Smells Like Queer Spirit: The Lost History of Queercore Punk

A few years ago, I was arguing with someone on a  punk website who told me it was “cringe” to try to classify queer punk as its own genre. “It’s called queercore,” I responded. “Are you new?” So I started talking to other punk fans and found a surprising number who have never heard of queercore.

But then, to think about it, I shouldn’t be surprised. There haven’t been a ton of histories written about queercore punk. There is one documentary called Queercore: How To Punk A Revolution, which isn’t bad, but it mostly focuses on the 90s and the most well-known bands. Even then, it has glaring omissions.

I’ve also never seen a history of the genre that goes up to present day or one that includes transgender punk artists. Yet there have been a lot of important queer figures in punk, and punk scenes were often safe havens for queer people who fit in amongst people who were challenging the status quo. So, allow me a moment to demonstrate to you how queer people have been instrumental in punk rock music.

Punk is generally accepted as having started in the Bowery neighborhood in Manhattan at a club called CBGB. While queer people were often part of the scene, few of the big figures in the scene were openly LGBTQ. Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry, in later years,  admitted to having relationships with both men and women when she was younger, although in recent interviews she’s claimed to no longer be bisexual, which has drawn controversy within the LGBTQ community.

Another queer punk who went under the radar a bit was Pete Shelley, frontman for the pioneering British pop-punk band The Buzzcocks. Shelley was bisexual, and his love songs often omitted gendered terms.

Then there’s the rarely told story of early punk artist Jayne County. Before coming out as a trans woman, she took on a stage name taken from the name of Wayne County, Michigan. County, a veteran of the Stonewall riots, was openly gender-nonconforming for her entire life. In 1979 she moved to Berlin and came out as a trans woman, changing one letter in her stage name to become Jayne County. County’s music often talked about trans issues and gender-bending with songs like “Man Enough to Be a Woman” long before these issues became commonplace topics.

Pansy Division are the band that people generally think of when they think of queercore. Started as the solo act for gay songwriter Jon Ginoli in 1991, 1992 saw the release of the band’s first single, “Fem in a Black Leather Jacket.” The first single’s B-sides were the holiday song “Homo Christmas” and a rewrite of Nirvana’s iconic youth anthem “Smells Like Teen Spirit,” which the band rechristened “Smells Like Queer Spirit.” Pansy Division gradually gained more members and a tour opening for Green Day made them one of the biggest queer acts in punk.

Green Day is fronted by Billie Joe Armstrong who is both openly bisexual and has openly explored gender-expansive fashion. Armstrong has said that Green Day’s breakthrough album Dookie touches on bisexuality quite a bit, particularly in the song “Coming Clean.” The band’s album Nimrod contains the song “King for a Day,” which delves into Armstrong’s love for gender-bending looks.

Nineteen-ninety-eight saw the original off-Broadway production of the queer, punk rock musical Hedwig and the Angry Inch. The musical tells the story about a young boy named Hansel who grew up in East Berlin and transitioned to marry an American soldier who promised to take her to America. The play’s ending is very ambiguous and open to interpretation but is often viewed as Hedwig realizing they’re not truly a trans woman but are actually nonbinary.

In 2012, the lead singer of punk band Against Me! came out as transgender in an interview with Rolling Stone magazine. Having already established herself with five albums that were released before she came out, Laura Jane Grace’s courage in coming out publicly inspired more and more punk fans who had always struggled with gender dysphoria—myself included—to finally realize who they really were and come out as trans. Against Me!’s subsequent album, Transgender Dysphoria Blues, remains the definitive punk album on the topic of transgender issues, even as more trans punk artists have come out of the woodwork.

Grace’s public transition kicked the proverbial door down for new trans punk artists. The year after she released Transgender Dysphoria Blues, Grace produced the debut album by Brooklyn-based indie punk act Worriers, fronted by the nonbinary singer/songwriter Lauren Denitzo. The album, entitled Imaginary Life, features Denitzo’s defining nonbinary anthem entitled “They/Them/Theirs.”

Around the same time came a new band out of Olympia, Washington, trans-feminist hardcore band, G.L.O.S.S. (Girls Living Outside Society’s Shit) fronted by the outspoken Sadie “Switchblade” Smith. G.L.O.S.S. remain legends in the hardcore punk scene despite only having put out a total of less than 15 minutes of music. G.L.O.S.S. became notorious for their lyrics, which encouraged transgender people—and all marginalized groups, for that matter—to fight back against discrimination with violence.

“When peace is just another word for death,” Smith proclaims in the opening seconds of their EP, Trans Day of Revenge, “it’s our turn to give violence a chance!” They were offered a record deal with Epitaph Records, arguably the most famous label in punk, but turned down the offer and instead broke up, citing members’ anxiety with their increasing popularity.

One of the biggest developments in recent years has been the first queer ska-punk artists. Ska—a genre from Jamaica in the 1950s that was a precursor to reggae—came to be combined with punk in the late 80s and early 90s in what is referred to as the Third-Wave Ska Revival. Only in recent years have ska-punk bands started to produce queer-themed music, particularly three artists on rising ska label Bad Time Records: We Are the Union, Catbite, and Jer.

Ann Arbor-based We Are the Union first started making music in the early 2010s but, when their lead singer Reade Wolcott came out as a trans woman in 2021, the band put out the gorgeous trans-themed album, Ordinary Life.

Philadelphia-based Catbite is admittedly more ska than punk. The band is fronted by the irrepressible Brittany Luna who is openly bisexual and often sings songs about other women, such as in their song “Excuse Me Miss” off their 2021 album Nice One. Jer, short for Jeremy Hunter, is the nonbinary trombone player for We Are the Union who also operates under the name Skatune Network, where they produce ska covers of famous songs. Jer put out their first solo record of original material, Bothered/Unbothered, earlier this year, which discusses nonbinary trans issues.

This history has to be, by necessity, somewhat incomplete, as there have been a plethora of queer punk artists, both those who wave their rainbow flag with pride and those who are a little more quiet about it.

I didn’t even have time to touch on important artists like Big Boys, Nervus, Sleater-Kinney, Le Tigre, Middle-Aged Queers, Team Dresch, or even David Bowie. But what I wanted this history to show is that, in spite of its reputation as a genre for aggressive cis-het men, punk has always been a more diverse genre than it appears on the surface.

With all its iconoclastic nature, queer people have easily fit into punk crowds and have been instrumental in moving the music forward. To be queer is inherently a punk act of defiance against a cisheteronormative society. Queer culture and the punk scene will always walk hand-in-hand, even if it doesn’t get acknowledged enough.