I don't want to do that to people. I want to be as natural to people as I can. I'd rather get run over by a fucking truck and go straight to hell than be rude to people who were fans I'd really rather burn in the stinking turd of hell. Some guy wrote me on MySpace and said, 'That's so nice, you're talking back to me, and you write back, and you're not an asshole.' I just want to be myself. (Ala)
SPIRITUALITY
In the late '80s, Floyd tried to get away from music; soon after Sister Double Happiness released its first album in 1988, he broke up the band and pursued what he calls a “spiritual journey,” studying Indian religion and even contemplating joining a monastery, an idea he dismissed fairly quickly, though he routinely credits a spiritual adviser on his records.
“I figured if I joined a monastery I'd probably end up being a pretty bad monk. Miserable me, you know, fucking fag sitting around a monastery pissed off at everyone. There were times that I didn't feel like being a part of the [music] scene anymore, but that's not a choice that I make. I actually accept it now: I'm always going to be doing music. I tried to quit music a few times. I tried to say that I'm not going to do any more bands now, but I figured out that's not really a choice now.” (Athitakis)
"For a long time, I was really giving no attention to the spiritual side of my life. Like, nothing at all. And then it started coming to me really strong. And it wasn't like, go to the first Baptist church, it came in the way of a vacancy. I thought, this is like a spiritual vacancy, and I had been a real spiritual kid. I was raised Baptist, and my parents said one day, 'We don't want to go to church anymore, but we want you to go if you want to, and we're take you, and we'll come and get you.' And that changed, I became Catholic, which freaked my mom out a little bit. But they took me to church, and then the war in Vietnam started raging when I was 15, and I got very political, very left. And I ignored all the spiritual stuff for some time. But then I started getting really hungry for it. When the Dicks were on tour one time, I had some books about Buddhism, and I studied that a lot, kept moving, and I found another path, sort of a hippie path, and I got very into the Hindu path of mother worship, the different mother goddesses. Kali is my chosen mother. I see her terrifying side, but I also see her loving side. I started studying that, and I even quit Sister Double Happiness for a year to join a monastery. I studied, for a year and thought, okay, I'm really not going to be a monk anytime soon.
And I got Sister Double Happiness back together. So yeah, a big mother thing. A BIG mother thing. And Kali is all those mother references. She'll slap you down, she'll pick you up. That's part of the whole trip, you have to look through it. It's all there, whether it's a hurricane down south, or it's a big gold palace up north. They're all part of it and if you get too attached to either one you're gonna freak out later on. You have to look at what's going one, deal with it, and keep your whole inner thing going on. And none of it's easy. I get rid of a lot of anxiety, and what could be called depression by singing. (Ala)
I still think there should be a little more equality in the economy but I got much more into a spiritual life for awhile. I'm not talking about crystals or moonbeams. I studied a lot of old Hindu scriptures and actually went to a monastery and studied that for a year. I quit Sister Double Happiness and just studied and met some really non-dogmatic, wonderful spiritual teachers whose philosophy was, if there is a heaven, atheists who just do good for no reason are more likely to be in heaven than Christians that do good to go to heaven. It's a very good philosophy, I think. Just do what's right. Not hurting people and that also softened and took away a lot of my hard edged political drive. It didn't blind me or make me apathetic but it opened up a whole new part of my life and I'm really happy that it did. I'm not a Christian but, at the same time, I probably like Jesus better now that I'm not a Christian than I ever liked him when I was. (Suburban Voice . . .)
Wayne: Thank you so much for the interview, my friend! That wasn't too painful, now, was it?
GARY: No, my ass doesn't even hurt! (Adams)
In October of 1986, I had been living in San Francisco for almost three years. I was paying $295.00 a month for a little studio apartment next to a nursery school on Euclid Avenue, attending SF State -- finishing up the B.A. degree I had been nibbling away at for the past seven years -- and working as a parking lot attendant downtown for $13.00 an hour, which was really good money back then. I was really into the local music scene, hosting a weekly radio show at KUSF which enabled me to get into almost any gig I wanted to see for free, and DJ-ing a couple of nights a week at the Transfer bar in the Castro. I was fully “out” and my life as a young gay man in SF was pretty thrilling. Sure, the bath houses had closed down, and more and more skinny, sickly-looking men with purple blotches on their faces could be seen cruising the Castro. But the full enormity of the AIDS crisis hadn’t hit yet. At that time, although the early signs were evident in retrospect, we just hadn’t yet realized how bad it was going to get, so most of us kept on “playing” with youthful abandon. The HIV test came out in early 1986; I took it in July and tested negative. When I went back three months later for a follow-up, I tested positive. 26 years old, and I honestly never thought I’d live to see 30, such was the state of things then . . . Yet life did go on.
