#austinist

[jacmalloy]

Austin, Texas

[mytestdrive]

Patrik, Age 1.5 Film Review by Kat DeBoer

Patrik, Age 1.5  is a 2008 Swedish film written and directed by Ella Lemhagen. The film has been seen at film festivals across the globe and praised for its representation of the hardships a gay couple would face trying to fit in suburbia lifestyle. The couple are hoping to adopt a child but because of a clerical error, end up with 15 year old juvenile delinquent and homophobic Patrik instead of a baby.  The film is very loosely adapted from a stage performance piece by Michael Druker of the same name. Lemhagen uses some subtle and not so subtle examples throughout the film of internalized and institutionalized prejudice.

The film follows Göran and Sven Skoogh, a gay couple who have just moved into a new home and are hoping to make a life and family for themselves together. The neighborhood is what I would call an overly exaggerated for the sake of the film idealistic suburban lifestyle. The road is lined with cute little pastel painted houses filled with nuclear “normal” families. Sven and Göran and very much the outliers of this neighborhood. This point is made clear to the viewer in the opening scene of the film. Göran arrives to the neighborhood welcome party and is meeting his new neighbors for the first time. His neighbors introduce themselves and their wives to Göran than ask him “Where is your little lady?” Sven then arrives to the party and is introduced as Göran’s husband. There is visible tension and awkwardness amongst the neighbors at this point which is escalated when Göran announces that they will be adopting a child soon as well. Because a clerical error with the placement of a comma, the child instead of being Patrik age 1,5 ends up being Patrik age, 15.

Believing at first that there has been some sort of error and that there really is a one and a half year old baby named Patrik out there for them the couple agrees to take in Patrik until the adoption agency opens after the long weekend. The prescence of Patrik puts a serious strain on Göran and Sven’s relationship as they have different opinions on the idea of how to raise a child.Upon meeting with the adoption agency the couple soon learns that although they have been approved as fit for parenting and passed all the tests before you are allowed to adopt with flying colors no country will let them adopt a baby from them. The 15 year old Patrik in their possession is in fact the real Patrik as it was the only child they were allowed to adopt. Lemhagen based this part of the film off of an interview they did with the first swedish gay couple approved to adopt in 2010 and they had been waiting for a child for 7 years. This theme of the movie is a great way to show the viewer some of the institutionalized homophobia that goes on right under our noses.

Patrik is a homophobic 15 year old delinquent. He originally believes that Sven and Göran or possibly brothers living together but when he learns they are a gay couple he calls them pedophiles and fears they will try and rape him. Most of the films blatant homophobia comes from Patrik but there are other examples from the townspeople. The kids of their suburban neighborhood ride their bikes up and down in front of their house calling them homos and knock their mailbox over, Göran as a doctor is refused by patients, the couple aren’t invited by the men of their neighborhood to parties etc. I really appreciated as a viewer that there was no harsh violence on screen, some queer films I have watched previously have been quite violent. I understand is a cruel reality for some people in the LGBTQ community. But, seeing violence on screen can be triggering to some viewers who have experienced violence because of their sexuality before and can make the film inaccessible to them. The film tries to focus on the struggles of the characters from societal internalized homophobia.

As a piece of queer theatre I feel it is easy to give examples of out right homophobia such as these but the internalized feelings are much harder to portray successfully for an audience to understand. I think this is where Patrik, Age 1.5 really shines. One particular scene that stands out in my mind especially is when Göran , who is a medical doctor,  is giving immunizations to a group of school children in his clinic. The little boy who he is giving a shot to asks him “Is it true that you’re a homo?” the little boy is about 6 years old I would say. Göran replies that yes it is true, and the boy continues and asks what being a homo means. Göran replies that it is when you love another boy very much. The little boy looks surprised. His father then walks in enraged, saying if Göran every touches his son again he is dead. This scene shows the viewer that homophobia is usually taught at a young age from the parents, the little boy didn’t even know what the word homo meant he just knew it was bad because his father said so. His father probably learned this attitude from his father before him, it’s a vicious cycle. 

