Author: addie

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Full disclosure: I have never been very good at writing music reviews. In fact, the one time I tried writing one for a website, it got sent back to me by the editor laughing. However, I am good at pretending I know what I’m doing, so here it goes. My thoughts on Against Me!’s new album, “True Trans Soul Rebel.”

So much good music has come out in the last year. 2013 was the year that brought us the awesomeness of Daft Punk’s single “Get Lucky”, Katy Perry’s PRISIM with the AMAZING “Roar”, and of course, Beyonce’s super secret self-titled album that is, in my mind, the best thing that came out of 2013 musically.

2014 has been quiet so far in the “OMG I MUST HAVE” music department. That is…until now. For this week, Against Me!’s “True Trans Soul Rebel” was released. We have had acoustic versions of a few singles since the band released a 2 song EP last summer. To say this is one of the most anticipated releases from the band, though is a great understatement.

The album is a very personal look into transition, and the emotions that come with it. Laura Jane Grace has done a brilliant job putting just the right kid of emotion into the album. I gave the album a listen to today. I’m still trying to process all of the feelings that have come out of it. There were some tracks on the back-half of the album, specifically “Dead Friend” and “Two Coffins”, which definitely got to me. I was a bit teary eyed listening to them. Most of the album speaks too closely to me in some regards.

Overall, I would VERY highly recommend the album. Like. Go buy it now. Or click to listen to it on Spotify.

It’s been a while since I blogged about the Transgender Day of Remembrance. Probably TOO long since I have. Pretty much everything that I said back then still holds true today.

“These 160+ souls should never have had their lives cut short. They were people with the potential to go on and do great things. Who knows what they could have been or become. The only thing that’s known is that they did not choose to be who they were, or to die at the hands of hate. I encourage everyone to please stop the hate in this world.”

That is from the 2009 blog. I’m not going to re-hash what I said there, save to say that we are still being rattled with fear and hate and people are still dying because of it. Since 2009, though, a lot of good has happened. There is visible transgender presence in the media landscape1, there are projects like #girlslikeus and trans* people have not stayed silent when it mattered most.

But sadly, there is still a need for a day like TDOR. Sadly, people are still being killed, or driven to suicide, because of hatred and ignorance. The list of those who were died for being themselves can be accessed here. While it is a far cry from the 160 people who died when I first blogged on the subject2, the fact remains there are still too many names on that list.

I’m going to close this post with a quote from Anne Frank. Because, if people took the time to realize this, maybe so many of our trans* sisters and brothers won’t have to die at the hands of hate.

“We all live with the objective of being happy; our lives are all different and yet the same.” — Anne Frank

Footnotes

1. The biggest presence of a trans person in media right now is Laverne Cox who plays Sophia on Netflix’s “Orange is the New Black.” But she is not alone. Since blogging in 2009 there have been musicians like Laura Jane Grace & Mina Caputo, journalist-turned-author Janet Mock, and child-star-turned-activist Chaz Bono who have all made important contributions to trans people’s visibility.
2. We are once again getting conflicting numbers being reported on the number of people who died this year. The list I linked to above only had roughly 70 names on it when I looked. This morning, I came across a link on BuzzFeed which puts the number at 238, which would make it MORE than the number reported when I blogged in 2009. However, as you can see in that post, there were conflicting reports then as well.

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“here comes the rain again falling from the stars drenched in my pain again becoming who we are as my memory rests but never forgets what I lost wake me up when September ends”

Green Day “Wake Me Up When September Ends”

A very powerful song by Green Day. It deals with the death of Billie Joe Armstrong’s father. November is the month that I would like to be able to skip over and not have to deal with the pain of November 2012.

This time last year, I was staring straight into the eyes of what would turn out to be the worst month that I have ever had to deal with. For starters, I lost one of the best friends, anchors, reporters and producers that you could ask for. Secondly, I was dealing with a roommate who had just come off of surgery and unknown to me at the time, would officially die for a few seconds on the operating table the 3rd time that he was rushed to the ER because his incisions had re-opened. Throw on top of that a Presidential election, Sweeps, and the death of an aunt that I wasn’t especially close to on my mom’s side of the family, and you can see why I was very emotionally distraught by Thanksgiving.

“And it seems to me you lived your life Like a candle in the wind”

Sir Elton John “Candle in the Wind”

Probably the biggest reason that I would love to just skip over November this year is the fact that it has [been one year since we lost Jeannie.]({{< ref “/blog/2012-11-08_Only-the-good-die-young” >}}) Quite honestly, this is probably the hardest part of this for me to write. I can’t believe that not only is she really gone, but that it has been a year already since I got the devastating news. Thankfully, I will say, she had enough sense to actually pass while I was distracted with directing WCCO 4 News at 10 that night. It’s been an especially tough year for me because of this, because there were so many things that happened to me this year where she would have been the first television friend I would have messaged on Facebook. But… I know that she is looking down on and helping all of her friends with their newscasts every day.

And I’m not joking when I say it… I really miss you Jeannie. And, if I haven’t said it enough this year, thank you for all of the help that you have given me.

“Everybody hurts Take comfort in your friends Everybody hurts Don’t throw your hand, oh no

Don’t throw your hand If you feel like you’re alone No, no, no, you are not alone”

REM “Everybody Hurts”

The second part of why November officially sucks for me is nearly losing a friend / roommate to what for any other person would have been a routine procedure. You really don’t need all the gory details. But when you get a call from your neighbor that your roommate was rushed to the ER, they took him for emergency surgery, and oh yeah…she has no idea where in the hospital he is…it’s wicked stressful. On and add to all of that the part where no one prepared me to find him hooked up to a ventilator when I finally got to see him the next morning. Or you know, the part where he technically died. Twice.

The good news, is that he is doing much better today.

“Time keeps on slippin’, slippin’, slippin’ Into the future”

The Steve Miller Band “Fly Like an Eagle”

I still can’t believe that it’s been a year already since all of this happened. It seems like just yesterday Rory and I were talking about his plan to take over the world, and I was prodding Jeannie that she needed to come up to the Cities and take a picture with the Mary Richards statue on Nicollet Mall. I guess time really does keep slipping into the future.

I want to start my thoughts tonight by saying that my heart goes out to the victims of this horrific tragedy in Boston this afternoon. At time of writing there are 3 dead and 117 injured according to multiple media sources.

Al Tompkins posted today one of the things that I was thinking watching the video coming out of Boston. In all of the video that I have watched of the horrific events that transpired this afternoon in Boston, you can clearly see two groups of people running in the opposite directions of the crowds: the first responders and the journalists.

Both of those groups managed to put aside personal safety, as they had no idea how many more bombs could be in the area, as they ran into that area. The first responders, heroically, tending to the injured and the journalists, witnessing the horrific things that we do, to keep the people at home informed of what was happening, to tell the stories of the people down there, and to get out the emergency information needed to keep people safe.

I don’t want to downplay the actions of the first responders, and I don’t want to overshadow the magnitude of what happened today. But… The journalists working on the ground will be forever scarred by the events that happened today. Well…not just those on the ground, but their producers, tape editors, control room crews, etc. who have all seen the un-edited, raw video that is coming in from the scene. Those kinds of pictures, many of which you never see on your television screens at home, leave a lasting impression on you. Believe me when I say this, as I have first-hand experience having been in a newsroom on 9/11/01 and watching an un-edited CNN NewsSource feed from New York City. And those who have covered the event on the ground or in the control room today will be working late into the night, running mostly on adrenaline. It won’t fully hit them until later tonight, or tomorrow, or next week what exactly happened today. I imagine that among the journalists (and first responders) that there will be a lot of “OMG” moments to come.