Early in 1987, while listening to KUSF, I heard a song called “Freight Train” by a SF band w/ the unusual name of Sister Double Happiness. The lyrics, belted out by a man with a BIG bluesy brawlin’ bawl, spoke directly to me and my fears as a newly-sero-converted HIV+ man:
I wake up in the middle of the night
My skin’s like a block of ice
Hot sweat pouring out of me
I got the plague of the century
It’s like a freight rain
It’s like an airplane
It’s like a hurricane
Taking me away
I was good as I could be
My skin smooth as ivory
I swear to God I hardly messed around
That modern plague put me into the ground
It’s like a freight rain
It’s like an airplane
It’s like a hurricane
Taking me away
I call my mama. she said “Don’t come home.”
Mt friends shun me. I’m all alone
Before they touch me they put on gloves
C’mon people, I need some love
It’s like a freight rain
It’s like an airplane
It’s like a hurricane
Taking me away
(Lyrics by Gary Floyd / Music by Ben Cohen)
Turns out the band was playing later that week at the VIS Club, so I called the station and got myself put on the guest list.
When the band came to the stage, I was immediately struck by the lead singer, Gary Floyd. For one thing, he was really cute – or at least I thought so. Husky and hairy, just the way I like ‘em. (This is well before the “bear” phenomenon had started, mind you.) Another thing – This boy could sing! Also, it became clear to me by the end of the night – from his lyrics as well as his stage manners -- that he was gay and not at all reluctant about exploring queer themes in his music and stage show.
Thus, a fan was born. I pretty much became a SDH groupie that night, and since they played their hometown quite often, I was able to attend a LOT of their gigs. I managed to get backstage early on, flirted w/ Gary, and ended up “going home” with him one night after a gig. Our sexual dalliance eventually morphed into a friendship that continues to this day.
What I didn’t know about, in those early days of our friendship, was Gary’s colorful punk-rock past – and of course, I couldn’t know where our lives would take us in the future. For this project, I’ve decided to let Gary’s words (printed in blue) speak for themselves, as much as possible, so that you can get a sense of why I think Gary is an important figure in gay cultural history.
OVERVIEWGary Floyd is San Francisco's own living, breathing punk rock icon, and deserves major credit, not just for being such a talented and prolific artist but for being an openly gay front person of a punk band in Texas in the late seventies/early Eighties. And this he boldly did as the powerhouse vocalist for legendary hardcore punk band The Dicks, a self-described “commie faggot” blues-derived, hardcore punk band who released their brilliant, rage-fueled first single, Dicks Hate the Police, which is now viewed as a timeless, punk classic. After The Dicks' demise, the tireless Gary Floyd, who has lived in San Francisco for the past 35 years, went on to form Sister Double Happiness, Black Kali Ma, The Gary Floyd Band, Hard Ride and currently the raw blues/country Gary Floyd and the Buddha Brothers.
(Out, Loud and Proud . . .)
CHILDHOOD ~ Pre-AustinWhen I was a little kid in Arkansas, some people moved next door to us and I was a little third grader and they had this teenage son who was a weirdo, sort of beatnik guy and he had a huge picture of the Mona Lisa hanging in his room upside down and he was an artist and sort of different from the other kids in that town and he was a big influence on me. There were obviously some wild seeds in me and he was the water that made them come alive. Being gay... I always knew I was gay, although I always had little girlfriends and stuff. They were just like sisters to me to prevent any un-gay ways of acting. I tried to create some façade to hide that. A school that was pretty much newly integrated and seeing the same bigotry towards people of color and the same sort of nightmarish feeling that I was getting from these people and having to hide, because I wasn't open nor did I come out until I left school. Also, the radical sort of music in those days. All of those things gave me a feeling of being a little bit different and you start to cultivate your own ideas and sometimes maybe they become a little more radical when you feel sort of alone. I'm not trying to make myself seem pitiful or feel sorry for myself... they were miserable years in the fact that, at school, I was hated. I was popular as sort of a class clown but I suffered because I did really bad in school, I hated it but I also knew that something was happening that I was going to be all right. Sometimes, those feelings can produce a lot of positive things. You don't really know it, always, but I sort of had an inkling of it because I knew I'd get out, someday.
I got drafted 1972. I'm 45 years old. But I had prepared myself from seeing people slaughtered and what I felt was a really unjust war against the North Vietnamese and the Vietnamese, in general. I'd developed a lot of very strong political ideas and I had signed up, when I registered for the draft, as a conscientious objector and I was accepted. So, when I got drafted, I had to do two years of alternative civilian work so I was placed in Houston. I moved to Houston in '72 and I worked as a janitor in a charity hospital, which was a job that they offered as alternative work. I worked there two years and that's where I came out and started doing lots of LSD -- which I don't do anymore nor have I for years -- but that's where all the things started happening that happen to young people when they move away from home. Then I moved to Austin. Suburban Voice . . .)