Although the movie touches on very serious topics and can be quite dark at times Lemhagen does so in a lighthearted story about finding love, whether it be in family or in a relationship that the viewer can’t help but want to follow to see if the characters get the happy ending they so desperately want. In doing so the viewer is forced to stare down the harsher realities of the film that happen. Overall I enjoyed the film and think it is a great introduction to queer film for a viewer who may not have seen anything like it before. I highly recommend Patrik Age, 1.5.

References

“Boys Beware Homosexuals Are On The Prowl ( For Adults Only).” Youtube, Inglewood Police Department , 1950, www.youtube.com/watch?v=MEBYc8oCGt8.

Wallace, Mike. The Homosexuals. Youtube, CBS, 1967, www.youtube.com/watch?v=TEWomEYWTlU.

“JUDY GARLAND: A GAY ICON DEFENDS HER GAY AUDIENCE, A RARE INTERVIEW.”Youtube, 13 Mar. 2010, www.youtube.com/watch?v=wauyHFqW0d8.

“AARP TV: Stonewall 40 Years Later.” AARP Media, 25 June 2009, www.youtube.com/watch?v=mTujTI8rGBg.

“50 Years of Theatre of the Ridiculous.” 50 Years of Theatre of the Ridiculous—Martin E Segal Theatre Center, New York City—May 15, 2017, Martin E. Segal Theatre Center, 15 May 2017, www.youtube.com/watch?v=93zlrj3X49Y.

Friedkin, William, director. The Boys in the Band. The Boys In The Band - Harold Arrives, Cinema Center Films, 1970, www.youtube.com/watch?v=zOakue0MiZs.

Wyler, William, director. The Children's Hour. The Children's Hour 1961 Coming out Scene, United Artists, 1961, www.youtube.com/watch?v=gbvfSGZzR9w.

Lemhagen , Ella, director. Patrik, Age 1.5. Sonet Film, 2008.

Chapman, Kamarie. “Queer Theater.” Understanding Plays. Bellingham, Washington.

Kaye, Helen. “Theater Review: 'Milk Milk Lemonade'.” The Jerusalem Post | JPost.com, 31 Dec. 0ADAD, www.jpost.com/Israel-News/Culture/Theater-review-Milk-Milk-Lemonade-372422.

Solomon, Dan. “Review: Milk Milk Lemonade at The Vortex [Theater].” Austinist, 13 Sept. 2013, 11:15 am, austinist.com/2010/09/13/review_milk_milk_lemonade_at_the_vo.php.

Daunton, Nichola. “MilkMilkLemonade – Ovalhouse, London.” Edited by John Roberts, The Reviews Hub, 12 Oct. 2014, www.thepublicreviews.com/milkmilklemonade-ovalhouse-london/.

Conkel, Joshua. MilkMilkLemonade, www.playscripts.com/play/1966.

Bauer, Gabrielle, director. Venus Boyz. Clockwise Productions, 2002.

Hart, Bobbi Jo, director. Rebels on Pointe. Icarus Films, 2017.

“Patrik, Age 1.5.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia Foundation, 11 Dec. 2017, en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrik,_Age_1.5.

[wheezer256]

TIL that James Gordon Wolcott killed his family with a .22 long-barrel in 1967. Found not guilty by reason of insanity, he was later released and is now a psychology professor and chair of the Behavioral Sciences department at Millikin University, going by the name James St. James. (austinist. via Pocket

[people-places-things-etc]

Texas-sized lightning by Jason Rodman Via Flickr: The Austin skyline takes a few direct hits on a hot summer night in Texas.

[chillypepperhothothot]

Halestorm_River City Rock Fest RCRF_38 by Jac Malloy Via Flickr: Bud Light River City Music Fest was held at the AT&T Center in San Antonio, Texas. Sunday, May 21, 2015.

