As I’m writing this, it’s my birthday, and I just released a new album that I’m super excited about! It’s called “Ganymede Gives Up The Ghost” by Stuffy Doll, and it’s got 17 tracks spanning genres from hip hop to screamy metal to punk to soulful ballads. Songs about a trans superhero, growing up, being sick, friendship, predators, the queer community, and so much more!
It even features the incredible Riley Silverman as the voice of The Narrator! (Not to mention that amazing album art by @ghostcashew)
If you like Hozier, Florence+The Machine, Slipknot, clipping., Lorde, Against Me! or honestly just any good music, I think this album has something for you.
Since it’s my birthday, I’m asking that you consider buying it on my Bandcamp, but if you can’t afford it, just stream it wherever you listen to music and please share it around. I’m putting all the money I’ve made so far into advertising this album because I really believe in it.
i've been listening to this album on repeat and orville has such a good stage presence/character that i needed to make something,, my fav song at the moment is kalahari down, its genuinely probably one of the most gut-wrenching songs i've ever listened to. anyway go gay cowboy :)
Rest in peace, Patrick Haggerty, it was a blessing to have met you. Haggerty was a country singer and queer activist, whose 1973 album Lavender Country is widely considered to be the first openly queer country album ever made. I originally became hip to Patrick through his 2016 StoryCorps short called “The Saint of Dry Creek”, a Sundance Film Festival selection that tells the story of being young and gay in rural america, and his father, a dairy farmer, who impressed upon him the beauty in being true to yourself.
“‘Look, everybody knows I’m a dairy farmer. This is who I am.’ And he looked me square in the eye. And then he said, ‘Now, how bout you? When you’re a full-grown man, who are you gonna go out with at night?’ And I said, ‘I don’t know.’ And he said, ‘I think you do know. Now, I’m gonna tell you something today, and you might not know what to think of it now, but you’re gonna remember when you’re an adult. Don’t sneak. Because if you sneak, it means you think you’re doing the wrong thing. And if you run around spending your whole life thinking that you’re doing the wrong thing, then you’ll ruin your immortal soul.’ And out of all the things a father in 1959 could have told his gay son, my father tells me to be proud of myself and not sneak. My reaction at the time was to get out in the hay field and pretend like I was as much of a man as I could be. And I remember flipping 50-pound bales three feet up into the air going, ”I’m not a queer. What’s he talking about?” But he knew where I was headed. And he, he knew that humiliating me and making me feel bad about it in any way was the wrong thing to do. I had the patron saint of dads for sissies, and no, I didn’t know at the time, but I know it now.” - Patrick Haggerty/Lavender Country
Patrick boldly made music that I know not only touched the lives of many of us, but provided a sense of comfort, confidence, and the power of feeling seen to his queer audience. He spent his life doing the opposite of sneaking, and left us with his art and spirit.
Taken at the OG Basement in Nashville years back after his show there.
lady constance is a seven foot tall badger and knows acab
📚 STUFF I READ 📚
pretty much nothing! It was a rough reading week! The first part of the week I was fairly consumed with the D20 I was watching & not reading much. Then I spent FIVE DAYS reading a little over half of a 258K fic before finally accepting that though it was pretty well written and not bad, I just wasn't into it and the thought of fighting thru another 120K was appalling, so I bailed.
and I did read about 20K of shorter stuff but nothing I want to shout out so.
📺 STUFF I WATCHED 📺
This Is Going To Hurt - s1, e1
QI - series S, ep 10-12
Death In Paradise - s11, e2-3
D20: Mice & Murder - "The Stabber of the Evening" (s9, e4)
D20: Mice & Murder - "The Eye of the Storm" (s9, e5)
D20: Mice & Murder - "Busted" (s9, e6)
D20: Mice & Murder - " I've Been Here the Whole Time" (s9, e7)
D20: Mice & Murder - "Outfoxed" (s9, e8)
D20: Mice & Murder - "The Belly of the Beast" (s9, e9)
Running along the coast with my favorite people and singing songs - how could anything be better? Hans and his electric skateboard luggage handling while we lose our slap happy / road weary minds in giggles, coastal walks with Carolyn, almost running out of gas with Jade, the subtle enthusiastic bemusement of Marco... good times were had <3 and through it all - the Squatchy kept watch over us.
(part one)
after my post about country music earlier, i’ve been geeking out all morning about the indigo girls so here are a couple of indigo girls stories:
at the very beginning of march 2020, my partner and i went to an indigo girls concert. our first date was on valentine’s day, so i was very much in an ‘oh my gosh is this real’ state. so please imagine me when they announce they’re going to sing a new, unreleased song, and it goes like this:
I work at the mall food court
And when I get home
I fix something to eat, settle into my seat
And turn on the country radio
I know every word to every song
And they make these lonely nights a little less long
'Cause then I'm under the stars, regular at the bar
Got a perfect girl, I got a worn in truck
We go down to the river, and the moonlight is silver
But most of all I get to be in love
I wanna be that boy, I wanna be that girl
I wanna know what it's like to fall in love
Like most of the rest of the world
But as far as these songs will take me is as far as I'll go
I'm just a gay kid in a small town
Who loves country radio
i was absolutely sobbing lol. that idea of using the exaggerated gender roles of country music as escapism defined my teenage years, and i had never heard someone else put words to it. not only that, but i was in love! i didn’t have to escape anymore, i could hold my partner’s hand! (at least in the theater full of lesbians)
our school shut down due to covid about 2 weeks later, and A had to move back home, about an 8 hour drive away. i spent a lot of that summer watching a shaky recording of Country Radio, since the album was still unreleased.
anyways this brings us to today, when i realized i never actually listened to that album all the way through. or at least if i did, i was so focused on Country Radio that i ignored the song immediately before it. that’s a shame cause it fucking slaps!
I was thinking about how I needed a ride
From the swimming pool to the other side of town
Yeah, I got a cousin, but it's too late to call
And there's a perfect stranger who can find me
In the last light of the parking lot
Thank you, Kansas City girl
With your long hair tangled, your tattooed skin
And your Hip Hop Hits radio
Turned down low, Kansas City girl
I still hear what you're playing
Where I'm coming from ain't the same ol' rodeo
like idk i’m equally obsessed with this song now. i can so clearly imagine the narrator being the same in both songs. maybe she needs to get to the other side of town to get to her food court job. she gets a ride from this woman from the big city! where they have hip hop! and obviously she falls in love a little bit cause who hasn’t? but then she goes to work and the regular world crashes back in, and all she’s got are the stories from country songs...
i could really go on about this album for days but it all boils down to that feeling of hearing a song made for you for the first time. i think that feeling healed a little bit of my soul.
Are you digging "Falling in Love at the End of the World," the theme song from World Gone Wrong? Do you live in Wisconsin or Northern Illinois?
Good news! Olivia and the Lovers (who wrote the theme song) are going on a mini Midwestern tour this week! They'll be playing in Chicago (Thursday, Whiskey Girl Tavern), Madison (Friday, Communications), Beloit (Saturday, C-Haus), and Milwaukee (Sunday, Jazz Gallery)! Joining them on the road will be Queer Bluegrass band Laurel Hells Ramblers, with various special guests along the way!