*Q:* There’s now increasing traction around fluid identities, and I feel like the fluidity that you’ve represented in your music—being able to slip in and out of identities—has pushed those boundaries further. Do you feel like we’re in a particularly free time in terms of gender and sexuality? *A:* Yeah, it’s definitely the most vocal period for it—to the point that people come for me. I get so much hate. I’ve been called a trans misogynist a lot online. For a while, it was really hurtful—it’s insane, people calling me this but not knowing me or relationships I’ve had with transgender people. I remember a fight I got in with someone after I played a show in Boston after the first Blood Orange album. They were like, “Love your music man, but why did you have to put a fucking tranny on the cover?” I confronted them about this, trying to explain what I was trying to do, and it became a physical altercation.
*Q:* How do you not become bitter when faced with these things?
*A:* Because I’m inspired from the school of Miles and Prince and these people that just kept it locked in and kept going. They had their famous battles of course, but they tried to keep it all love and did the best for them and the people they loved. And that is what I choose to do. Prince was the main person who showed me to be myself at the fullest, and he still teaches me that to this day. I’m still learning things from Prince. I can’t change what people think about me, so I just have to make sure that I love my opinions of me. It’s taken a long time, but that’s where I got to.- Dev Hynes
"Originally, I wanted to write a song about how I am attracted to toxic forms of masculinity. As much as I am mentally opposed to those archetypes, they really do it for me. I wanted to talk about that disconnect, but the song ended up more like a prolonged fantasy that took a dark turn. I am not sure why I am preoccupied with this idea of being annihilated by someone else spiritually and physically, but it certainly comes up a lot. It is kind of an embarrassing song, thematically. But I think that is kind of bodacious. There is also some power in it, because even though the lyrics might paint the picture of me as submissive, it's sung with strength and power, like I am the director of the whole thing." - Mike Hadreas
*Q:* Does your songwriting depend on a certain state of mind, a certain way of life? If you had that well-off existence, could you produce the goods?
*A:* No. I mean, what am I going to write about? Nice restaurants? Or that IKEA rug I bought, shit, it just didn't fit the room. And look at the job she did on my nails, fucking bitch.
*Q:* Do you feel that people miss the artifice of what you do and take it as just your diary in song form?
*A:* It is my diary in song form. You know, I don't care, you can do anything you want.
*Q:* It doesn't bother you to be characterised in the way that you often are?
*A:* That bothers me because I get characterised - and I know I've had two beers and I know I complained about my hangover from earlier - as the sad, drunken clown. Which begs the question, 'are you?' Actually you're right, that really does bother me, it really does pigeonhole you. I could milk it, I could be that.
*Q:* Why would you want to?
*A:* Maybe it's who I really am. Like Victoria Beckham. I saw her on CD:UK and I couldn't believe it, I couldn't believe how vain it all was. But she moves good. And I'm sure she could talk for hours about her new look.
*Q:* 24700: What is the impact you hope to create by showing stories and characters like the ones in All Together Now?
*A:* My intention is for this show to provide people with opportunities for different ways of seeing and being in the world, that promote connection, celebration and empowerment amongst all kinds of people. I hope it is able to model people coming together despite their differences, learning from each others stories, and working together to create things that make their community a joyful, inclusive, nourishing place. I also hope that providing queer representation on a children’s show can help normalize people’s genders or bodies who don’t fit into a box. It’s often really hard to just let yourself be uniquely you, even as a queer person who is supposed to be more free in who they are. It’s so easy to put ourselves into boxes of what we are and aren’t. I’m hoping to create a more fluid, free version of what the world can be be on this show, with these characters and stories. I’m also hoping to make kindness, sincerity, vulnerability and love cool instead of uncool!
*Q:* It's not a political record but you said that troubles facing women, queer community, POC fueled this record. How are you able to channel frustrations and worries and turn it into something that isn't overly political, but also so beautiful and dreamy at times?
*A:* It's definitely something that I don't think about all the time, like making my music politically fueled or very black and white like, ‘This is what it's about.’ But I think sometimes when I'm inspired or frustrated or angry by something, I instantly want to write and just write whatever comes to mind. It doesn't necessarily have to be about that. But something that a listener can connect to in ways. If they can connect to this lyric, or this guitar line, or this sound or tone of a certain instrument. Wanting to make someone feel something is important to me.
