Jon Ginoli (2nd from left) did not get the memo…

As we’ve already mentioned, tonight will be the TNG-sponsored screening of Pansy Division: Life in A Gay Rock Band at the AFI Silver Theatre in Silver Spring. You can see more information about the movie and the party in our previous posts. Here, though, is a chance to hear a little more about Pansy Division from the mouth of their frontman Jon Ginoli. You will want to know that Pansy Division is an out, gay “queercore” band that formed in San Francisco in the ’90s and writes songs with explicitly gay, and often explicit, content. That’s the basics. You can learn more by reading the full interview. That and a Pansy Division mixtape are below the fold.

Pansy Division: Life in a Gay Rock Band plays tonight at 7:30 at the AFI Silver Theatre. Tickets are $10. Stub-holders will receive free Blue Moon beer at the following afterparty at the Quarry House Tavern.

The New Gay Zack: What was the process of getting this movie together? Did they contact you or was it commissioned?

Jon Ginoli: It’s an interesting story. Our bass player Chris, he was hired to do financial aid for a film school. He was actually taking classes at this school while he was working there and, for a final project, he and some other people collaborated to do this film. Chris wasn’t the director but he was the editor. Because the band was involved we were able to supply all kinds of wonderful footage.

TNG: Did you learn anything about yourself during the making of this movie that you might not have realized before?

JG: I had no idea that I had that many hairstyles. I was really surprised, especially when it comes at you over the course of a movie. I didn’t think I spent that much time worrying about my hair but I guess I did.

TNG: Anything else?

JG: Watching the film with an audience made me realize that there’s a lot of history, especially in the early part of the film, about how things were in the early ’90s when activism was more active and things seemed more urgent. People with AIDS were still dying. If you had AIDS you pretty much had a death sentence. When we were starting out that was a backdrop. It was an issue that got us started, like how are gay people going to advance and have civil rights and have freedom if there’s no cure for this disease?

TNG: Was AIDS the main battle then or were there other issues to deal with?

JG: It’s interesting to ponder what those issue might be if AIDS had not surfaced as an issue. What might our issues have been if there wasn’t this 15 or 20 year period where we were really fighting for basic things like staying alive and not getting infected? Who knows how much further we might be. Or the other way, if the sympathy engendered by the whole crisis might have helped move other things along faster.

TNG: You say in the movie that a lot of your frustrations with gay culture, that it seems stale or that it can be a disappointment when one actually comes out, motivated the formation of Pansy Division. Do you still have these frustrations?

JG: For sure. I don’t think its changed that much, but it’s changed some. There’s a wider variety of activities that gay people are involved in than there used to. But at the same time, if you focus on what is gay it come down to bars. I just saw that movies “Nick and Nora’s Infinite Playlist” which is pretty funny because Michael Cera’s character is a straight guy who plays in a queercore band. It points out that for younger people it doesn’t have as much stigma as it used to. You’ve probably seen the same statistics that say gay marriage is far more accepted by people under a certain age than over it. That’s just another reminder of that.

TNG: Do you think the documentary will help expose you to new or younger potential fans that might not be familiar with your music?

KG: It might, but I’m not so sure. People watch the films that most align with their interests already, especially when you get a festival that’s fulls of films that you might not get the time or opportunity to see. The film is good, though, so even if you’re not clued in to what were’ all about it will still be interesting.

TNG: What do you think the current climate is like for gay bands?

JG: I think that it’s easier to be a gay musician than it used to be, but not if you’re talking about the mainstream. People are always emailing me about people who are gay. There’s a lot to keep up with that I’ve never heard of or never heard. If you were trying to make a list of all the gay musicians now it would be really long. I’m not sure how many of them are writing about things that directly impact the gay experience. I don’t think that needs to be a litmus test, but one of the things that makes Pansy Division unique and interesting is that we focus on things that are specifically gay in our lyrics.

TNG: What are some of your favorite current queer bands?

