An Intimate Evening with Laura Jane Grace ‘Killing Me Loudly’
Laura Jane Grace is best known for her band Against Me! who has been a staple on the punk scene since forming in 2002. The band has always stood out with its rough-around-the-edges sound and lyrics filled with political and social commentary. However, there is an entirely different side of Laura. In 2012, she came out as transgender in an insightfully intimate Rolling Stone article and announced she would be transitioning from Tom Gabel to Laura Jane Grace. Since then, Laura has been a leader and advocate for the transgender community. She is finally in a place where she is comfortable sharing all of herself, and by doing so she is helping countless people along the way, either by giving them courage to be who they really are or helping to develop an understanding of a community that so many people misunderstand.
Just before leaving for an Australian tour, Grace hit the stage at City Winery in NYC for a performance titled ‘An Intimate Evening With Laura Jane Grace;’ the only information that was let out to the public was that Laura would be giving the crowd a personal look into her songwriting and mindset before, during and after her transition. The venue is a wine bar/restaurant, with a small stage and assigned seating for tables. The chatter outside before doors opened was excited but nervous: ‘I wonder what this will be like,’ mostly due to the calm atmosphere, which is very unlike any Against Me! show.
Prior to Grace’s set, opening act Globelamp took the stage. I was pleasantly surprised at dainty Elizabeth Le Fey’s vocals (despite losing her hearing and performing like that for the first time) and ‘psychedelic folk’ sound. Although everyone was there for Laura Jane Grace, Fey captivated the audience, especially during her dreamy cover of Jefferson Airplane’s ‘White Rabbit.’
When Laura walked on stage she was beaming, the happiest I have ever seen her, including the 15+ times I have seen Against Me! She welcomed the crowd and explained that she would be taking us through her transition with songs and accompanied journal entries from the same time as those songs were written; she reminded the crowd that it was okay to laugh, that she had a sense of humor about herself. She also noted that drummer Atom Willard was there to ‘make sure her head didn’t get too far up her own ass.’ In the beginning of the set, the journals were filled with quotes of a tormented soul — someone trying to be something she was not (and failing). After ‘Tonight We’re Gonna Give it 35%,” Grace shared the quote from a 2004 entry, where she told a story of being in Milan, Italy, and seeing some transgender women at a food truck with her band. Everyone joked and mocked the women, and Grace went along with it, knowing very well that she wished she had the courage to do what those women were doing. “Not knowing who you are is a terrible terrible fucking feeling,” she said. With every entry, more insight was gained, and although they were sad stories filled with the raw emotions of depression, addiction and, most importantly, dysphoria, Grace told them with a sense of pride and with a smile; you could sense she was a million miles away from where she was during those journal entries. “I pretend to feel because I am tired of feeling nothing,” she shared from another 2004 entry after ‘You Look Like I Need A Drink.’ The journal entries put every song into perspective and really took the crowd through Laura’s journey, from the lowest of her lows to her acceptance and pride of who she really is. The set ended with a few tracks from the band’s latest album Transgender Dysphoria Blues, along with some passages from more recent journals. Before going into ‘Two Coffins,’ she read a line that felt so powerful: “It scares me so very completely, but I realize that this kind of shape-shifting is the only way I’ll ever survive.”
Laura came out for an unexpected encore, proclaiming to the crowd ‘OK, now it’s time to fuck around and have some fun!’ and played some classic Against Me! tracks. ‘Sink, Florida, Sink’ had everyone out of their seats singing along. This personal look into Laura’s life is something no one in that crowd will forget. I walked away with a greater understanding not only of her lyrics but also of her transition as a whole. Against Me! will kick off their US tour this summer at Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival June 12. You can find the rest of the rest of their dates on their website.
Setlist:
- Walking Is Still Honest
- Tonight We’re Gonna Give It 35%
- You Look Like I Need A Drink
- Cavalier Eternal
- How Low
- Searching For A Former Clarity
- Borne On The FM Waves
- Androgynous *The Replacements cover*
- The Ocean
- Bamboo Bones
- I Was A Teenage Anarchist
- Transgender Dysphoria Blues
- Two Coffins
- True Trans Soul Rebel
Encore:
- Joy
- Black Me Out
- Sink, Florida, Sink