[strutaustin]

Street Style : SxSw 2014

It is the Monday after SXSW weekend and we have been cruising around the web all day checking out the best street style from over the weekend. There are many beautiful and inspirational styles on display always but everyone really stepped it up this year. I really enjoyed the pictures taken by Derek Stout of the Austinist and picked a few for you to peep here. Make sure to visit their site and check out all the galleries!

[jacmalloy]

Lone Paddler

[herocious]

ALT LIT CAR WASH READING IN AUSTIN

During lunch at work I sit outside and use social media to promote the event. I tweet: I'm reading a tiny story aloud today at a car wash on MLK and Airport in Austin. Come say hi at 7pm :) I don't tell anyone I work with about the event, not even to make small talk in the copy room. At home I practice reading aloud the story I plan on sharing at the event. I delete words I don't like, then I delete entire sentences I don't like. When it feels bare enough I put books in my messenger bag, say goodbye to our dog and cat, and walk to the bus stop. On the bus the idling engine puts me to sleep. I don't salivate, which is surprising. The ringtone on my phone sounds faraway, insistent. I bounce back to reality. I dig in my messenger bag's side pocket. "Hey," I say. I say, "I'm on the bus, about to reach MLK." "Cool," you say. You say, "I'm by Wheatsville." "Have you passed it yet?" I say. "No," you say. "Can you get me some Guayaki?" I say. "Okay," you say. We discuss a meeting place. We decide on 21st and Guadalupe, the same corner with the Daniel Johnston alien frog. I get off the bus then cross Guadalupe. I stand in front of the famous graffiti and take a picture with me in it.

I take this picture because it happens to be consistent with the story I'm about to read aloud at a car wash. You call to say you're by the CVS. I walk north along the line of traffic until I find you driving our Honda. The Guayaki is cold. I drink it fast, bomb myself with caffeine and sugar and the magical powers of yerba mate. "Thank you," I say. "I also bought this t-shirt," you say, handing it to me. It's green and very soft. I want to smear my face in it. I want to see you in it. I feel focused. At a stoplight on MLK, heading east, you change your shirt. A few minutes later we take a right into a car wash. Alicia Fyne, the event organizer, is in her car in the far left bay, just like she said she would be. There are people packed into her car. You park off to the side, grab your Buddha's Brew Kombucha, and enter the world. I follow. We introduce ourselves to the people inside Alicia's car. They get out and, like that, SAD SAD SAD FEST in the far left bay of the car wash on the corner of MLK and Airport starts. We meet Alicia Fyne, Andrew Hilbert, Joseph Green, Cheryl Couture, No Glykon. There is beer. There are flasks of whiskey. In other bays at the car wash, people are washing their cars. A friend shows up: David Nguyen. Other people enter the far left bay, lean against the tiled walls, introduce themselves. It's fun. No one gives a shit. We're here to make something beautiful on our own terms, but I think that's always been how beauty gets made. Around 7pm Alicia corrals everyone to the area around her trunk. She introduces the event. Last month they read at a Taco Bell. This month a car wash. Next month, maybe, a cemetery. I'm the first to read. I stand up, set my messenger bag on Alicia's trunk. I may or may not thank Alicia for organizing this event, but I'm thankful. I say something about Tiny TOE Press, show one of our handpressed paperbacks. People seem to be listening. "I'm going to read something called Cardboard," I say. Then you start recording.

I sit down on the curb next to David Nguyen. He offers me some whiskey from his flask. I take a pull. "Tasty," I say. I say, "Thanks." "No problem," says David. "It's Canadian." Next to read is Cheryl Couture.

Cheryl sits down on the curb to give everyone a chance to recover from their laughter. It takes awhile. I put my hoodie on because it's in the lower 50s. It feels good to be laughing in the cold with other people. Next to read is Andrew Hilbert of SlagDrop.

This event starts to feel like it's all times happening at once. Against my will, I think about the meaning of this event. Taking something that's done in private and, usually, consumed in private, i.e. writing and reading, and bringing it to a car wash, where people come to clean their cars, not to write our read. In search of meaning where there's no meaning: a pitfall, a character flaw. David Nguyen takes his flask out. You drink some just to taste it, and I take another pull. Next to read is No Glykon of Reality Hands.

