9/30/14

Trying Bad



I've had two different friends suggest that I get mad, that I turn bad, that I let my anger and my rage out. That I crystallize it. That I dye my hair black. That I get evil. I want to be evil. I want to be bad. I want, as one friend suggested "the end of nice." Not that I'm particularly nice. I mean, I am nice. I want everyone to like me. The end of that.  I want a change. A decision. A turning towards the night. It is Autumn, right? That annual reminder of death, rebirth. Decay. Rotten. I feel like I am turning into a demon. I have to go to Hell. I have to have my Season in Hell, I guess, for a little bit longer. I have to accept it. This is how I will learn to articulate it, the anger that I think is righteous. It's a cycle. Like, I have to trick myself into setting myself on fire or something, about being in Hell. About being, like, cosmically aflame. Like the Sun. Like the planets. It's weird that there's even fire in outer space, since there's no air there, right? It's not fire exactly. Can someone smarter than I am explain that, for me. Can I subcontract that out, an explanation of flame in outer space? What about the music of the spheres. There's so much I don't understand-- I keep using the same metaphors, the universes, the gravitational forces inside a person. I'm deciding to go dark, to see the other side. I knew I was going to. I knew this would be required. It's just so scary and confusing and sad. But that's okay. Persephone. I'm ready. I've faced the Sun and now I'm ready to face the fucking Moon. I'm turning to night. I want to be evil.



I'm worried about my fatty acids. I'm worried I haven't been getting my Omega-3s. My DHA and my EPA and ALA. My acronyms. I'm told, I researched what they're for. Where they occur (their sources) and what they do for you (their benefits). The bad news is I have neither. I'm given to understand that they benefit the cardiovascular system, but that's just one wing of their miraculous reach. Apparently they also affect the brain; how it works. Furthermore, there seems to be a link between Omega-3 consumption and emotional function. Mood. Maybe that's the reason I'm so depressed, so unfocused, so unsuccessful, etc. It's just a matter of oils. Maybe it's just that my neurons just need to be greased up. Lube, as any sex-positive sex-educator will tell you, is critical and yet culturally underrated. So now I'm sprinkling flax seeds into everything. The cheap kind I get from the "Latin Foods" aisle of the grocery store. I'm contemplating fish oil, but there are literally communities set up with archives of information on how to start shopping for fish oil supplements, how to start conceptualizing the seven (yes, seven) criteria you should be using when shopping for fish oil supplements: freshness, potency, sustainability, taste, purity, I forget the other two. It's disgusting. I want to take that fake algae supplements, but maybe those don't work. Should I start eating fish? Cold water, oily fish? Should I get really into sushi? Maybe this is the cure for my depression: sushi. It could be that simple.



There's an exhaust fan on the roof of the building next door. The chicken shop. It runs all day and all night. It's incredibly loud. I think it started this summer, started making noise this summer. I just started noticing the noise when I got back from West Coast in August. At first I thought it was like an infernal buzzing, like a chainsaw, like a jackhammer. I called the cops. I filled out noise complaints. I tried to describe the noise, and its location, in forms submitted online to the police precinct. I gave the address. I got an automated e-mail response the next day, saying that the police had visited the location but could find no evidence of the disturbance. Since no further action was required, none was taken. Well of course not. You can't hear the buzzing from ground level; only up here. I wonder if Paps can hear it; it's right outside her bedroom window. It drove me mad.  Lately, though, the sound has changed. It's gotten wobblier, less intense, somehow more percussive. I can hear it rattling around a little bit. I think, Maybe the machine is loosening itself. I think, the machine is relaxing. We're getting to know each other. Now the machine and I are neighbors. Now I hear it clicking more, lisping, stuttering. Now, I think, I can hear it purring.

9/29/14

Equinox

(This is old, I'm playing catch-up.)

I'm going to listen to my horoscope and instead of focusing so much on what isn't working and what's missing, I want to pivot a bit and focus on what is there. My horoscope said to focus on what's next. This is good advise generally, but also particularly to my concerns right now. So instead of focusing on my list of grievances, a ransom note, I'm working through envisioning, imagining a list of solutions, answers, rewards, cash prizes, etc. Instead of focusing on the fact that my snake plant, mother-in-law's tongue, which was at least three or four years old, suddenly fucking died this week, I'm going to focus, instead, on what kind of awesome new plant I'd like to welcome into my life right now. So this means also focusing not on all the shows I'm not playing, but on the shows I am playing.

My dresser broke so I went to Ikea to buy a new one. I kind of feel silly buying furniture from Ikea. Is this a middle-class aspirational thing? That I feel like I'm too old for particleboard? I mean, I don't think anything is permanent. I might not live in New York forever. No one will be able to. But so it's all I can afford and I like the ease and I like the design so I bought a new nightstand. Had a kind of a missed connection on the train home, it was funny.



The other week I went to K8 Hardy's exhibition at Higher Pictures featuring reproductions and installations from her zine: Fashionfashion 2002-2006. The press release includes the following description of the zine by John Kelsey, from his essay "Information in Drag" which is included in Hardy's How To: Untitled Runway Show:

(Hardy) released a series of zines called Fashionfashion, featuring mostly cut-and-paste images of herself, posed and styled (by herself) in grotesque, brutally collaged fashion/lifestyle editorials (by herself). For these riot grrrlesque publications, Hardy exploited her own exploitation working as a stylist’s assistant, scavenging outfits at thrift stores (or making them herself), and wearing make-up more in the clown/horror vein than what mainstream women’s magazines call beauty. In one memorable self-portrait from this time, Hardy spread her legs wide for the camera while menstruating through underwear printed with a repeating dollar sign motif. She called this her “money shot.”


K8 Hardy Fashionfashion, "Money Look" 2006

I thought the show was really cool. I didn't know she had made that zine, or that the zine existed at all. I like K8 Hardy's work. I've been, like I'm sure many other people are, a little bit intimidated by her work. I had, for a while, this preconceived notion of what her work was like-- that it was very cool, very coded, very radical (politically, philosophically, aesthetically) that it was too arch and too smart for me. I was wrong, necessarily. I've always liked seeing her work, whenever I have. I'd like to imagine that she and I have some shared reference points; queer independent culture in the Pacific Northwest among them. It seems like K8 Hardy got into making art, the art world, etc. a lot earlier than I did. I feel like I have as much of an authentic claim to punk culture as one can have, but I still feel very much like an outsider in the art world. Okay-- this isn't about me. The point is I like K8 Hardy's work, though I felt sort of ignorant of it for a long time. Seeing this new show at Higher Pictures was another example of finding out about something an artist made, possible a while ago, and really liking it, immediately, and wondering why you hadn't seen it before.



I told my friend I was with "Wow, I wish I had known about this zine before!" What I meant to say was, I wish I had known how to read this zine before, back when it came out. Think about it, in the early 00s, Hardy was making this zine. Apparently she was also working as a stylist's assistant, which I'd like to know more about, personally. This is a period when I was definitely not following fashion at all, and so would not have been able to read a response to the visual culture of fashion in any kind of informed way. Looking at the photos from the zines now, though, it is a little spooky. She was so right on.