“Emotionally, I was attempting to capture how I felt at the time, and that caused some internal struggle. I constantly was wondering if I was conveying what I wanted to say correctly, but as soon as I just let it all come out, I was able to let go of the fear,” she said.
Sometimes – on songs such as Fireworks, where she offers marriage to “silence”– it’s as though Mitski has given up on people altogether. When I note that she appears to be an outsider even in her own music, she replies, “If I ever found a place where I belonged, that in itself would be an identity crisis to me.”
A lot of queer people have waited a lifetime for a love song as honest and complicated as “Desafío.” Its hook—“Love me, bind me, and slit my throat/Search for me, penetrate me, and devour me” (translated from its Spanish)—is a gripping, direct description of queer desire. Its tempest of hot, undulating synthesizers and drums set a scene of sex and love that feels unfettered and free. It also reveals hidden inhibitions in its creator: Before “Desafío,” Arca’s experimental electronic songs were intense, but he hid a percolating sensuality beneath fractured noise. Up until the release of his 2017 self-titled album, Arca had never sung on his music before—and on “Desafío,” the yearning sensuality of his voice strikes its most passionate note.
But “Desafío” is more than just a new classic of queer music; it is that rare love song that continues to feel revelatory and new. Arca’s music sounds like it comes from a future we still haven’t reached—one where the way we love will be fluid and liberated and uncompromising, rejecting every single convention of the here and now. –Kevin Lozano
*Q:* You identify as non-binary genderqueer, preferring to go by “they” over “he” or “she.” What was the process to that realization?
*A:* I moved to Jamaica Plain this past September, I moved in with two other people who are very queer. Our house is just like a gaytopia, it’s gay as fuck, everybody who lives there is queer as fuck. One of my roommates told me they identify as “they” and I thought “what is that?” I found it interesting. Like, you can do that? By being exposed to a larger queer community has expanded my vocabulary when it comes to my identify. Identifying as gender queer is something I have always felt but never had the words for. Say you’re going to the grocery store every week, you get your meats and cheese and your Oreos. Then you go to the fruit section and there’s this fruit there. It’s your favorite ever and you’re like “fuck! I love this fruit!” so you buy a whole bag every time you go to the grocery store. You come home and your roommates say “you know those are called apples right?” and you say “What? These are called apples? That’s great! Now I know what to ask for every time I go to the grocery store and I can research more about apples since I love them so much.” Me identifying as genderqueer is me finding the language to express and identify myself. It’s been really interesting since gender binary is such a culturally pervasive concept. I think that gender is a social construct that is very real and part of our cultural ideology. It’s interesting observing that through the lens of a non gender-binary person, while also still being apart of it and engaging with it by default. I’ve noticed since being non gender-binary how gendered things are, things that don’t need to be. Like you see “scissors… for boys” and “scissors… for girls” when really its like, “Yo, those are just scissors.”
"I think that people are congratulating themselves for being excited about women in music right now, which is interesting," she observes. "I'm psyched that more bands with queer people and women are getting visibility, and we're talking about it, because it's great and I think having more women on festivals is a good thing, but it sucks to have to be put in that category when you just think of yourself as a musician. I would just prefer to blend rather than getting an award and a pat on the back for being a woman." - Lindsey Erin Jordan
*Q:* Your record deals a lot with coming out and being genderqueer. What has it been like, playing as an artist who deals with that on their record?
*A:* It’s sort of the same as just existing in the public space and existing as a non-binary person. It’s just as exhausting because it’s sort of like a constant education process of telling people “this is who I am.” So I have to constantly be teaching people about my existence and who I am as a person. Music helps with that because I can sing about it and it’s less educational and more about identity. It’s educational in that people listen to it and they’re like, “Oh, I understand” and I don’t have to sit people down and be like “here’s my entire story.” Now I can just sing it. But it’s hard because even so, being queer and non-binary, a lot of people still don’t understand what that means even after all these songs are coming out. Some people will call Adult Mom a “girl band,” or will still be like “frontwoman” Steph Knipe.
It’s hard because I'm being very public about it. But it’s also, I think, very helpful for me and my process of feeling comfortable with myself.