I watch someone put their car in reverse then realign it into the bay. Another person smacks their doormats against the concrete. Soapy mist blows out of the farthest bay. To hold a reading where you least expect it. To hold a reading where it doesn't fit in. Is this a tribute to freedom? to doing what you want? Again: searching for meaning where there's no meaning. Next to read is Joseph Green.

Behind me I hear people ordering from Popeye's. Someone driving by wonders what's happening at the car wash. It's a non-exclusive event. Come listen if you want. You accidentally pause the recording then start it back up again.

And last to read is Alicia Fyne of wait...what?, which is actually the name of this monthly reading series, not SAD SAD SAD FEST. I look to my right, then to my left. I look behind me. People still seem to be listening.

The spell of words takes awhile to wear off. Then, it does, and that's it. People huddle to socialize, congratulate, followed by minor dispersal. We say thank you, goodbye, thank you, and plan on seeing most of them Saturday night at SlagDrop's release party. Inside our Honda, it's quiet until we start talking.ious

[chacal-la-chaise]

Fair Sailing Tall Boy by Steve Hopson on Flickr.

Erased.

[elizs]

Man, I was snarky in 2006.

[sarahmvasquez]

Austinist: Put 'Em Pencils Up: Behind The Quick Draw Photo Booth

Here's a feature I did for Austinist. I wanted to write about this guy for awhile, so I'm glad Austinist snatch this up. Of course, the day I submitted the article, there was an editor shake-up so we'll see if I stay. I'm working like crazy at the radio station, so that's where most of my time and energy goes anyway. I'm a little rusty from my little journalism break after graduation, so I really need all the practice I can get.

Put 'Em Pencils Up: Behind The Quick Draw Photo Booth

Quick Draw Photo Booth is not just a photo booth. People do get their photos online, but they also get photos hand-drawn by Aron Taylor. And while that is happening, there's a weird character interacting with them.

Click here to read the rest at Austinist.

[fuckyeahdecemberists]

TheDecemberists2 by Eric Uhlir on Flickr.

[jacmalloy]

Guitars & Amps

[sargenthouse]

Austinist Interview with Teri Gender Bender & Omar Rodriguez Lopez of Bosnian Rainbows

The mythology of At the Drive-In is wrapped up in bodies. The work of performance, the spontaneity of movement, the ferocious activity of channeling emotion into sound: their frenetic creativity brought these ideas to life and is now best preserved in clips that show off Cedric Bixler-Zavala’s howl and Omar Rodríguez-López’s throwing off guitar in favor of tambourine. In addition to the video archive, this corporeal energy is ever evolving through the projects the group spawned, generating a timeline littered with friendships and failures most recently embraced by Bosnian Rainbows -- the result of what happens when one protagonist of the above mythology meets a woman with an even greater passion for moving intensely.

Rodríguez-López first saw Teresa Suarez (who performs as Teri Gender Bender) at a venue in Guadalajara where her band, Le Butcherettes, took the stage even as a power outage had convinced other artists to cancel the show. Now, having produced and toured two albums as Le Butcherettes, they’ve reformed and come together with Nicci Kasper (Kudu, KRS-ONE), Deantoni Parks (John Cale, The Mars Volta) to define a new and all-encompassing aesthetic as Bosnian Rainbows.

You’re on a break from the tour at the moment. Where are you all staying?

Omar Rodríguez-López: We’ve all been living together in a small house, out in California by the ocean.

And have you been working there, rehearsing there, or working on new material?

Not really, just mostly on the time that we do have off, we just have communal living time. We have communal living time without the prospect of enterprise, or expression in that sense. We move around a lot together -- we did some time in El Paso, and Hamburg, Germany, and now this, because we’re here in California and we rented this little house. And so we just have a conversation, a communal conversation at 9AM, about what’s happening in the world, news topics, like 9 to 10 AM. We all cook breakfast together. We went into a long stretch where we were only eating broccoli and garlic and onion, only that. Then we went through a couple days where we all fasted together. And then movies at night time and then exercise and stuff, like midday, before it gets really hot. And then variations of that schedule, as well.