Fashion, as a thing, is constantly cannibalizing itself, collapsing into itself, a kind of permanent and proto-Futurist function of being addicted to the "shock of the new". Hardy seems to have grasped that fairly early on, and the apparent hijinx captured in these zines reads, to me, like a strong, clear way of derailing, participating in that conversation. I'm trying to think: what was really in fashion in 2004? When, during the early 00s, did chav culture, lad culture, youths roughhousing come back into fashion? I look at these photos of K8 and her friends goofing around, looking alternately casual, poised, bored, angry, hysterical, somnolent, in thrift store concotions, belted bags. I see this as a kind of ripping apart, dumbing down, washing, exploding fashion. Notions of streetwear, sportswear, couture.

The exhibition included a note from Hardy about aknowledging the collaborators involved with producing the zines. Hardy notes: "One of the stances I explicitly took when originally making this zine was an anti-credit stance. I didn't want any names on the zines, any recognition of clothing designers, or photo credits, or even my own name. It was to be the opposite of fashion magazines, where every credit is a small advertisement... There are no designer clothes in these zines, to the best of my knowledge."

I wish the actual zines were still available somewhere, but luckily you can go up to Higher Pictures this month and see the blown-up, gorgeous monster-sized versions of them.

After the opening, we went downtown to the Hole to check out an evening of performance in conjunction with the Future Feminism exhibition, organized by Antony, Kembra Pfahler, Johanna Constantine, Bianca Casady, Sierra Casady. The exhibition is sprawling,. ambitious, and features 13 evenings of performances. Kind of a lot to keep up with! A little bit amazing. The night I went I saw Narcissister, Dynasty Handbag, and No Bra. Three artists who I've had the good fortune to see around New York for a while, and whose work (while very different) I like a lot. Narcissister showed some fantastic films I hadn't seen before and did a couple mesmerizing live numbers. Dynasty Handbag did the Beyoncé "Drunk in Love" piece I had heard so much about but hadn't seen yet. No Bra performed numbers off of her most recent album Candy, which I'm still obsessed with, as well as her first great big hit, the classic club banger "Munchausen" which I had never had the good fortune of seeing her do live before. It was great:



I think the Future Feminist show was a qualified hit. I wish I'd seen more but it was kind of crowded, right? Like an actual hit.

Thursday I went to the opening of the Thread Lines exhibition at the Drawing Center. It's a really varied, thoughtful show. I was in kind of a rush when I went by, and it was crowded, so I didn't really get to spend as much time with it as I might have liked to, I should go back. Also on Thursday I went to Mattachine at Julius' Bar, always a favorite. The DJs were Angie diCarlo, Amber Martin, and Nath-Ann Carrera, all deep loves of mine. I had fun, kind of stayed out too late.

Friday I was feeling blue, and bored. I partied with the kids downstairs, PLD and Paps. Lola came over, we hung out like we were all students, except Lola's the only one with that as an excuse. It was fun. Eventually I went to the Village and hung out with Ryan and went bar-hopping. This was, gosh, two Fridays ago.

The next night I went to see Cole Escola's solo show at the Duplex. Cole has been doing these shows once a month for a while now, almost a year. Each month it's different. Similar characters come in and out, but it's new material every month. It's really scary and brilliant. One of those "Oh, shit" moments in New York. Obviously, Lena Dunham and Kathleen Hanna are singing his praises, etc. It's like, a bit like what I imagine Whoopi Goldberg's The Spook Show might have been like. Unmissable. SO ANYWAY: Cole is going to go on a little sourjurn but before he does he's doing ONE MORE SHOW in New York, on OCTOBER 11TH. Get your tickets HERE.

I went home, I listened to Bossa nova and changed my clothes, and went to GAYLETTER'S Interracial party, being held at the new Williamsburg gay nightclub spot LoveGun. The party was fun, and PACKED as usual. I'm glad it's back, that party. Not that it went somewhere, or like, was canceled, but I like when it happens. The crowd is unfortunately somewhat homogeneous, ethnicity-wise. And in many ways. I do think, though, that in 2014 in Williamsburg it's pretty cool to have a queer party where the theme is diversity, or the "interracial" theme the Gayletter boys are putting forth. Like, I do think that's a cool thing. GAYLETTER has also, in addition to reviving the party, put out an actual honest-to-god Magazine, which you can buy HERE. So the party was packed, I went to Metro to go to Frankie Sharp's party Mentrosensual, which was cute and also packed. I was pooped. We went for a walk, the weather was nice. I went to bed kind of early.

Sunday I went to soundcheck at Joe's Pub for the AFTERCLAP show, the Afterglow Festival benefit. After sound check I went to go see Marie Karlberg's exhibition, A Stranger in the Dark, at Reena Spaulings.



It was a very cute show. I don't know Marie very well, I try to see her artwork whenever I can, I've been to her parties before. I think she seems nice and smart and cool, I've heard her talk a bit about her career and her values in terms of art. The press release for the show begins with: "This shit is pretty retarded. Parents, don't let your kids get a fine arts major." and ends with "Be a BRAVE Woman take off the panties / nice panties". Maybe I'm not great at reading art and performance, because I have a subconscious way of "interpreting" work by projecting my own ideas on it. Maybe everyone does that? I'm into Marie Karlberg's work because I think she and I have similar values or are interested in similar questions, about power, commerce, the current climate in the art works / media world. But I think maybe we get to these questions in different routes. I think her work is punk, but it's not flippant. I think her work is feminist but it's not didactic. I think she's not trying to necessarily be rebellious or wild, the drawings weren't slovenly at all. Sort of craft-ische. Really considered, studied. Not stern, but pretty sure of itself. Definitely not fucking around. That's, I think, a great way I'd describe the show-- she's definitely not fucking around. Or, if she is fucking around, to a degree (who isn't?) she's mostly not fucking around. She seems like she knows what she's doing. I was into it. I missed the performance though, I had to leave. Oh, one other cool thing was that people at the gallery were totally smoking indoors. I feel like the only time and place in New York where I see people smoking e-cigarettes these days is at art gallery openings. It was cool to be at Reena's and see folks smoking cigarettes, the old-fashioned kind (the analog kind), indoors, with utter impunity.

I went up the street to Joe's Pub and I did my performance at AFTERCLAP. The show was fantastic, it was fun to be reunited with the kids from Ptown. The evening was somewhat marred, however, by an unwanted visitor. Whatever. I did a new piece, which I'm going to do in other things. It's like this:

GLORY PARADISE BOX



I sang "Glory Box" by Portishead to the tune of "Paradise" by Sade. Because, to me, being a woman would be like Paradise, right? Would be like being in Paradise. That's what it feels like, to me. Plus there's this gendered notion of Paradise, at least most Western ones, tied up as it is with the Eve/apple/ snake thing.