AUSTIN ~ Punk, The Dicks, Being a “Commie Fag”
"Mommy, mommy, mommy..." bawled Gary Floyd to start The Dicks' classic 1980 single, Dicks Hate the Police, a warning that "you'd better stay out of my way... I've had a bad day." The Dicks had two incarnations -- the first, based in Austin, TX, featured Gary, guitarist Glen Taylor, bassist Buxf Parrott and drummer Pat Deason. The band moved to San Francisco in '82 but only Gary ended up making it a permanent move and he started a second version of The Dicks with guitarist Tim Carroll, bassist Sebastian Fuchs and drummer Lynn Perko. This lineup stuck until the band's breakup in '86 and Gary and Lynn moved on to the bluesier Sister Double Happiness. (Suburban Voice . . .)
Almost all the really good bands in Austin were either fronted by or had gay people in the band. People were pretty open about it then. It wasn't like people were trying to hide and the other thing about it was that people weren't really making a big deal about it. They weren't getting up and giving speeches for gay rights but they were just sort of being themselves and that was really wonderful. That's extremely refreshing. And after years of also not fitting into gay bars, because with mohawks and bleached hair and being fat was another thing that was very unaccepted -- all of those sort of mixed in together -- I really didn't like the queer bar scene. So Raul's [the primary venue for Austin’s late-70’s punk scene] fit all those things. It was really wonderful. Queers were really obvious in the scene and the people that weren't, if anybody didn't like it, we'd tell them we'd beat the shit out of them. Get a bunch of queers to beat your fuckin' ass. It usually never came to that. There was always a lot of mutual respect. (Suburban Voice . . .)Mommy, mommy, mommy
Look at your son
You might have loved me
But now I got a gun
You better stay out of my way
I think I've had a bad day
I've had a bad day
Daddy, daddy, daddy
Proud of your son
Got himself a good job
Shoot niggers and Mexicans
I'll tell you one thing, it's true
You can't find justice, it'll find you
It'll find you
People tell policemen
They've met their match
Down in them desert sands
The Dicks won't catch
Dicks hates policemen, yes, it's true
You can't find justice, it'll find you
It'll find you
Mommy, mommy
Look at your son
You might have loved me
But now I got a gun
You better stay out of my way
I've had a bad day
Mommy, I've had a bad day (Lyrics by Gary Floyd / Music by Glen Taylor)
The punk scene in Austin was really good in the fact that a lot of the best bands were fronted by queer men and they also happened to be sort of big queer men. So that was an advantage right there. And people wouldn't automatically mess with us cos we were sort of redneck queers in a way - redneck in the fact that we were big and we didn't really want to take any mess with anybody about it. And we were very lucky because the punk scene was very open minded there. And there was me and there was Biscuit from the Big Boys and (gay) others who were fronting these other bands. And I also had these three tough straight guys who were in the band with me and they gave me a lot of confidence. (laughs) I might be saying something a little different if I had three little rosebuds in the back of me. We were very lucky there and the frat-rats hated us a lot more for being punk than for being queer. (Out, Loud and Proud . . .)Saturday Night at the Bookstore:
One of the Dicks’ most outrageous songs, and one of my favorites, is a song titled “Saturday Night at the Bookstore.” In it, Gary furiously berates a suburban married man he sees with his wife at a Safeway supermarket on Sunday morning, whose dick he had sucked the night before through a glory hole at the local adult bookstore, and who now won’t even acknowledge Gary’s presence. Gary end the song crooning “I’m in love with a glory hole . . .”
Wayne: I'm especially fond of "Saturday Night At The Bookstore”. Though I may be a forty-something, married man of 20 years, I remember adult bookstores in the late 70s. They were amazing! And you're telephoning me from one?