It sounds really idyllic. I wonder if you’re aiming to figure out this practical way of living as a family with your friends?

Actually, that’s definitely the results of it, but again, it’s just an ideal way of living. You know, a higher standard of living, cause for me the high standard of living is not whether I have a lot of things, it’s like, whether I’m eating right. And what ideas are being put into my head. Basically whatever’s coming in, because all that stuff has to go out and it’s what we’re feeding our minds and our spirits with. So, luckily -- or by design, actually -- this group is comprised of people who all have very similar dietary beliefs, political beliefs, and moral beliefs. And so, that makes it easy to live together, but also, it makes it desirable to do that, because what else would we be doing, you know? And so it’s like, if you hang out with someone who just wants to poison themselves and buy into media culture and mass marketing and all this stuff, it’s like, you have a great relationship and a great connection, but at some point, when you get to a certain level, it’s strained, because one day they want to go to some corporate place to eat, and you’re concerned about whether the food that’s being put in your body has been genetically modified, or what the nutritional intake is, like, whether it benefits your body or not. So, it’s sort of, that type of thing, it’s a very strong belief in, like, how exactly you want to live your life.

And you feel like you’ve found a group of people who share these beliefs? And you’re able to build upon and understand them together?

Oh yeah, without a doubt. I mean, that’s why this group of people were put together. It’s like, we all have the same passions, we all have similar or the same tastes in music, painting, fashion, art, film, humor, sports. You know, everything you can think of, you know. Of course, I always like debate, but in terms of those things as individual concepts for, you know, how a human being is supposed to survive in this day and age of utter consumption, you know, we have similar concepts.

How does your ability to interact with and improve one another affect the way that you interact with other people as you travel around the world?

Oh, it affects everything. That’s a great question, I mean, because, god, no one’s even ever asked that. I mean, everything depends on that: the more compassion you can have for obviously your immediate family, but most of all people forget, like, the more compassion you can have for yourself, like not being hard on yourself, and believing in yourself, and feeling that you are worthy of, you know, good food and good sleep, and a good environment -- the more compassion that you have just in general, the higher you raise can that compassion level, the more that you see it everywhere you go. When you go on tour, there’s all sorts of characters out there, you know? Different types of people with different agendas and different ways of living coming at you, and you want to be able to share ideas and express yourself. We’ve worked on knowing what’s essential to us, and so when we talk to other people in the world we can exchange all that knowledge. and share those ideas with anyone that’s interested, you know?

You’ve talked in the past about being really taken with Teri’s ability to incorporate failure into her art, to almost use that failure as the art form itself. How have you seen that evolve in working with her?

Well, you know, I think that was already so strong in her that it was more than a question of how I’d seen it evolve in her. It was a question of how I saw it evolve in myself, you know. At least for me it’s that same thing about sharing ideas. Not in a preacher way, or a soap box way, but just by being, you know, like the best possible. It’s just by living and treating people a certain way, and being a certain way. Just being around her and seeing the way that she handles, you know, failures or criticisms, or interactions. It awakened this whole other thing in me, like this whole other way of seeing those things. And to see something in action in someone else, there’s no better way to actually take something in or learn something. It’s much better than you reading in a book, or it being explained to you, or something like that, you know.

At Fun Fun Fun Fest back in Austin this fall, you missed your first time slot and were rescheduled. But the surprise of the rescheduling made it really exciting. The audience had this, “Oh! They did make it after all!” sort of feeling. What was that like from the performer side?