I can't find the interview somewhere but I seem to recall Beth Gibbons as saying that she had written that song to be about a transsexual? Am I making this up? A "transvestite"? It was, I think, even in 1994, a problematic and troubled topic-- this projection of one's desire onto another. Even if I'm misremembering (though I don't think I am), I wanted to capture something that was problematic but sincerely passionate. The thing of wanting to be a woman. It's not that easy, right? Also I wanted to try to sing kind of more soulfully. I'm going to sing this song again on Wedesday at Judson Church as part of THE BLUE HOUR hosted by Rumi Missabu of the Cockettes. It's a free show and there's a dance performance beforehand, KEEPING THE TIGERS AWAY. And before that there's a free meal at Judson, so maybe you'll want to come.

So the show was cute at Joe's. I had fun, until it stopped being fun, but I was sort of okay with that anyway, could deal.

Last week, I had the good fortune to see Mecca Normal perform at Le Poisson Rouge, opening for Mt. Eerie. I had never seen Mecca Normal perform live before, and I was totally thrilled and blown away. They mostly performed songs from their new record Empathy for the Evil, which is fantastic, as well as some new songs written just for the tour. They were really beyond. Here's a video for a song off the new record. "Art was the Great Leveler."



Jean Smith is so real, you guys. I got to meet her, because I'm working on an interview with her. It was a fantastic show.

That all being said, Wednesday I was in a very bad mood. I applied for this fellowship and I didn't get it. I know it's just one opportunity, but I took it really hard. It happened to come at a funny time for me, and I got really depressed. I feel like I had a kind of a nervous breakdown on Thursday, after talking to my analyst about it. I don't know if I really want to talk about it now. I feel like I'm supposed to be brave and push forward and just get on with my life, but I'm really, really sad. I took the weekend off, it feels like. At least from social media. I don't know. It feels like something is different. I need to get mad, to get evil. To get bad. I'll get back to this later. Mecca Normal was amazing, right.

Friday I went to the optometrist and got fitted for contact lenses. It's a fucking trip. My optometrist also put the kibosh on my favorite beauty-secret, my Rohto eye-drops, claiming they were a) horrible for eyes to begin with and b) totally incompatible with wearing contacts. I figured out how to put them in, but taking them out is a real bitch. This morning I put my contacts in and it feels wrong. Like, something feels weird. I'm taking them out at 3pm, after 8 hours, since I'm still new to this. Regardless, Friday I spent a lot of the day poking at my face, feeling weird and awful. Friday night I went to go see Bridget Everett's show ROCK BOTTOM, which is at Joe's Pub until 10/16, and is fucking AMAZING. I've actually never seen a full-length Bridget show before, which is shameful, because I love her so much. As you know, I interviewed her for the late great EastVillageBoys in 2011, and she also played my mom on TV. Her show is a masterclass in comedy, music, cabaret, performance art, talking, being pretty, making a point. She has so much to teach us, least of all about Chardonnay.

I was seated at a very nice comp table (gracias, Colita) next to a cute and perky gay couple. One of the boys asked what i was drinking and I said whiskey ginger ale. I wish I could have had chardonnay but I decided against it. By that point in the evening, since I knew I was drinking, I had already taken my contacts out and switched back to my glasses. I don't want to have to wrangle my contacts when I'm fucked up. Not yet. So I told the gay next to me what I was drinking, saying it should have been chardonnay huh, and he said "Oh, no, honey-- not with those glasses." Less about me.

Bridget Everett is obviously a fantastic star, I'm totally obsessed with her. She had gorgeous outfits in the show, all made by House of Larreon. The songs, from her album Pound It with the Tender Moments, are smart and catchy and addictive and fucking nasty. I don't know what else to say. I was terribly depressed all weekend and she was a beacon of light, joy. I love her. If you can get tickets to the show (which you might not be able to) you should do whatever you can to go, it's amazing.

Saturday I went to a photo shoot, feeling a little self-conscious. I went to the Pleasure Chest uptown with Max B to celebrate the store's birthday with free champagne. It was cute, there were cute people there, I bought lube. Thinking about the leather/bondage scene. It's always there. That's always an option, right? We took a very long walk downtown, then ultimately went to Gag! at Metro. That was fun but I was tired of seeing people, of being unseen by people. Still not over my bad mood. I'm such a fucking baby.

I woke up early Sunday and went to the Art Book Fair at PS1. As usual, I spent too much money and still didn't buy everything I wanted. Someone had made these 3 Teens Kill 4 shirts, but by the time I got there on Sunday they didn't have my size left. I bought a book of the collected issues of Shotgun Seamstress, a fantastic back issue of Linda Simpson's legendary zine My Comrade, and a copy of the new issue of Women Artists. I guess I can't really let myself feel bad about spending money in this way. It's not like I bought drugs or something.

After the book fair, which was fantastic but really, every year, so overwhelming, I went to Anthology Film Archives to see COCO, a new film written and directed by Margaret Haines, presented by Sex Magazine.



I've heard so much about this movie, since I'm friends with Robin Newman (who is one of the stars) and Patrick Dyer, who made the music. I was not disappointed, COCO more than lived up to the rapturous mythos I had clouded it in. It's a stupidly gorgeous, somewhat tense, and totally engrossing look at girlhood, adolescence, trauma, fear, memory and socialization. There was a book released in tandem with the film, which I wish I had stopped to buy, because I'm very curious about Haines' thinking in the film. I'm not really qualified to speak on Cinema (or Art, really)-- I loved the movie. It sort of creeped me out and sort of made me feel really proud and conspiratorial, like when you're friends with a tough girl at school. Or a sick girl. Someone you don't have to protect but want to align your power with. COCO was sensational. I hope it gets shown some more in New York? Keep your eyes peeled, it was pretty amazing.

When I was in Provincetown, I was walking one night on my way to the show. I was late. I stopped by Essentials, a little general store, to buy cigarettes. I was late for my thing. The woman behind the counter said, instead of looking at my ID, she had a new thing, where she was going to try to guess people's ages. I calmly said, "Well, how old do you think I am?"
She looked at my for a minute. I had to focus on keeping my cool. I wanted to bolt out of the store. "I'd say, 24." she said.
"I'm 30," I answered.
"Well," she said, "I was going to say 24, 25."
I told her that was sweet. She said she was also good at guessing Sun signs. I asked her to guess my sign. She guessed Sagittarius. I said no, close, I'm a Sag Moon. She asked what my Sun sign is. I told her, Leo. She said she was surprised. I asked her why.
"You don't seem like a Leo." She said, thoughtfully.
"I don't?" I asked. I was in a hurry, I was late, true, but I was also curious. I feel very much like I am a typical Leo. In a way where I don't feel typical or actual at all, in most ways, I identify very strongly with being a Leo.
She said, "No, you don't seem like a Leo. You didn't come in here, like 'It's all about Me!'" She said. That was funny, I thought I had done exactly that. "What's your rising sign?" She asked.
"Cancer." I said.
She nodded sagely. "See," she said, "that explains that."

9/19/14

The Elephant Which Is Us

Woke up this morning on the wrong side of the bed. Wished I had a round-shaped bed, this morning. I'm not sad, I'm mad. I'm not tired, I'm bored. I'm angry that I'm not more talented. I have a lot of grief about not being successful. I want to be rewarded for these things; I want to be accepted for not trying to fit in, for not marketing myself. I want the fact that I'm just beyond the purview of some kind of sexy trend piece to be a virtue, but it's not. And I'm upset about that. No profile piece. No symptom-mapping. No fascination. I don't want to be fascinating. I think that's more evolved, but it hurts.



