Notes From the New Wave Queer Underground

May 15, 2014 1:19 PM

Southern Belles, Latchkey Kids, and Thrift-Store Crossdressers. Worth a click if only for the photos of a teenage RuPaul.

Bonus: here is a video of Wee Wee Pole singing a song about pizza.

posted by Juliet Banana (12 comments total)

THere's some great stuff from that era of Atlanta music on Youtube, too.
posted by thelonius at 1:32 PM on May 15, 2014 [1 favorite]

What a nice and interesting read. Thanks.
posted by benito.strauss at 1:44 PM on May 15, 2014

I just came here to say that "Thrift-Store Crossdressers" is a GREAT band name!
posted by Greg_Ace at 2:01 PM on May 15, 2014 [1 favorite]

The Bitter Southerner is pretty great generally. This is one of their best.
posted by ob1quixote at 2:20 PM on May 15, 2014 [1 favorite]

That was really wonderful. Thank you!
posted by rtha at 3:23 PM on May 15, 2014 [2 favorites]

Oooooo!
posted by The Whelk at 3:37 PM on May 15, 2014

THere's some great stuff from that era of Atlanta music on Youtube, too.

I found some nostalgia videos in my YouTube history:

New Wave In The New South
Ru Paul works The New Music Seminar 1986
Inside the 688 Club
Atlanta Music Scene 1977-1984

Drivin n Cryin Mother's Day 1987

Piedmont Arts Festival 1983:
The Roys
Love Tractor
The Swimming Pool Qs
Arms Akimbo

It's really strange watching video of shows that I attended in high school, 30 years later, on Youtube!
posted by thelonius at 3:37 PM on May 15, 2014 [7 favorites]

I was a latchkey kid and a thrift store crossdresser, so you could say this was relevant to my interests. I sure wish I'd found a posse like this to run with, when I was a young tranny. I've never envied people from the South before, but this actually makes Atlanta sound like a much better place to grow up than Long Beach.

"It's boil-in-the-bag perversion for sexually repressed accountants and first-year drama students with too many posters of Betty Blue, The Blues Brothers, Big Blue and Blue Velvet on their blue bloody walls!"

No matter how many good movies he's ever in, I will have a hard time forgiving Simon Pegg for that shitty, shitty line. Rocky Horror isn't just great fun. It has saved lives.
posted by Ursula Hitler at 6:52 PM on May 15, 2014

(Also, what's so freaking bad about first-year drama students with too many posters of Betty Blue, The Blues Brothers, Big Blue and Blue Velvet on their blue bloody walls? Aside from having an eccentric obsession with the color blue, they sound like fun kids!)
posted by Ursula Hitler at 6:53 PM on May 15, 2014

Atlanta sound like a much better place to grow up than Long Beach.

There were a lot of fun and creative people in the early 80's alternative/music/art/party scene, as described in TFA. The process of gentrifying the Intown neighborhoods was not yet complete, so it was still pretty cheap to rent living space, practice space, or spaces for bands or art shows. That always helps.
posted by thelonius at 9:02 PM on May 16, 2014

as described in TFA

Wait, what? I read The Fucking Article. My point was that Atlanta sounded cool in that era, going by what the article said. What's with the 'tude?
posted by Ursula Hitler at 2:21 AM on May 17, 2014

I wasn't criticizing you at all! I loved what you wrote. 'TFA' just a figure of speech, I thought - maybe it sounds inherently fight-y.
posted by thelonius at 9:18 PM on May 17, 2014