Yes, yes! Nothing's changed! Nothing like an old glory hole to say "welcome home"! (Adams)
Gary on Divine and John Waters as an inspiration for some of his more feminine costumes from the Dicks era:
Any fat guy in drag was sort of Divine-ish. I loved to dress up back then, and the idea of making a punk crowd feel uneasy was always a wonderful way to spend the evening. The early John Waters movies from the 70's and early 80's were ground breaking and so fresh and new. Now he makes tired stuff, but I still love him. (Floyd)
Sister Double Happiness ~ Being a Bear From a 1991 review of SDH’s Heart and Mind LP: The ferocious rock-music disc would rank as one of the year's standouts even if Floyd weren't a self-pro-claimed "big fag? But he is, Blanche -- the first openly gay gutbucket hard-rock vocalist ever signed to a major label. He walks as fiercely as any queen and as ruggedly as a pitbull. His sexuality provides a perspective, but it is rarely the subject of his songs. The LP opener, "Bobby Shannon" is a queer but hardly gay blues tune about a dog devotee of the Indian monkey god Hanuman. But when Floyd turns a pained eye on the desperate state of the planet in "Ain't It a Shame," ozone depletion and police brutality are joined by the specter of a boy hungry for risky sex. With dread overtaking lust, Floyd warns, "Your kicks aren't safe. You leave it to fate. You got a dangerous machine." Floyd unleashes an entrancing vocal on "Exposed to You," a nearly unhinged plea to a youth who offers sex but won't return love . . . "Hey Kids" [is] a raging anthem about the costs of the closet. Floyd offers encouragement to "the kid whose light has been covered" and a warning to the businessman who has "waited so long to make the love you need" that "some private moment may come back.. .and be handed to you gently or else thrown in your face." The last verse offers love to a sick friend and rage that he's been denied the care he needs. "Hey Kids" is the first rock song about both outing and governmental inaction over AIDS. (Block) Hey kids in school
I'm talking to the ones whose light's been covered
Having to play by the rules
That some old man a thousand years ago discovered
Oh boy, but I wonder why
Why they're messing with you
In the very same way they messed with me
A long long time ago
Hey Mr. Businessman
I see you every day in your pinstripe running
You never did understand that
When all those lies start burning
Oh boy you're gonna wonder why
Why you waited so long
To make the love you need
'Cause it should have been done
A long long time ago
Oh, in these days when my freedom is up for discussion
And you hold my future in your hands
Some private moment from your past
Might come back at you brother
And then the truth like poison
Will be handed to you gently
Or else thrown in your face
Hey friend of mine
I know you're sick
But with love you can recover
Oh, I wanna take you in my arms
And I'll yell out loud that I love you like a brother
Oh, boy, but I wonder why
Why they've waited so long to give you the care you need
'Cause it should have done
A long time ago
(Lyrics by Gary Floyd / Music by Ben Cohen)
I felt very akin to the bear movement because I never really liked gay bars, per se. I met this one guy who told me there was a bar in San Francisco called The Lone Star where big guys; more blue-collar, worker-type guys hung out. So I went there, and I befriended many people. and I got very involved with it, and I liked it a whole lot. My connection with it is, um, I look like one, I guess!Sister Double Happiness was the best band, as a unit, that I was in. And then The Gary Floyd Band, who've changed so much... there've been so many different people... the core was me, Danny Roman, and Jonathon Burnside. But the one unit that was really cohesive and I felt ties with was Sister Double Happiness, partly because of [drummer] Lynn Perko, who is, of course, in [Roddy Bottums' group] Imperial Teen now. She and I are like brother and sister, and we have been for so many years. I remember one time when we were doing really good in San Francisco. We were playing an acoustic show at the Great American Music Hall. This was during the days when I was really hanging out at the Lone Star a lot. Somebody came backstage. They looked sort of nervous and said, "I don't wanna get you upset, or anything, but there's about 30-40 bikers out there!" So I ran and looked out front, and it was everybody from the Lone Star! It was one of the best shows we ever did. It was really, really wonderful! So, whenever we'd play around, all the local bears would come, and usually somebody would come up and say. "We've heard of you." Then we'd either go fuck or become friends! Or sometimes both!
WAYNE: Has it ever been important whether or not you have gay people in your bands?
GARY: (laughing) You know, there are so few queers who come to our shows, I don't need the competition! I'd like to get several really pretty girls so all the guys would hang out with them, then I could pick up - sort of "mop up" - the queers if they wanted. (seriously) You know, the only thing I've ever cared about is the musicianship.
WAYNE: That's what I like about your songs. You don't deliberately force the gay issue. It either comes up, or it doesn't.
GARY: I've really tried to handle being gay in that very same way. Of course, everybody acts up a lot when they first come out, but there's a certain point that, to me, I don't see being gay as something unnatural or something bizarre. This is a real part of life. There've always been queers, and there always will be.
WAYNE: What do you like most in a man?
GARY: A big fucking fat dick with a long-shootin' load! (laughs) I think I most admire a man who can accept me without trying to change me. And also the dick with the big load!
WAYNE: A woman?
GARY: Sistership. Ninety-five percent of my best friends are women. I become their sister, and I'm very satisfied with that. I love that! (Adams)
Floyd has long been a vocal advocate of gay rights, sometimes angrily so -- on "Where Do We Run," from Sister's 1993 album Uncut, he sang: "I knew some tough guys who went out to have some fun/ They got a gay guy tried to shoot him with a gun/ That gay guy struck back and cut the bastards' throats ... they are weak, weak and going down." The same attitude pervades Black Kali Ma's "Gotta Keep Movin' On," which Floyd wrote in tribute to James Byrd and Matthew Shepard.
"If you think [San Francisco] is bad, just leave for a while," he says. "You get out of here, there's a lot of fucking racist, homophobic shit going on, sexist crap that goes on that even would shock the most politically incorrect people in this city." Referring to Shepard, he says, "Even if he'd gone up to them and said, 'Can I suck your dick?' " -- and here, his voice rises an angry octave -- "you don't kill people for that." (Athitakis)
ART
Throughout his career, Gary's expressions reached beyond music into a fantastic series of mixed-media creations. Avoiding the term "artist," Gary does Art. His pieces forge a stressed synergy between overt sexuality, spiritual insistence, and subjective violence. The initial impression is extreme; but, the subtleties that follow leave the viewer lilting in a simpler truth.