I struggle to get people to book me and then when someone makes the mistake of booking me to play a show, I do something deliberately "off-putting" and am incensed when no one gets it. I feel like no one ever asks me to perform and I so desperately want the opportunity to perform. Music. And to do readings of the stuff I'm writing these days. And I know, I know, I know that I can't do every show. But I also feel like I don't really get asked to do many shows, at all, anymore. I want to, very much.



Twice, people referred to me in the past tense this week. As in "I loved your blog back in the day". People who I didn't know back in the day. Who didn't say anything at the time. People who wouldn't be caught dead asking me to perform at any of the 7,685,766,324 shows/events they organize, but want me to come support them. Because they read my blog back in the day. It feels like there's some weird shared understanding that I suck and that I'm over-rated and that I need to be brought down a couple of pegs. Maybe that's just how it feels.

I feel like I can't win for trying. I see so much shared sentiment among so many people right now. In New York and elsewhere, and in me too: we're fed up. But we're having a hard time talking about it or making the connections between our hang-ups make sense. And for me I'm experiencing it as this culture of consensus. How the shit that gets done gets done by clique. Like: the same groups of people perform together and mostly for each other and work in the media industry to further solidify their "legend" while not, you know, doing anything other than making rules for themselves as to who's in and who's out.

It's not unlike in American Vogue, when you'll see the Marc Jacobs perfume ad, the magazine feature on new clothes you should buy this fall (including that Marc Jacobs dress), then an editorial featuring models wearing that hot new Marc Jacobs dress, and then personal anecdotes from the editors where they say their favorite newest item of clothing is that hot new Marc Jacobs dress. We can say gesamtkunstwerk. The "total work of art" in Wagner's imagination-- inseparable from totalitarianism. The abject beauty and power-fetish-kink of the feedback loop. EVERYthing looks prettier when it's smaller, when you're up above. Or so the thinking goes.



Maybe people feel like we need those scenes, zones of of self-comfort, of affirmation, of "security" as a kind of escape from or safeguard against the horrors of an unjust world.

Like: "My life is hard, I get a lot of negative attention when I walk around New York because of my style, because of my gender style, because of my poverty, because of my gendered poverty style, so I need to be part of a community that makes me a star. It's my right, for being so imaginative as to demand it. I deserve-- I'm entitled to this. I am correctly identified as a star, the Future of Queer Art in America, I am the most important thing and I demand respect. I demand that the world sees me the way I want to see myself." Maybe that's how these scenes get justified, right? Are we not having the same conversation people have had for centuries? About the necessary of beauty over truth? The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie? Belle Epoque? I remember this is a similar reasoning used by Rose Melberg in describing Tiger Trap's twee imagery back in the day. I'm not saying it's not justified, I'm not saying it's bad. I'm saying it's going on and we're pretending it's one thing and not the thing it actually is.

It's not just that I'm sore about not being included. Thought I am sore about not being included. But it's a two-way street: I don't get invited to glamorous shows and I wouldn't be right for them, on some kind of philosophical level. Maybe I'm just not meant to be hip or celebrated. Or included. Maybe this is just a cop-out and I'm just trying to make myself feel better about the fact that no one wants to book me.



The fucked up thing is that I'm actually not trying to get famous. I'm not trying to get rich. Someone at Afterglow asked me what my ultimate goal was. Was I an Actor hoping to make in in a movie or TV? Did I want to get a record deal and become a famous singer, like the character I played in MAPPLETHORPE? No. My answer is that I really love making art work and it feels like that's what I'm best at and want to do. So I want to be able to spend as much of my life as possible doing that, making art. For me right now this means performance.

I feel like: if you're in a scene that doesn't challenge you, that is just about telling you how special, pretty, good and fantastic you are, you need to be in a bigger and more challenging scene. I'm really good at being nice and also being challenging. I have a lot of cognitive dissonance. I'm really compelled by the inherent paradoxes of social practice. I'm funny, I'm not the worst singer in the world. I know how to get an audience's attention. I consider performing live to be a kind of sacred ritual. I don't think there's any reason to perform unless we address the elephant in the room, which is us. Maybe that seems weird and maybe it's not as glamorous and maybe won't affirm your white dick and the feelings you have about your white dick, but I think what I'm doing is useful and important and I want so badly to get the opportunity to perform it for you and to read you the writing I'm doing about it.

I'm good. I'm available. I'm working. Please, please book me for your shows.

9/18/14

SUNDAY SUN DAY SOME NIGHT

TWO IMPORTANT THINGS IN NEW YORK CITY THIS SUNDAY SEPTEMBER 21ST:

FIRST: The People's Climate March. Maybe you've heard of it? Check out this cute video by Ombro de Oro and Viva Ruiz and Ryan Streit:



SEE YOU AT THE MARCH ON SUNDAY.


SECOND: For those of you that missed the Afterglow Festival in Provincetown, there is a special performance and benefit this Sunday:



An Encore Evening of Performances by the Shining Stars and Special Guests of the Afterglow Festival in Provincetown Hosted By Stella Starsky + Quinn Cox

***
FEATURING:  Justin Vivian Bond • Joey Arias • John Kelly • Max Steele • Amber Martin • Nath Ann Carrera • Jill Pangallo • Patrick Johnson • Brian King • James Lecesne • Tammy Faye Starlite • and Musical Director Matt Ray

***
AT JOE'S PUB at THE PUBLIC THEATER
SUNDAY SEPTEMBER 21, 2014 at 9:30
TICKETS $22

OK this is just a small update. See you all Sunday!

9/16/14

"I TRIED TO PLAY IT STRAIGHT"

Ahead of the new Comme des Garçons collections being shown Next Saturday in Paris, I want to talk about this new handbag that CdG matriarch Rei Kawakubo designed for Louis Vuitton, as part of their ‘Celebrating Monogram’ series, which features a series of collaborations with fashion, art and design luminaries reinventing the iconic LV monogram. The collection includes collaborations with: Karl Lagerfeld, Frank Gehry, Cindy Sherman, Marc Newson, Christian Louboutin and Rei Kawakubo. You can see the complete collection HERE. The press notes indicate that there's a slight precedent for this, as Vuitton celebrated their 1996 centenary collection by including collaborations with Azzedine Alaïa, Manolo Blahnik, Romeo Gigli, Helmut Lang, Isaac Mizrahi, Sybilla and Vivienne Westwood. That one sounds cute, no?

This isn't Miss Rei-K's first time tangling with Vuitton, of course. She put together a daffy little collection of mutant handbags, deformed little monster pouches and purses back in 2008, when she approached LVMH with the idea of a collaboration to celebrate Vuitton's 30th anniversary in Japan.



