Queercore

(Joey Miller, a k a P Gargoyle, f k a Joanne Norris, drummer for the Injections as well as Noise 292 and Everybody Violet, explores the sexual cultures of the San Diego scene.)

Detail: Annotated Injections flyer (collection Joey Miller)In 1979, when I started playing drums in the Injections, I was just another white working-class kid who happened to be a sailor who had landed in San Diego.

The music that we were playing really had no particular label, but we did end up somehow landing in the punk genre, which was awesome. My friend recently saw the picture of us that is on the blog and commented that we all “looked like a middle-class kids.” We were not wearing leather, safety pins, ripped shirts, colored hair and spikes … There was none of that. I had 501s on and a lesbian baby butch mullet.

I was also in the Navy. and it was about the time that I had just come out of “the closet.” I was underage, so going to any clubs took some tricky business to accomplish. I could drink on the base (some watered-down beer with other underage sailors, which was as exciting as listening to a foghorn).

I felt isolated and alone and had a propensity toward off-the-wall music. I had been weaned on Lou Reed, David Bowie, Mott the Hoople and George Clinton, to name a few, but had just come from 18 months of subjection to the Armed Forces Radio and Television Network. I had just come to San Diego a few months before after being stationed in Puerto Rico for 18 months.

Coming to San Diego was bittersweet. I loved Puerto Rico, the food, the ocean and El Junque, the rain forest that was about 20 minutes from the base. I loved Old San Juan and the pace of the island. Fast-forward and I meet [future Injections bassist] Lisa [Acid] and through my meeting with her, I meet Lou [Skum] and Bruce [Perreault]. We begin playing, and we have a great PR person in Lou, who I think got us all of our shows (minus the one next to the Brass Rail, which I organized).

Being young and gay in the military in San Diego in the late ’70s was rough, and finding the music crowd made it so much more manageable. I was wearing so many hats during that time, as were my counterparts. Trying to find other queer punks was a bit hard, since everyone I think at that time was either just out or coming out due to the ages we all were.

I also think it was hard for some to come out to people they had grown up with, and one person that we knew was actually “kicked out” of a band for being gay. My own experience was that at times my queerness was tolerated, and there were times when it was clearly something someone wanted to target me for. These incidents were few and far between, but those few incidents left an impression on me. I felt that San Diego became dangerous in and out of the music scene for queers in the ’80s. The rise of the skinheads correlated with a rise in hate crimes, in my opinion. It took me meeting my friend 3D (Dan), who was a gay skinhead, to realize that “skinhead” did not equate to fascist hate monger queer-basher.

It was great to see as the years went on a vibrant scene of queer musicians and artists that collectively began making a scene called Queercore. I know that my time playing with Noise 292, we had our own mini Queercore. We played at the CLUB, a lesbian bar (now the Casbah); Matthew [Rothenberg] was able to meet one of the most prominent gay activists in Tijuana; and all my bandmates were privy to the various cultures (leather and kink) within the queer community due to their open-mindedness. One male band mate donned a skirt for a performance, and all was right with the world.

— Joey Miller

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