The medium, in Gary's words, "is what I can grab the quickest...pizza boxes, scotch tape, water colors, copied photos and diabetic test strips [...] What I save on psychiatric services, I spend on art supplies. I leave 90% of my personal crisis in the art, leaving the remaining 10% for me to carry myself." (Art of Gary Floyd )
ON BEING A “CELEBRITY”
I'm a big puss. I've gone up to people who were in bands that I liked and they were assholes, and do you know what that taught me? That I don't want to do that to people. I want to be as natural to people as I can. I'd rather get run over by a fucking truck and go straight to hell than be rude to people who were fans I'd really rather burn in the stinking turd of hell. Some guy wrote me on MySpace and said, 'That's so nice, you're talking back to me, and you write back, and you're not an asshole.' I just want to be myself. (Ala)
SPIRITUALITY
In the late '80s, Floyd tried to get away from music; soon after Sister Double Happiness released its first album in 1988, he broke up the band and pursued what he calls a “spiritual journey,” studying Indian religion and even contemplating joining a monastery, an idea he dismissed fairly quickly, though he routinely credits a spiritual adviser on his records.
“I figured if I joined a monastery I'd probably end up being a pretty bad monk. Miserable me, you know, fucking fag sitting around a monastery pissed off at everyone. There were times that I didn't feel like being a part of the [music] scene anymore, but that's not a choice that I make. I actually accept it now: I'm always going to be doing music. I tried to quit music a few times. I tried to say that I'm not going to do any more bands now, but I figured out that's not really a choice now.” (Athitakis)
"For a long time, I was really giving no attention to the spiritual side of my life. Like, nothing at all. And then it started coming to me really strong. And it wasn't like, go to the first Baptist church, it came in the way of a vacancy. I thought, this is like a spiritual vacancy, and I had been a real spiritual kid. I was raised Baptist, and my parents said one day, 'We don't want to go to church anymore, but we want you to go if you want to, and we're take you, and we'll come and get you.' And that changed, I became Catholic, which freaked my mom out a little bit. But they took me to church, and then the war in Vietnam started raging when I was 15, and I got very political, very left. And I ignored all the spiritual stuff for some time. But then I started getting really hungry for it. When the Dicks were on tour one time, I had some books about Buddhism, and I studied that a lot, kept moving, and I found another path, sort of a hippie path, and I got very into the Hindu path of mother worship, the different mother goddesses. Kali is my chosen mother. I see her terrifying side, but I also see her loving side. I started studying that, and I even quit Sister Double Happiness for a year to join a monastery. I studied, for a year and thought, okay, I'm really not going to be a monk anytime soon.
And I got Sister Double Happiness back together. So yeah, a big mother thing. A BIG mother thing. And Kali is all those mother references. She'll slap you down, she'll pick you up. That's part of the whole trip, you have to look through it. It's all there, whether it's a hurricane down south, or it's a big gold palace up north. They're all part of it and if you get too attached to either one you're gonna freak out later on. You have to look at what's going one, deal with it, and keep your whole inner thing going on. And none of it's easy. I get rid of a lot of anxiety, and what could be called depression by singing. (Ala)
Wayne: Thank you so much for the interview, my friend! That wasn't too painful, now, was it?
GARY: No, my ass doesn't even hurt! (Adams)
Works Cited
Adams, J. S., Wayne Ingle & Kevin John. “Musical Bearings.” American Bear #13 Aug./Sept. 1997. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Ala, Tuula. “Interview with Gary Floyd.” SF Burning. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Art of Gary Floyd. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Athitakis, Mark. “Another Crossroads: Former Sister Double Happiness Frontman Gary Floyd Re-Confronts His (and America's) Musical Roots” SF Weekly, March 03, 1999. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Adams, J. S., Wayne Ingle & Kevin John. “Musical Bearings.” American Bear #13 Aug./Sept. 1997. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Ala, Tuula. “Interview with Gary Floyd.” SF Burning. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Art of Gary Floyd. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Athitakis, Mark. “Another Crossroads: Former Sister Double Happiness Frontman Gary Floyd Re-Confronts His (and America's) Musical Roots” SF Weekly, March 03, 1999. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Block, Adam. “Floyd's Vocals Suggest He Had Kitty Wells for a Baby-Sitter.” The Advocate. 12 November 1991. (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Floyd, Gary. Personal interview. 27 February 2009.
“Out, Loud, and Proud, Long Before It Was Hip to be Queer.” Amoeblog (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
“Suburban Voice Interviews Gary Floyd.” Operation Phoenix Records. (Printed in Suburban Voice #41, 1998.) (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
Floyd, Gary. Personal interview. 27 February 2009.