Those handbags were gorgeous, and so precious that one's still baffled and finding any of their pricing information. You couldn't just go buy one. You couldn't call the store and order one. You had to go to one of the specified limited CdG x LVHM "shop-in-shop" locations, officially order your preferred bag, and then pay for it in advance of them being made and then shipped out to your local Vuitton dealership, or some such thing. The story of that collection goes that Kawakubo had been so "excited" to see Vuitton opening in Tokyo in 1978, it had seemed to her to usher in some new sense of optimism or excitement that French luxury fashion brands were expanding into the Japanese market. That's a nice thought, but I do struggle to envision Kawakubo getting particularly excited about shopping, excited about purses. I do like thinking of her in 1978 though. At that point, Comme des Garçons had developed a fairly cultish following in Japan, her followers already known as カラス族 ("Karasu-zoku" or "Gang of Black Crows"). In 1978 she had yet to show her work in Paris, and it's nice to think of her encountering a brand-spanking new Vuitton boutique in Tokyo and getting "excited" about the cross-cultural implications of designing and promoting luxury. She referred to her 2008 collaboration with Vuitton as a collection of "party bags" to celebrate the brand's 30 years in Japan. Does Rei Kawakubo seem like someone who often thinks about or talks about "parties"? Here's a photo of Rei Kawakubo and former LVMH CEO Yves Carelle (RIP) together at the launch of the Vuitton x CdG collection in 2008:


Party Girl

ANYWAYS. The 'Celebrating Monogram' collection features the collaborators describing their work, posing with the finished product (Cindy Sherman wears the new Spring collection by Ghesquière in her portrait), and providing a brief on their inspirations for their collaboration, perhaps a behind-the-scenes picture or two. Kawakubo dispenses with the formalities and the celebrity worship, naturally. Nobody who's even remotely familiar with her work or her approach to marketing would bat an eye at the fact that for her photo, she's had a pencil drawing hung behind the handbag instead of posing with it, or the fact that there are no behind the scenes photos, duh.

On her inspiration for this collaboration:
"Breaking the traditional Louis Vuitton Monogram was the premise of this one work—which was to find something that would be new, some kind of new value. Although there are various ways of breaking to create something new, this time I tried to play it straight: I simply made some holes in the fabric of the bag. I generally like small bags."

I'm really curious about the translation here. Did she actually say "play it straight"? Is that an idiom that resonates in Japanese, or French? For that matter, you know homegirl knows a thing or two about her LGBT brethren, and you know Miss Thing speaks much more English than she lets on. The idea of "straightness" as it relates to the work of Rei Kawakubo. I'm off on a tailspin about this. Anyway, here's what "playing it straight" means, to Rei Kawakubo, in 2014. Here is her "Bag with Holes":



Just fucking cut holes in the damn thing, right? I love that for Kawakubo, "playing it straight" means not, y'know, coming up with some fussy twisted shape (a la Gehry) or fucking with some oversized or conceptual "sport-y" silhouette like Lagerfeld and Newson. No, for Rei Kawakubo, "playing it straight" means just slashing holes right through the bag, so that you can see through it. The bonded interior lining "to keep belongings secure" seems like something the higher-ups at LVMH insisted on, for the sake of practicality. Kawakubo notes that she generally likes small bags. This is a red herring, CdG has never just been about Kawakubo creating clothes that she wanted to wear. That's what Comme des Garçons Robe de Chambre (which has since become Comme des Garçons Comme des Garçons, or "Comme Comme") is for: to recreate her own wardrobe. Yeah, usually Kawakubo is rocking one of the vintage wallet-sized purses, or one of the teensy Paco Rabanne chain-mail collaboration purses. I doubt we'd see her, even at a "party", rocking this huge flat thing with holes slashed out of it. I don't think so. I love that this is her way of paying tribute to, somehow reckoning with Vuitton's "heritage." And yeah, it is something new, I guess.

"I feel," says Kawakubo, "that Louis Vuitton is the house that most beautifully and skilfully transforms what is tradition into what is now. Yet I always approach all of my work in a way that is exactly the same: I look to create something new."

SO, again, she's being kind of a punk here: Yes, Vuitton is all about tradition and history and making history relevant. That's all well and good, but Kawakubo, lest y'all forget, has one mandate, the same one Ezra Pound pounded: Make it New.

Continuing on, she says: "When designing the bag for this project, I was looking for some new design, something that hadn’t been done before, something within the limits of possibility."

These are certainly new. Hear me out: these aren't the randomly applied fraying holes she used to great acclaim in the early 1980s in the garments Suzy Menkes so charmingly dubbed "Swiss-cheese sweaters". No, these holes are artisanal, super-deliberate, a form or decoration. These holes are the concept of embroidery doggedly purse pursued to their logical conclusion. They seem reminiscent of the crafted holes cut out of the Comme des Garçons Homme Plus Fall/Winter 2014 collection, the "Holy Jacket" collection, which featured these stylish little kicks:



These are new, these are a new way of exploring texture, shape, volume. And embedded in the design is an implicit indictment of the luxury and tradition Kawakubo claims to have been to taken by, back in 1978. This is her trying to "Play it Straight": don't fuss with any kind of fancy shape, color, material or process: just find a new way to ask philosophical questions about materials, history. Play it straight, right? Just carve a fucking hole in the precious object. For Kawakubo, "playing it straight" means literally ripping the thing a new orifice.

But let's back up for a second. Her stated goal here was to keep to her usual modus operandi of finding a way to make something new, and she also notes that in addition to newness, she was looking to design "something within the limits of possibility." Possible how exactly? Possible as in practical? This is the woman who famously designed chairs that weren't really designed for, you know, sitting as such. Maybe she means "possibility" in terms of something that could, physically, exist in our reality at this time. Or maybe she's referring to "the realm of possibility" in another way.



I don't know if these collaboration pieces will be as hard to buy as the last time she tangled with LVMH, but out of the six artists chosen to design new products for this collection, Kawakubo's contribution with a suggested retail price of $2790.00 USD, is the cheapest one in the collection.

9/15/14

Reporter Boys

Friday night after my chores and my day job and my gym, I went to Printed Matter for the issue launch party for Gay Goth Scene #3. They haven't put out an issue in over ten years, but the zine's editors Raven and Bones (a.k.a. Joel Gibb and Paul P) are right on time, in terms of giving the children what we want. Perfect Little Daniel and I went, because B0DYH1GH is absolutely a gay goth band, and we weren't disappointed. The new zine is spooky and cute, and a positively diabolically delightful addition to anyone's archive.



After the zine party we went out to eat at Taim, then I went home to change clothes watch cartoons. I headed out to the new party "GIRLS" which was the inaugural party for the new Williamsburg gay bay LOVEGUN It was produced by the rightfully legendary Frankie Sharp, and featured the line-up of all your favorite Night Club Dolls as co-hosts, DJs, performers, personalities. BIG thanks to Sam B. and Bailey S. for getting me listed and Eli for the encouragement to go to the front of the line and admit that I was on a guest list.

