Quantcast
Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 26174

Laura Jane Grace’s True Trans Soul Rebellion

by Santi Elijah Holley

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.
Laura Jane Grace
Laura Jane GraceRYAN RUSSELL

Rock ’n’ roll memoirs have become a genre all their own, usually telling similar stories of fame, sex, alcohol, and heroic amounts of drugs. These books have largely become formulaic, written by white, able-bodied, cisgender men. Tranny: Confessions of Punk Rock’s Most Infamous Anarchist Sellout, the new memoir by Against Me! singer and guitar player Laura Jane Grace, nearly falls into redundant “rock star tell-all” territory, but Grace sets her memoir apart by describing her experience with lifelong gender dysphoria—Grace finally came out as transgender just four years ago.

Born Thomas Gabel in 1980, Grace was raised in South Florida by her mother after she separated from Grace’s disciplinarian military father. After a few early run-ins with the law, Grace discovered the DIY punk rock scene, which gave her an outlet for her rebellious energy. Tranny—cowritten with Noisey’s Dan Ozzi—traces the meteoric rise of Against Me!, from ramshackle two-piece folk-punk band to playing stadiums. Grace takes a few obligatory shots at former bandmates and label execs, but she mostly aims at herself, believing that all of her self-perceived narcissism, arrogance, and rage came from her dysphoria.

[ Comment on this story ]

[ Subscribe to the comments on this story ]


Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 26174

Trending Articles



<script src="https://jsc.adskeeper.com/r/s/rssing.com.1596347.js" async> </script>