“Out, Loud, and Proud, Long Before It Was Hip to be Queer.” Amoeblog (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
“Suburban Voice Interviews Gary Floyd.” Operation Phoenix Records. (Printed in Suburban Voice #41, 1998.) (Accessed online 2 March 2009.)
LGBTQ Music in the 1920's
Hello Class,
I intend this task to be entertaining and fun for you, and to counterbalance the horror of the film Paragraph 175.
So I just want you to spend about an hour or so listening to the music here, reading the lyrics, and thinking about these incredible songs you're hearing from the 1920's and 1930's. Have some paper and a pen next to you while you listen, so that you can take notes about your reactions, responses and thoughts.
After you finish, write me a 300 word letter in which you tell me what most made an impression on you when listening to this music. What did you like and dislike about the tunes? What did you learn or realize through listening and reading the lyrics?
You can submit your letter via the dropbox at the end of this post.
We begin in Berlin in the 1920's, during the Weimar Republic era of pre-Nazi Germany. Below are some performances of cabaret music that was popular at this time of emerging new ideas about human sexuality and gender. For this first tune, just enjoy the performance, and then you can read the lyrics after.
When the Special Girlfriend(Spoliansky; Schiffer) 2.35
When the special girlfriend
meets her special girlfriend
for a little shopping
shop to shop they’re hopping
shopping without stopping
Theres no greater pleasure
than to shop together
and the special girlfriend
tells the special girlfriend:
You're my special girlfriend
Oh you're my fav'rite girlfriend
my sweet and pretty girlfriend
l trust in you my girlfriend
to keep our secrets, girlfriend
When the special girlfriend
meets her special girlfriend
with great tenderness she'll
tell her friend she's special
oh my special, oh my special girlfriend
— So what does my special girlfriend say about that?
— Well, I can only tell you one thing . . . if l didn't have you, we'd get on so well . . .
— awfully well . . . it's almost unbearable how well we get on together . . . there's only one other person I get on so well with
— with my/your sweet little man . . .
O my man, what a man
but a man's just a man
Still a man with a frau
when he can sure knows how
Just last week her boyfriend
had her in a whirl
that romance is over
she's dropped him for a girl
— Well, your sweet man is a little pushy
— oh yes?
— yes, absolutely
— why? . . . how come . . .
— well, he does these things . . .
— oh, I don't approve of that at all . . .
— well, come on, let's kiss and make up
— O.K. love, let’s make up
Just last week her boyfriend
had her in a whirl
that romance is over
she's dropped him for a girl
When the special girlfriend
meets her special girlfriend .
with great tenderness
she'll tell her friend she's special
oh my special, oh my special girlfriend
The next three performances are all by the same amazing singer named Ute Lemper, from her CD Berlin Cabaret Songs, which I highly recommend! This next video also has some cool period visuals that you'll enjoy, and the lyrics are pretty easy to understand.
The Lavender Song
(Arno Billing [=SpoIiansky]; Kurt Schwabach) 2.59
What makes them think they have the right
to say what God considers vice
What makes them think they have the right
to keep us out of Paradise
They make our lives hell here on Earth
poisoning us with guilt and shame
lf we resist prison awaits
so our love dares not speak its name
The crime is when love must hide
from now on we'll love with pride
We're not afraid to be queer and diff'rent
if that means hell — well hell we'll take the chance
they’re all so straight, uptight, upright and rigid
they march in lockstep, we prefer to dance
We see a world of romance and of pleasure
all they can see is sheer banality
Lavender nights are our greatest treasure
where we can be just who we want to be
Round us all up, send us away
that's what you’d really like to do
But we're too strong, proud, unafraid
in fact we almost pity you
You act from fear, why should that be
what is it that you are frightened of
the way that we dress
the way that we meet
the fact that you cannot destroy our love
we're going to win our rights
to lavender days and nights
We're not afraid to be queer and different . . .
This next song is one of my favorites! The video has no visuals, so feel free to read along as Ute sings, as the lyrics are delightfully witty!
Maskulinum — Femininum
Chuck out the men!
(Hollaender) 2.34
The battle for emancipation
's been raging since hist'ry began
Yes, feminists of every nation
want to throw oft the chains made by man
Hula girls and housemaids and wives in Maribou
hear all our voices thunder in protest
Anything that men do women can do too
and more than that we women do it best
Chuck all the men out of the Reichstag
and chuck all the men out of the courthouse
Men are the problem with humanity
they're blinded by their vanity
Women have passively embraced them
when we could have easily outpaced them
Yes we should have long ago replaced them
or better yet erased them
lf we haven't made our feelings clear
we women have had it up to here
As babies men all howl and bluster
they cry through the night and the day
perfecting the techniques they'll muster
for the times when they don't get their way
Nursie holds the monster and feeds him from her breast
and baby is contented for a bit
But when he sees his nurse is trying to get some rest
the little man decides to have a fit
Chuck all the men out . . .