The party was fun and cute and really really fucking crowded. I'm surprised I didn't know more people there. I probably did, in fact, but it was just so dang crowded. A really cool space, and I'm excited to see what comes of it. I always like a new gay spot withing hobbling distance of my lair. I went out for a cigarette and texted with miss Kayla, who was around the corner so I went to go hang out with her at Jawn and Peter's house nearby. We drank Jager and watched music videos and talked about New Orleans and gentrification and pop stars and gossip. They're journalists so they're really funny and know a lot of cool things. It's their job to know those things and to tell them, that's their job. We screwed up our courage and went back to Lovegun at 3am and it was cute, way less crowded, a fun time. Dancing in the upstairs lounge with all the kids, getting down to new records. It was a very auspicious feeling. A lovely new moment.

Saturday was hard, because I was hungover. I went grocery shopping, in the rain. I went out to lunch. I saw The Material Image at Marianne Boesky uptown. It's curated Debra Singer and includes Michele Abeles, Lucas Blalock, Sam Falls, Ryan Foerster, Amy Granat, Rachel Harrison, Leslie Hewitt, John Houck, Barbara Kasten, Jason Loebs, Nick Mauss, Ken Okiishi, Arthur Ou, Anthony Pearson, Marina Pinsky, Mariah Robertson, Matt Saunders, and Chris Wiley.



I liked the show. I like all art shows that happen in Upper East Side townhouses. Maybe that's not fair. My favorite piece, the creator of which I didn't actually ever nail down (sorry!) was a window shade that had the bars of the window-frame stenciled into it, as if by having been exposed to sunlight. Then it was flipped upside down for a nifty little "Hail Satan" trick. You can see it on the right hand side of the installation shot above. No but seriously the show is sober, smart, not too pretty and not too funny. A strong if unobtrusive play on physicality, history, space. I was thinking about the idea of the "living archive" and the mechanical production of art. I was thinking, at the show, about how everything came together, how the artists and the curator must have organized their thinking about the work, the flow through the house, the colors, etc. Certainly worth seeing and definitely worth the trip uptown. At the opening, I could not for the life of me score a glass of wine, but I did see some fancy art patron ladies rocking the same Eileen Fisher harem pants I wore to great acclaim this past week in Provincetown. When I shuffled to the beach-front hotel patio for morning coffee I was the envy of everyone there.

From there, I headed downtown to see the Voir Dire*, the first U.S. solo exhibition by Cyril Duval, at Johannes Vogt Gallery. I sure did like this show a lot. It made me think about how sometimes I'm so naive. I, and I think a lot of people like me (as well as people unlike me) have a tendency to sort of gloss over or willfully refuse to see a sinister aesthetic. To me, the show was light, playful, poppy fun. Of course, spending more than two seconds looking at anything Duval has ever done would start to disabuse a body of such optimism. I'm not saying it was mean; I'm saying it was toothsome. How can I describe the show? It was like gummy candy. It was chewy, its textures surprisingly tougher than it's putative flavors. I was really into the assemblages of debatably real retail detritus. The reappropriation of McDonalds' sweeteners, songs, imagery was nice, but I feel a little inured to the electric revelation of horror below the Golden Arches. Maybe it's because I grew up in America. Maybe it's because I obsessively ate fast-food for the first half of my life, maybe it's because I became a vegetarian and haven't touched it since. I'd almost rather have seen a fictional fast food company, something a little less loud. But I suppose that's the point. The show is super gorgeous, unsettling and kind of kinky. Like dating an Earth sign. HIGHly recommended.


item idem, Super Gospel Rap 2014

In contrast to the Boesky gallery girls, the Duval opening was packed with downtown kids rocking their clubwear-inspired Designer Duds. I saw more than a few boys rocking the boots, the coats, whatever, from the Raf Simons and Sterling Ruby collection. I love both Simons and Sterling but the new collection hasn't really stirred anything in me. Certainly, though, they're clothes you could wear from the art opening to the nightclub. For that familiar journey-- they have you covered.

Went back home to recuperate a minute, then back up to the city, to Midtown no less, to meet up with my buddy Steven (Another journalist, actually. Another reporter). We went to Ladyfag's new party Holy Mountain. The trick was that if you RSVPed, you could get in for free before 11:30pm. We did so but were met with a line like I haven't seen in a while. We barely made it inside by, like 12:30, at which point we all had to pay the cover, which kind of sucked, but I get it. The party itself, the space, was MASSIVE. Multiple rooms to bounce between, dark alleyways. It felt like I was always on the stairs, like some kind of M.C. Escher painting but with house music.

After much searching and many random versions of the same drink ordered at each of the four different bars, we found the Jade Room, where Juliana Huxtable and Rizzla were DJing. I got there right as Juliana was DJaneing a rad remix of No Doubt's "Don't Speak" which was frankly fantastic.



I made out with this cute boy, it was weird. Drunk people at nightclubs think we're being so romantic but I think it probably did not seem that way to anyone looking on. I wore this old old Marc by Marc t-shirt (I know) from like... Before the recession? OLD. It looked good in the ubiquitous black lights. I saw a few people who seed to be invisible black shapes, but when they turned around the white drop-stitches on the back of their shirts, the non-logo logo of Maison Martin Margiela, glowed in the blacklights.

On our way out of the club at 3am, we found a drink ticket on the sidewalk. I kind of thought this was a sign that I was meant to go back into the club and wait in another line for another drink I surely didn't need, but instead we offered the ticket to a group of improbably young partiers, decked out in their sportswear finest, who snatched it up with nary a thank you. Harrumph.

Sunday I woke up to a literally perfect blue wonderful day. I walked over the bridge and listened, finally, to the new Blonde Redhead album, Barragan. I've been obsessed with them lately, rediscovering Penny Sparkle and Misery Is A Butterfly and just remembering how much I loved them I high school, college, forever. The new record is a little funky, but not too funky. Like... a little bit 70s, Prog? I can't really describe it. It's like a more angular less fun Mazzy Star. It sounds sort of folksy, like Goldfrapp's new record? Like an electric version of that. It's not really familiar, easy, fair or useful to try to categorize. I can only compare things to things that I know.



I went uptown to go window shopping at Barney's. I'm planning a little change to my look, and I'm in the market for a red sweater. I saw a nice Margiela one, a cotton sweatshirt, but I can't justify the $500 price tag. Sure, they have it in a darker shade and a size too big for a third of the price on Yoox, but I can't even. I think instead, I might cop a nice FANMAIL sweatshirt from their Fall 14 collection, since their new collection features this really nice red:


From the FAMNAIL A/W 14 lookbook lensed, as usual, by boy genius Milan Zrnic.

Anyway, it was a gorgeous day, I took myself to lunch at Zabar's, having my favorite, their gazpacho for probably the last time this season, I guess.  Then to Sadie Benning's new solo show Patterns at Callicoon Fine Arts. The show was smart and sweet, included a luxurious green carpet, falling somewhere between AstroTurf and suburban den. From the gallery's press release: "Each work proposes a way out of prescriptive orders even while they formally articulate those orders."

