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| Photo credit: Dusti Cunningham |
By ERIC SCHELKOPF
Los Angeles band GayC/DC is putting a different spin on the music of the iconic Australian band AC/DC.
GayC/DC is the world’s first and only all-gay AC/DC tribute band. The band was founded by Chris Freeman, bass player from iconic queer punk band Pansy Division, and drummer Brian Welch.
The band is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year and will perform at 8 p.m. April 21 at LiveWire Lounge, 3394 N. Milwaukee Ave., Chicago. Tickets are available at livewireloungechicago.com.
I had the chance to talk to Freeman and Welch about the band.
Q – I know the tour kicks off in Chicago. Ae you happy about the tour kicking off in Chicago?
Welch – Definitely. I have some friends in Chicago and I’m very excited to have them to see this band.
It’s going to be very fun.
Freeman – As do I. And I’m very excited for them to come see the band that they’ve been wanting to see for 10 years.
This is our 10th year. One of the places we talked about playing when we first got together and started to see that this band had legs was Chicago.
It’s such a great rock town.
Q – As both of you mentioned, this is the band’s 10th year. Has the band exceeded expectations?
Freeman – There is no way we could have predicted this. We had a band before that was an all-gay tribute to the Go-Gos called the Gay-Gay’s.
We really only played regionally. We played some shows like in San Francisco and San Diego.
With GayC/DC, we’re trying to get over to Europe as well. So there’s a lot more that this band can do.
I’m very pleased about that. I didn’t see that coming at all.
Q – As far as you Brian, what have you enjoyed about being in this band?
Welch – Well, this band has had a very interesting projectory. We agreed right away we didn’t want to look like AC/DC, we wanted to be something completely different.
We wanted to be a show. Not that AC/DC isn’t a show, they are. And let me be the one that says that AC/DC runs in all of our DNA.
We absolutely love this band. But as gay kids growing up, we wished some of the lyrics had pertained to us, that we could have really related to.
We rehearsed for somewhere between seven and nine months. We wanted to get ready. We had to find other members.
We really had to make this band be what we knew it could be. We’ve seen this interesting projectory of sort of what this band has done and what this band has become.
And we realize now that we’ve got some clout and some responsibility. Because we need to be out there.
We need to be upfront. We need our name on the marquee.
We need to show that we’re not backing down, the LGBTQ community is not backing down. And I’m honored to be in a band with Chris, because he’s in one of the bands that was very influential for me to come out, the Pansy Division.
And they broke down a lot of doors. We wouldn’t be able to do this without Chris and Pansy Division. So I see everything that we’ve done has happened because it’s supposed to and every step we’ve taken is a step we were supposed to take to end up right here.
Freeman – And just to add on to what Brian said about when we were thinking about what we are going to do with this thing, I kind of envisioned it like what if AC/DC started out as a gay band.
Q – There are a lot of cultural wars across the country these days. Do you think GayC/DC helps to unify people, because you can say to people, ‘Well, at least we have this music in common.’
Welch – I say yes, because when we’ve played cities that we’ve never been in before, we get people – and we guess the majority of them are straight – but they’re singing along.
And you’ll have this guy up front with his girlfriend and he’s kind of stepping back a little because we have props and costume changes. It’s definitely not a PG-13 show.
But by the fourth or fifth song, he’s right up front pounding his fists in the air, singing along and having a great time. We knock down those walls.
Freeman – And people who don’t even like AC/DC have come up and said, ‘I don’t even like AC/DC, but now I do.’
Q – Chris, I know you are coming back to Chicago on June 17 with the Pansy Division. Brian was talking about how you guys opened a lot of doors. When the Pansy Division first formed, was that your intent, to open doors?
Freeman – Our intent when we started was just to have a laugh. I joined in November 1991 and guitarist/singe Jon Ginoli had sort of been gestating the idea for almost a year. And he recorded most of the first album in that year.
And then when I joined, within a year we had our first record out. Then we went on tour with Green Day.
We were hoping that they’d be a lot more bands after us that would have jumped through that window of opportunity, but they didn’t. So we just kept at it.
I think we kind of did our job and now you’ve got gay artists from the get-go.
Q – I know that in a previous interview, Brian, you talked about how you would like people who see you guys on stage to be inspired to be who they think they should be.
Welch – Yes, especially right now in the political climate and cultural climate that we’ve seen. You’ve seen pushback on both sides.
I think it’s important for us to be visible for anyone who is maybe growing up and feeling like they’re unaccepted for who they are. We hope that people who come to see us are inspired either for themselves or for their little brother or little sister.
If we reach that one kid, it’s all worth it.
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