The men get their pick of professions
they're policemen or scholars or clerks
They get rich and acquire possessions
like we wives who keep house for these jerks
They're ruining the country while we mop up the floor
They're flushing this whole nation down the drain
Sisters stand together, let's show these men the door
before they drive us totally insane
Chuck all the men out, etc.
Now we head back to America to check out some of the queer blues music that was being written, performed and recorded at more-or-less the same time as the Berlin Cabaret songs we just heard. I've discovered a fantastic 16 minute podcast for you to listen to which focuses solely on women-loving-women, but first I wanted to play you a couple of tunes sung by men. For more of this sort of stuff, check out JD Doyle with Queer Music Heritage, from whom I've borrowed heavily here.
We've gotta begin with Louis Powell in 1938, bringing us a song called "Sissy" (with some interesting chatter the beginning).
The next song, "Say I Do It," directly rips off Ma Rainey's classic “Prove It On Me Blues” which you'll hear in the podcast, and was recorded only two months after that song, by Waymon "Sloppy" Henry. It has the same hook, but the lyrics are much more gay and include another euphemism for sex, coffee grinding. This video also has some fantastic period images!
I now turn you over to Mike Rugel and his excellent podcast, Uncensored History of the Blues. I'll say goodbye now, and look forward to reading your letters!
-- Professor Mathews
I intend this task to be entertaining and fun for you, and to counterbalance the horror of the film Paragraph 175.
So I just want you to spend about an hour or so listening to the music here, reading the lyrics, and thinking about these incredible songs you're hearing from the 1920's and 1930's. Have some paper and a pen next to you while you listen, so that you can take notes about your reactions, responses and thoughts.
After you finish, write me a 300 word letter in which you tell me what most made an impression on you when listening to this music. What did you like and dislike about the tunes? What did you learn or realize through listening and reading the lyrics?
You can submit your letter via the dropbox at the end of this post.
We begin in Berlin in the 1920's, during the Weimar Republic era of pre-Nazi Germany. Below are some performances of cabaret music that was popular at this time of emerging new ideas about human sexuality and gender. For this first tune, just enjoy the performance, and then you can read the lyrics after.
When the Special Girlfriend(Spoliansky; Schiffer) 2.35
When the special girlfriend
meets her special girlfriend
for a little shopping
shop to shop they’re hopping
shopping without stopping
Theres no greater pleasure
than to shop together
and the special girlfriend
tells the special girlfriend:
You're my special girlfriend
Oh you're my fav'rite girlfriend
my sweet and pretty girlfriend
l trust in you my girlfriend
to keep our secrets, girlfriend
When the special girlfriend
meets her special girlfriend
with great tenderness she'll
tell her friend she's special
oh my special, oh my special girlfriend
— So what does my special girlfriend say about that?
— Well, I can only tell you one thing . . . if l didn't have you, we'd get on so well . . .
— awfully well . . . it's almost unbearable how well we get on together . . . there's only one other person I get on so well with
— with my/your sweet little man . . .
O my man, what a man
but a man's just a man
Still a man with a frau
when he can sure knows how
Just last week her boyfriend
had her in a whirl
that romance is over
she's dropped him for a girl
— Well, your sweet man is a little pushy
— oh yes?
— yes, absolutely
— why? . . . how come . . .
— well, he does these things . . .
— oh, I don't approve of that at all . . .
— well, come on, let's kiss and make up
— O.K. love, let’s make up
Just last week her boyfriend
had her in a whirl
that romance is over
she's dropped him for a girl
When the special girlfriend
meets her special girlfriend .
with great tenderness
she'll tell her friend she's special
oh my special, oh my special girlfriend
The next three performances are all by the same amazing singer named Ute Lemper, from her CD Berlin Cabaret Songs, which I highly recommend! This next video also has some cool period visuals that you'll enjoy, and the lyrics are pretty easy to understand.
The Lavender Song
(Arno Billing [=SpoIiansky]; Kurt Schwabach) 2.59
What makes them think they have the right
to say what God considers vice
What makes them think they have the right
to keep us out of Paradise
They make our lives hell here on Earth
poisoning us with guilt and shame
lf we resist prison awaits
so our love dares not speak its name
The crime is when love must hide
from now on we'll love with pride
We're not afraid to be queer and diff'rent
if that means hell — well hell we'll take the chance
they’re all so straight, uptight, upright and rigid
they march in lockstep, we prefer to dance
We see a world of romance and of pleasure
all they can see is sheer banality
Lavender nights are our greatest treasure
where we can be just who we want to be
Round us all up, send us away
that's what you’d really like to do
But we're too strong, proud, unafraid
in fact we almost pity you
You act from fear, why should that be
what is it that you are frightened of
the way that we dress
the way that we meet
the fact that you cannot destroy our love
we're going to win our rights
to lavender days and nights
We're not afraid to be queer and different . . .