Indeed! I'm always into stripes, polka dots, patterns as a way of dressing, expressing and contextualizing myself. I was inspired by Benning's use of treacly, Fimo-like materials and anxiously outdated color palettes. Look: I'm obsessed with the 70s as anyone can be that didn't live through it, but when you show a pattern of mustard yellow next to black next to burnt sienna, you're saying something about colonialism and the cosmically planned obsolescence of the EuroZone and no one can tell me differently. The patterns are about how they fail, how they grow. The patterns are like the rings inside of a tree: a tool for measurement, but a living document, an organically disruptive "order". I saw so many friends at the opening too. I spent most of the night talking with people about those Kate Bush shows in London and who we would drop that amount of money to go see. Melissa said Roxy Music, if it included Brian Eno. I said Sade, maybe? I don't know. Living in New York I'm so spoiled with getting to see the best fucking performers. Like the Raincoats. I fucking saw the god damned Raincoats. There's nothing to top that, really.

After the opening I went up to the East Village for drinks, and I ran into Xenia, looking so fab. It was one of those days where I felt so happy and lucky to live in New York, where I get to see so much cool stuff, for free, and I kept running into fantastic friends I love.

Went to Boiler Room where the jukebox is always good because they let anyone play whatever. Someone put on The Misfits' "Where Eagles Dare"



Then they put on a lot of Eminem. (Menime? Menemy.)

Got home pretty late and had a rough time waking up this morning! I'm supposed to go to a thing tonight, a journalist's birthday party tonight. I'm so tired though. I might go anyway.

To get the inside scoop.

9/11/14

It's Free, it's for me

I.

The last few days sure were great. I left New York in a kind of a dark place, or a weird place. New York is a dark and weird place, no? Thursday night I saw my friend Ben's brilliant show, I went to a couple of parties, felt weird about it. Friday I got my eyes examined, picked out new glasses, it's a new thing that's happening. I went to the fashion week event at Dover St. Market, drank some wine and thought about buying literally everything form the new BLACk CdG collection. Then I went downtown to Joshua Smith's art opening at Essex Flowers. It was really great, his work is hilarious and surprisingly poignant/topical, very cheeky and very cool. I had a blast. I met up with Bobo and Meli Darko and we all decamped back to my house in Brooklyn to order sandwiches and hang out on my floor, listening to the Andrea True connection. Fell asleep kind of early, feeling myself soften. Saturday I woke up, puttered around the house, went and got a haircut and came back to the house, dyed my hair blond for MAPPLETHORPE, and puttered around some more. Eventually I met up with Paps and Lola at that bar near our house for some beers. I think maybe I drank cider, I'm not sure. I had plans that night but I felt really bad (dentro de mi corazón), so I shamefully canceled my plans and bopped around by myself, deliberately. It's as if they need a new word for this; it's not actually called a shipwreck if you do it on purpose, right? Sunday I woke up early and went to the gym and did a modicum of errand-running, but nowhere near as much as I ought to have done. Eventually scraped myself together enough for Bushwig, which was fantastic. I had so so so much fun. I sang the new song I added to MAPPLETHORPE, a cover of Team Dresch's "Musical Fanzine". I don't know if the crowd got it or liked it. I never know. I saw some people there I like a lot and got to hang out, I talked to my ex for a while, it was sweet. I definitely drank too much. Here was my look at Bushwig:



II.

I have this thing, it's like my big complaint about Fashion Week. It's not that I wish I was involved in the Fashion World-- though I do wish that-- it's that there's all these open bars and I want a piece of it. If there's anything free, it feels like it's going to waste, and I want to help avoid waste. I feel entitled to anything that's free or being given out to people just because. I'm a person, I deserve it too. I won't bore everyone with the story of how I came to perform on the Bushwig bill, but it's pretty much along these lines. Also, they had drink tickets for the performers so I definitely drank all of my free drinks as if I was actually thirsty which I wasn't. Because they're free, they're for me.

It's like at this party I was at a few weeks ago, or these events I've been to in the last month. There's this thing that happens when people get super creepy and selfish about hoarding. I mean hoarding things like attention, fantasy, drugs, clothes, magick, belief, time, power, etc. I've been in rooms lately where there seems to be a vibe of people demonstrating how full they are, how sated they are, how glad they are not to have to share. I mean, this is the other thing I hate about fashion week parties; it's ABOUT not letting people in. The whole point, it feels like, it seems to me, is that I don't get to go in. The fun thing about drugs is you can use them in front of other people who maybe ask for some and you can say "No, I don't really have much left." or you can say "Oh I only have enough for me." It's annoying, it's a scarcity thinking thing. Or like, to let me know that you have cool plans, a cool project, you're invited to a cool party later, you had so much fun last night, because you want me to know that you have it/had it, and I don't have it and can't have it.

Let's be real, this is a kind of insecurity. The having to remind you that they have something you don't, that you should be envious of them. Actual Power Functions by Remaining Invisible. If you have to remind someone how cool you are, then you're not very cool, right? The more evolved, rational, compassionate and mature way of thinking is to simply ignore this-- I know, really it's not a function of me. I'm no less deserving of free champagne and gift bags than anyone else. I know that, I can say that even though I'm so insecure. But what is the response then? I've ignored it and responded to it and I've outgrown it. There's a kind of weirdly dysfunctional, sinister thing there. I don't know. How did I get there from someone bragging about how fucked up they got. Maybe you see my point?

Like, this image:



Who the fuck cares, right? I'm being serious-- who the fuck cares if someone calls themselves an artist, a curator, deep, an intellectual, whatever? What does that take away from you? As if there're only so many artists that can exist, as if the integrity of the category "artist" depends on us being so proactive about who is and who is not allowed to claim it. It's this thing where, in the ostensible search for meaning, truth, actual real comprehensive collective consciousness, we end up being cops. It's this thing of "They say they're an artist but they're not really an artist they just want to be thought of as an artist." I really chafe at that. What this says to me is "I got mine, you get yours." It's a kind of "enlightened" republican thinking, where if you've "worked really hard" to get your so-called security, if you've put in the blood sweat and tears and your ivy league liberal arts enclave, then you get to be entitled about not sharing, you're above reproach because you made your own fortune. It's so silly and selfish, I hate this.

III.

So Sunday night I came home very very drunk from my free drinks. Nauseous, even. I was curled around the toilet when I remembered that I had ordered Thai food as I do every Sunday night. I got the Thai food and ate it and kept it down. I passed out. I woke up only a few hours later to hurriedly pack for my trip up to Provincetown.

I met up with Erin and Matt and Colin and Amber and Nath-Ann and we all took the 7am train to Boston. I got shushed by someone on the train, before even leaving the station, because we were evidently on the quiet car. The guy was really passive-aggressive and mean, it did upset me, I gotta say. We got to Boston, had some sandwiches, then got on the ferry, where I was reprimanded again for sitting backwards in one of the seats.

What is it with pathetic white men who seem to get off on trying to publicly shame or humiliate me? I mean, I realize maybe I present in a kind of threatening way-- I'm tall, I have European features and can have a loud voice. I'm effeminate, I sometimes wear gaudy clothes. But I'm really nice! I seem to be a target for white men's ire, I don't know why.

SO on the ferry, they announced that it would be a choppy ride. I've never been seasick in my life so I didn't pay it much mind. Amber and I split a bottle of very expensive but not very good (very overpriced) champagne on the ferry, thinking that the bubbles would keep our stomach settled during the trip. Not so much. I didn't puke but other people definitely did. It got very weird on that boat. I was basically choking back vomit the entire second half of the ride.

