He’d probably hate me saying this, but Lucas Silviera, singer for Canadian quartet The Cliks, is fast becoming the first trans man of rock and roll. Not first as in no others came before him, but first as in preeminent, most visible, or most inspiringly confident. Despite an insistence that his music is for people, not trans people, Silviera’s combination of musical chops and refusal to be closeted is setting an example that more queer musicians, of any letter on the spectrum, should follow. The Cliks’ formerly sonic, now more wounded, brand of rock is accessible across the board, yet the band has shown a great loyalty to both their queer fan base and the queer press.

Their new album, Dirty King, came out recently and the band should be getting their fall tour dates soon. In the meantime, you should check out the below interview with Silviera and the Cliks video sampler that follows it.

The New Gay: I noticed a big shift between the album covers for your previous album, Snakehouse, and your new one. It seems that you’ve gone from a slick image to a more defeated one [shown above.] Why is this the case?

Lucas Silveira: You got the defeated part right. I was trying to express feeling very vulnerable and defeated in the experience I had that brought on the writing of the album. At the same time I think that I learned a lot.  I learned that… people will come at you with the worst and you have to fight back and do a lot of work to stay on your feet and stay on top of your game. That’s what I was trying to assert. There was a vulnerability and a feeling of defeat, but a feeling like I was fighting for something.

TNG: What was the experience?

LS: A series of experiences that all coincided with the same emotion. We started touring a lot. Touring really effects your life and your relationships, not only with the people you know at home, but also with the people you work with, and your label and your management. It became a very strange world where I felt very isolated. People don’t understand about touring. You have sort of repetitive stress trauma that goes along with it… You keep going away and coming back and trying to adjust, then you go back out and try to adjust to that. It can really do a number on you. It can really test your limits about figuring out where you are in your life and heart and soul. And with all that’s going on, you’re supposed to be creating as well. In the midst of insanity, my psyche and artistic side closes. It just turns off. I didn’t have the capacity to sit back and go, “This is what I’m feeling.” I had no idea what I was feeling! It came out of confusion. Everyone was confused as to what the hell was going on, we were working so hard that we didn’t have time to catch up with our own emotions. It caused conflict and I felt a lot of pressure. Everything, put in a bubble, makes me explode.

TNG: The sound of this album is a big departure from the last one too. It seems less cocky and more vulnerable.

LS: You have to take yourself with a grain of salt when you go into a studio. I felt I was going in completely unprepared. I didn’t think I had enough material. We were on the road for 400 days and came home for two months and I was told I had to write an album. Are you fucking kidding me? I can’t create something of substance in two months; I can’t catch up to the last two years of my life and make it something palpable and real. [But] I found out I work really well under pressure, and no matter what happens, as long as I do have that opportunity to sit down and be by myself, I can actually create. We had two weeks of pre-production, I had quite a few songs, and when I was there I wrote nine or ten songs in two weeks, which is unreal for me. I’ve always created one or two per month, that’s always been my rate. Then I started touring and stopped writing, which scares the living shit out of me. I was like, “What happened?” You sign a contract and stop writing? I didn’t do a very good job of channeling that energy. I compressed it, but something good can be said about compressing emotions so when they come out, they come out full blown.

TNG: Is this going to mean the beginning of a different, more vulnerable side of The Cliks than we saw on Snakehouse?

LS: It’s not a different side of me, I’ve just never exposed it through The Cliks. I had this idea, from the label and my management, this expectation of of what music would come out of this band. You record an album of a certain genre, and people expect you forever to remain within that. There’s this pressure to recreate the same thing. It is senseless. Why would you want to hash over the same emotions over and over again? I have always written music that fits into different genres. When I went into the studio I had a couple of them. One is “Emily” which is very Beatles-esque, with piano arrangements. I said “I have this song, it’s sort of half done. I really love it. We could have it as something in the middle, not a full track.” I played it for her and she was adamant that I finish it. And I thought this will never make it. It’s not a full blown guitar rock song. I said, “This isn’t really a Cliks song,” and she said one of the most important things I’ve heard to date about my relationship to The Cliks and songwriting: “You know what a Cliks song is? A song that you write…” This [record] does have gentler side because that side of me exists.

TNG: I also saw that you were recently on TRL. How did that go? Was Middle America ready for you?

LS: It was so intense and so fast. It just felt like we were there and gone in two seconds, they didn’t get too much into asking us things. It was kind of like a three question segment. The crowd was so noisy and I was so overwhelmed that I couldn’t hear myself talk.

And they better be ready, because ready or not, I’m here and not going away. I give audiences a lot more credit, whether they be straight or gay or trans, for being able to find a universal meaning in music and not look at the music as though it’s coming from only one perspective. I don’t write from a trans or queer perspective. I come from a very human perspective. As long as people retain that they will be able to relate to the music no matter what. I know people are ready because it’s already out there. It just happens I’m trans, but that should not be a part of the equation. I think any good creator of music creates music that anyone can relate to. I think that when you try to relate only to a segment of the population it diminishes what you’re trying to do.

LS: I hate to dwell too much on your album art, but I thought the cover image was very brave. Was exposing your chest scars your decision?

TNG: Completely my decision. The publicist was very adamant about it; they were very wary of the situation. Even my band members were wary and thought that it was not the best idea, but when people tell me not to do something that’s when I want to do it even more. It’s not that the label wasn’t supportive. They were worried. I’d have to fight a lot, I think that a lot of people didn’t understand what I was trying to express in doing that. People read into stuff about me trying to be a big trans poster boy. To me it was about exposing myself as a human being, and I thought that that was the best format to do it. In my opinion, an album cover shouldn’t just be a band standing there with fucking guitars looking stupid. The purpose of creating music is to connect to people and create art. If you can’t evoke emotion with the cover, no one will go into it. It’s like a book. It’s such a valuable medium to have this visual attached to something that is sonic. The death of the album cover is sad. I remember looking through the cover of [Pink Floyd's] The Wall, and being so connected to the imagery through the music. I’m glad i fought for it. Now it’s not just an album cover, it’s a beautiful piece of art.

TNG: Have you heard from your trans fans about the decision?

LS: We’ve gotten a massive response. They have the response where they say, “That’s really brave.” I wasn’t trying to say, “Look at me, I’m so brave for taking my shirt off.” A million people take their shirts off every day. I’m not trying to be brave or courageous. It’s about the creation of art. In my being able to do that, there are other people who can look at my body, who have different bodies, trans or not, and feel a sense of connection.There was a cover of a magazine called Love that Beth Ditto did [naked]. She’s a big girl, and she has a beautiful body, a lot of people said that’s so gross, because she’s fat, but I said “Why?” People who are fat are beautiful. Why is that damaging to you? What about that threatens you? I have trans kids and adults who come up to me and say thank you for the doing this, but for me it’s not for the trans or queer community, it’s about humanity. I’m trying to create a sense of self, and trying to be able to feel confident in who you are.

TNG: What’s next for The Cliks?

LS: We are right now going through this phase of waiting for the storm, any day now I could hear about when we’ll be touring… We’re doing Virgin Fest in Canada, sharing a stage with Pearl Jam. Can you imagine? A tranny on the same stage as Eddie Vedder? That, to me, is moving forward.