This post was submitted by John "Jolly" Bavoso

Former TNG contributor (and current She.Rex DJ) Coach Vee submitted this post.

Welcome to the Dollhouse, where ex-members of the Girl Cave host local and touring DIY bands of all stripes, and you can’t swing a feral cat without hitting a gaggle of gays. Last Monday night, queer folk poppers Trouble, Wisdom Tooth and Jubilee packed the Dollhouse with doe-eyed homos seeking songs in the key of twee.

Trouble, hailing from Richmond and sounding a bit like Sarah Dougher, played a slew of what she called letter songs–text message-ready tunes titled acronym-style. For the record, “LLS” for Like Like Sprung, “JFB” for Just Friends with Benefits, and “h” for  little h, as in, when you’re informally hanging out with a crush (as opposed to “H”, when you are seriously hanging together).  You can sample the track “h” on the Queer as Folk Pop comp assembled by Trouble’s tour mate and comp creator, Meagan, aka Wisdom Tooth. The whole Queer as Folk Pop comp streams for free, here.

On break from Oberlin, Wisdom Tooth tours light (one ukulele and one Stratocaster-style toy guitar), but her lyrics betray a heavy heart. Proof’s in mellow pudding pop lyrics like: “You’re not better off alone,” “I asked the spirit world / will I find another girl?,” “If I had my own rodeo my own rodeo my own rodeo / you and me like a pop song on the radio on the radio,” and “I’m real tender when it comes to / girls who play vintage Fenders.” Spare instrumentation brings Wisdom Tooth’s lyrical knack to the fore, and despite some definite bummer crush-that-got-away songs, there’s a sense of humor in her emotive style. How could there not be in a song that strings together: “touch my hand/ your outfit ruined all my plans/ you’re the camp counselor with the awesome tan / I’ve got the braces with rubber bands.”

D.C.’s Jubilee is Amy, Brian, and Till, and they represented the fullest set up of the evening: banjo, plugged in guitar, and a drum kit that would make Julia Child proud. Layered vocals, singing and drumming in the off-beats, and occasional a cappella singing are regular features of a Jubilee show, but the fuller instrumentation and some punker-sounding tunes debuted perhaps some new direction’s for the bands song writing. Jubilee’s set jumped from a nude-as-the-news Joni Mitchell cover, to ninety-second pop punk, to songs that’d make good train-hopping soundtracks (hear “Killdear,” on the QAFP comp). They closed with a tune about queer siblings, and the tension between letting go and the urge to protect a younger brother. The song couples quirky syncopation with a military cadence and Amy’s rallying cry, “Fuck their expectations, goddamn their expectations.”

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