Anyway we made it into glorious Provincetown and went to the hotel, then sound checked, ate dinner and did the opening night cabaret of the Afterglow festival. I had a blast. It's such a supreme honor to get to go to Provincetown, let alone as part such a fantastic festival. I was in the company of some of my favorite performers, and I met so many fantastic new people whose work I didn't know or didn't know well. It was so magical and I felt and still feel actually overwhelmed with gratitude and joy for being part of it.

On the opening night there was a really cool gala for the festival performers and the organizers/sponsors/attendees. It was so fucking fancy and chic and nice. And oh yeah, it was in Provincetown so at sunset the sky looks like this:



I performed on Tuesday night, right after the brilliant debut of Stella Starsky's first one-woman show, and opening for Erin Markey. I was in heaven. I really was. I had a small but sweet audience and I did MAPPLETHORPE and it was nowhere near as hard and painful as I thought it'd be. I think everyone pretty much got what I was doing. Performing at the Crown & Anchor as part of the Afterglow fest, performing MAPPLETHORPE in this context, was truly a perfect dream come true. Nothing can fuck with that.  I've so loved seeing the other performers on the bill, and am very sad to be missing the second half of the festival, as I am. On the plus side, we're doing a big group reunion bill at Joe's Pub on 9/21, more on that soon. I hung out on Wednesday with my friends Marya and Jane in Truro, then my friend David back in Provincetown. The people there have for the most part (99.999999%) been so overwhelmingly welcoming and inclusive and sweet to me. It's really funny.

At night we went to this fun party called FAG BASH in Ptown, there were lots of cute boys and girls, none of whom particularly wanted to make my acquaintance. That's okay though because I did actually get cruised real deep slow and heavy by a cute boy on a bike in Provincetown the other day, and he was cruising me so intently that I honestly had no idea what was happening. I'm so insecure and out of it that I was about ready to compose a tweet about how some hot guy on a bike keeps following me and smiling at me and saying hi and calling me ginger, like assuming he was making fun of me, trying to mock me, and then realized I should have, you know, tried to marry him and stay in Provincetown forever. Anyway back to FAG BASH-- my favorite new york band WITCH CAMP performed and were fantastic. I am so obsessed with them. I'm heartbroken to miss their show on Sunday night. Eventually the crowd thinned out and I started walking home. I was soon joined by Amber and Nath Ann of Witch Camp who offered to ride their bikes while I walked. It was perfect. It was a really perfect moment.

IV.

I left New York in a kind of a dark mood. I've been in a dark mood a lot lately. Probably for a lot of reasons. I feel so happy for this week, though. I made a note to myself-- remember, the next time you feel freaked out and lonely. The next time you feel anxious and worried. The next time you feel like some random white dude is taking his anger with his mom out on you-- remember how it felt and how it looked and how it sounded to walk down Commercial Street in Provincetown, all alone, at the end of summer, with nothing but a just-barely-past Full Moon to light your way.

I feel like there are some things I need to be a little bit more explicit about. I thought I knew about generosity. I thought I knew about how to make someone understand something, but in fact I've been repeating the same mistakes I complain about here and elsewhere.

I'm ready to tell you.
I'm ready to be real. I'm ready to ask you.

9/4/14

Festival Circuit

Rode the train this morning with the black-clad masses. Not the Fashion Week crowd, the folks who hail cabs for them. Or, hail cabs for the people who don't already have personal drivers. You know. A kind of sub-class. Black cotton separates, fake silk. Chunky rubber flats comma fake gold  accent jewelry.I'm listening to Fugazi. Bobo once sagely recommended listening to Fugazi when you're feeling frustrated.

Feel a bit like I'm losing my trip on reality. It's like my summer was-- my summer was from July 25th or so. I've been on vacation and I'm still on vacation. But

It's 2014 and creative professionals have to work on our vacations. We're always on the clock. So I'm doing some shows. I'm actually it's not work I'm actually thrilled and beyond grateful/excited to be playing these shows. FESTIVALS.

ME ON THE FESTIVAL CIRCUIT THIS WEEK/END:

This weekend I'm performing at Bushwig. I perform Sunday at 6:02PM (18:02, natch), on the outdoor stage. Al fresco. I'm excited about that because to my mind this means sunglasses and a cigarette won't be seen as like, superperformative, which is good because they're not (not when I'm doing them). I'm really excited! I'm just singing one song, the new one I'm adding to MAPPLETHORPE.

And then Monday morning I'm catching the train up to Boston to take a boat to Provincetown for the beloved Afterglow Festival. I'll be there Monday night for the opening night variety show, then performing the next night, Tuesday 9/9 at 7:30pm at the Crown & Anchor.

I need to figure out what to wear, what to pack, for festival circuit. What do people wear at festivals? I wish there was an article to direct me! At afterglow, I'll be performing my solo show MAPPLETHORPE and I'm so thrilled to be opening for my hero Erin Markey.

I saw Erin the other night at the benefit party for the House of Larreon Lookbook event, featuring snapshots from the forthcoming lookbook for both House of Larreon and Larry Krone Brand-- both conceptual fashion houses designed by brilliant artist Larry Krone. I'm really into his work because he makes performance costumes and fashion for some of my favorite artists in New York, many of whom are in the lookbook: Molly Pope, Erin Markey, Cole Escola, Becca Blackwell, Kathleen Hanna, Neal Medlyn, and of course Bridget Everett. The photos were taken by Todd Oldham and are available for sale on eBay HERE. This is also a benefit for the Rock Camp for Girls, so it's a good reason to buy the pictures.

I want to buy the clothes. I want the clothes. Right, you guys. It's fashion week. This is stressful for me, because for me, fashion week is the week of me hearing about but not getting into a lot of cool parties. But I always feel like I'm excluded so maybe NYFW just highlights it. Getting dressed is hard tho. I want to go home after work and change my outfit before heading out. After work I have to go to an art opening, then my analyst, then grab something to eat, then seeing the brilliant Ben Rimalower's new show Bad With Money opening tonight at Duplex, then going to a Fashion Week party, then going to another Fashion Week Party. So I need a new outfit that is sexy and durable. ANd I have to run home to put it on very quickly before going back to Manhattan.

Went to that cool Judy Chicago show with the Duchess last week, showing Judy's early work. Can I say that Judy Chicago is maybe my Bob Dylan? Her navigation through modernism feels to me the way that people seem to feel about Bob Dylan's navigation through rock and roll, the 1960s, etc. I loved the show and I'm so glad I went.

Last week, I went to Providence for B and M's beautiful wedding. Had a hilarious and strange time. Ask me about it some time. Hey-- someone from my life, remind me to write it all down some time, about the wedding. Came home, celebrated Bobo's birthday. Having a great time, as always.

Today's Beyoncé's birthday. It's B DAY:


Summer is slipping away! After Ptown next week my summer really is over and I have a zillion projects to work on.

But first, Festival Circuit. But before that? Costume change and multiple busy party event night.
Here I go.