This next song is one of my favorites! The video has no visuals, so feel free to read along as Ute sings, as the lyrics are delightfully witty!
Maskulinum — Femininum
(Spoliansky; Schiffer) 1.45
One was masculine and one was feminine
and so they fell in love with ease
Then the masculine one told the feminine one
how he felt about their qualities
You are feminine but very masculine
while I am masculine but very feminine
and such a masculine and such a feminine
are this year's perfect personalities
Oh please be my masculine
and if you let me l will be your feminine
We once felt so inadequate
It drove us mad a bit but now thats past
And the feminine went out as masculine
she wore top hat and tails each night
And the masculine went out as feminine
he even wore high heels despite his height
And the feminine supports the masculine
at home the masculine cooks for the feminine
But still the masculine one and the feminine one
felt sure something wasn't working right
They both found the other to be
far too masculine or far too feminine
and while they got slightly riled
they soon were reconciled
and fought no more
What keeps a feminine a real feminine
remains although it's out of sight
and the same applies to every masculine
although it's hard to hide when working right
And when the masculine aggressive feminine
enwrapped the feminine submissive masculine
she had a handsome pretty mascu-feminine
a very cute hermaphrodite
The child’s an undisputed neuter
a well—suited neuter theres no cuter neuter
and masculine and feminine
are back in bed again and making more
Here's our last song from Berlin. This one could still be a modern feminist anthem!One was masculine and one was feminine
and so they fell in love with ease
Then the masculine one told the feminine one
how he felt about their qualities
You are feminine but very masculine
while I am masculine but very feminine
and such a masculine and such a feminine
are this year's perfect personalities
Oh please be my masculine
and if you let me l will be your feminine
We once felt so inadequate
It drove us mad a bit but now thats past
And the feminine went out as masculine
she wore top hat and tails each night
And the masculine went out as feminine
he even wore high heels despite his height
And the feminine supports the masculine
at home the masculine cooks for the feminine
But still the masculine one and the feminine one
felt sure something wasn't working right
They both found the other to be
far too masculine or far too feminine
and while they got slightly riled
they soon were reconciled
and fought no more
What keeps a feminine a real feminine
remains although it's out of sight
and the same applies to every masculine
although it's hard to hide when working right
And when the masculine aggressive feminine
enwrapped the feminine submissive masculine
she had a handsome pretty mascu-feminine
a very cute hermaphrodite
The child’s an undisputed neuter
a well—suited neuter theres no cuter neuter
and masculine and feminine
are back in bed again and making more
Chuck out the men!
(Hollaender) 2.34
The battle for emancipation
's been raging since hist'ry began
Yes, feminists of every nation
want to throw oft the chains made by man
Hula girls and housemaids and wives in Maribou
hear all our voices thunder in protest
Anything that men do women can do too
and more than that we women do it best
Chuck all the men out of the Reichstag
and chuck all the men out of the courthouse
Men are the problem with humanity
they're blinded by their vanity
Women have passively embraced them
when we could have easily outpaced them
Yes we should have long ago replaced them
or better yet erased them
lf we haven't made our feelings clear
we women have had it up to here
As babies men all howl and bluster
they cry through the night and the day
perfecting the techniques they'll muster
for the times when they don't get their way
Nursie holds the monster and feeds him from her breast
and baby is contented for a bit
But when he sees his nurse is trying to get some rest
the little man decides to have a fit
Chuck all the men out . . .
The men get their pick of professions
they're policemen or scholars or clerks
They get rich and acquire possessions
like we wives who keep house for these jerks
They're ruining the country while we mop up the floor
They're flushing this whole nation down the drain
Sisters stand together, let's show these men the door
before they drive us totally insane
Chuck all the men out, etc.
Now we head back to America to check out some of the queer blues music that was being written, performed and recorded at more-or-less the same time as the Berlin Cabaret songs we just heard. I've discovered a fantastic 16 minute podcast for you to listen to which focuses solely on women-loving-women, but first I wanted to play you a couple of tunes sung by men. For more of this sort of stuff, check out JD Doyle with Queer Music Heritage, from whom I've borrowed heavily here.
We've gotta begin with Louis Powell in 1938, bringing us a song called "Sissy" (with some interesting chatter the beginning).
The next song, "Say I Do It," directly rips off Ma Rainey's classic “Prove It On Me Blues” which you'll hear in the podcast, and was recorded only two months after that song, by Waymon "Sloppy" Henry. It has the same hook, but the lyrics are much more gay and include another euphemism for sex, coffee grinding. This video also has some fantastic period images!
I now turn you over to Mike Rugel and his excellent podcast, Uncensored History of the Blues. I'll say goodbye now, and look forward to reading your letters!
-- Professor Mathews
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