JG: I knew this was going to come… This is the ironic thing: I think its important for people to be out and gay in music, but at the same time I find it hard to stay on top of music period. I need to do some homework to answer this question accurately. The ones that come to mind are bands that are already broken up,like Team Dresch… The one I listen to most came out five years ago, VIP. If they hadn’t landed on a bill with us I wouldn’t have heard of them either. I found their record, I never knew it existed. It’s fake gay gangster rap. They’re not even very good rappers. They sound like Gravy Train. Gravy Train and The Gossip are good examples of good current gay bands that I’m into.

TNG: How do you feel about The Magnetic Fields?

JG: God, I wish they had a different singer. They write great songs, though.

TNG: When you started, did you have trouble being taken seriously as a “gay band?”

JG: There’s the idea that we’ll use the gay thing as a novetly, I mention this in my upcoming book. What would you think a novelty gay band would be like? They’d have costumes, they’d have drag, they would have emphasis on appearance and style. We want to focus more on the music, the substance of the thing. The fact that some of the songs are humorus and blunt and funny makes it so some people don’t want to take its seriously. But using humor as a tool is one reason that our band has remained viable all these years. Our music is not medicine that you have to take because you agree with a certian point of view.

TNG: Did you ever feel pressure to “gay it up?” Were people ever disappointed that you weren’t some gay novelty vamping around in boas?

JG: There wasn’t pressure, but we realized that if we had we would’ve had a bigger gay audience.

TNG:: In the movie you say you had more straight fans than gay ones. Is that part of the reason?

JG: Actually, that has changed since the movie. For a long time our audience had been younger and straighter because of the impact of touring with Green Day in ‘94. We toured last year, first time in four years, the crowds were a bit older and there were a lot more queer 20-somethings than straight ones. It’s a gradual shift.

TNG: It seems like there is this inevitability of the subculture becoming the dominant culture, like with Green Day fans becoming your fans. Is this concerning to you?

JG: It would be if it made us change what we sang about , but we didn’t. We started out thinking no straight people were going to like our band, but realized pretty soon that that wasn’t true. Our idea was that we grew up as kids listening to music that had a heterosexual message to it. It was heterosexual by default. We thought that if people who are gay can grow up relating to these hetero… open-minded [straight] people who hear us could find something to relate to. That’s the approach we always took, not that we have to sing about a different subject to get a straighter audience or to focus on just having gay audience….

Pansy Division is not for everyone, that’s true about anything. What’s different about now, versus 30 years ago when I was in high school, the sub-segments of music are chopped so small that it allows for a band like us to come along and not get completely marginalized. Tt the same time, it’s hard to find a center that holds with something that everyone can relate to. Somethign is gained and something is lost in that evolution… And I do believe in evolution, Sarah Palin.

TNG: Has getting older changed your songwriting? For instance, is there less impetus to write about sex?

JG: I was interrupted a minute ago by my boyfriend walking in naked from the other room…. When we started out we wanted to write the sex songs because that was what was missing. We started doing more songs that were relationship oriented, but there are sex songs on the upcoming record as well. As you age it becomes a less urgent topic.

TNG: Finally, one of our readers wanted me to ask you something: Do you remember a fan giving you a pair of Backstreet Boys Pants in Nashville 8 or 9 yeras ago? He really wanted to know.

JG: I’m really surprised to hear this, because it’s in my [upcoming] book that our drummer got into the pants of the Backstreet Boys. Was [the reader] a gay person? Oh my god! We didn’t have anywehre to stay, so these kids offered us there house when their parents were out of town. They said ‘Hey, my mom does clothes for the Backstreet Boys, wanna see Howie’s pants?” Luis our drummer was really into the idea of having the Backstreet Boys’ pants. He was excited that they gave him the pants. It’s a true story! I didn’t know that any of them were gay, that’s nice to hear.

TNG: Our reader Stuart will be really excited.

JG: It might even be on the cover of the book. ‘Find out how Pansy Division got in the Backstreet Boys’ pants.” Something misleading like that. TNG