Well, we were on our way to Austin and our van broke down. And so we actually missed our slot, and so we thought we weren’t gonna be able to play, and we went to Austin anyways because, you know, we have friends there. So we went anyways and then the people from the festival said, hey we had a cancellation, there's a slot and so we said sure of course, so then we just went and we played. And it’s a good example of something that could be seen as a failure: if you have this thing that's scheduled, and you're supposed to do your part and show up but then, the van broke down. And so you failed to meet your end of the bargain to show up, and you're like 'oh man, we missed that', and so you missed an opportunity. For somebody else that might be the end of the world, “oh we missed the opportunity to play”. But we just said 'oh the van broke down that's what happened, so let's just go watch a movie anyways'. So we drove the extra five hours or whatever, just so we could go hang out with them and watch a movie. And through not worrying or not obsessing about it and not even seeing it as a failure, this whole other avenue opened up. And we were there, had we turned around we would not have even been there. We were there to be able to say 'oh sure we can play that spot'. And we went and we played without thinking whether people understood or not who was supposed to be playing or what happened to the original act that was scheduled. And it was cool you know, it was like a great example of the whole failure thing, because I thought it was like the best show of that leg of the tour.

The way that you talk about a lot of this, you’re referring to almost a movement or a revolution in the way that you conceive of yourself in relation to your art and to the rest of the world. And, I wonder, maybe if you're not even referring to a large scale kind of revolution, do you think of it as something very radical and something very necessary to pursue?

Oh, I think of it as something absolutely necessary. I think of it as the only thing that keeps me away from death. And, a revolution, yes, but only in the terms of the only revolution that truly matters, which is a personal revolution. All throughout history we see revolutionaries but they're only tyrants. As soon as they get any kind of power they become just as bad as the people that they overthrew. And so, when you read about those things it just seems like the personal revolution has to happen first. And, it's a much more attainable goal, and a much more important one, because what would you believe in if you hadn't figured out those things. I'm thirty six now and I feel like I’ve barely just entered my body. I've just become aware of my body and myself as a person. And, so that personal revolution is exactly right. That's everything. Your mind, and your body, and what's coming in. It's so important. And not buying into the madness of the time that we live in. I'm not against anything I’m just for the individual, especially the individual that wants to form part of a collective of a larger society. But you can't do it without that individual realizing his place or without a place in that society. And on a larger scale obviously, with all sort of movements that have happened-with the digital revolution, occupy wall street, occupy this, occupy that, someone should just occupy their mind first. Because I haven't occupied my mind my whole life and I have an idea of the preconceived notions that have been handed to me through conditioning and culture and society. And I’m just barely at thirty six just getting to a place where I’m starting to occupy my mind and my body and starting to become aware of things.

Speaking of minds and bodies, Teri, you’ve talked a lot about how the early songs for Le Butcherettes were written when you were 17 and sort of angsty. As those feelings have changed and you’ve grown, have you seen those changes reflected in your movements on stage?

Teri Gender Bender: Yeah so, I was very little and very angry because my father had died and we never really ever got to say goodbye. We left off on very bad terms and I felt very selfish. And so I was very angry. We moved to Mexico. I didn't want to go back because I didn’t write Spanish very well and there was a lot of anger that came across on the first songs. But now we are growing, and I realize that my problems are not real problems. Yeah, I lost my father, so what? A lot of people go through lots of things every single day. And they're not angry, they try to make the best out of it, so I think I have the opportunity to not worry so much. We're traveling, we're eating really good stuff. I started doing yoga. I never in my life thought I would ever do yoga, and it's great. You stretch and sweat and just appreciate the people in our lives, instead of obsessing over, "Oh, what could have been, what could have happened." I'm in love with life, and I love my mother and my little brothers, and so, music is a great expression for when you're angry or in love. So when I'm moving on stage, I still feel like sometimes like I have the blessing of being able to just be in a trance. Other people work out, there in a trance, and they're in their head. For me being up there and being able to move around without really knowing what I'm doing. It's like I'm free, I'm being able to tap into my father in a way. Yeah, it sucks, but I also have a blessing of being able to just be in my trance and think of my dad and life is very short and we're not gonna be here forever.

You had told that story about your school uniform, and how you wanted to wear pants and they wouldn't let you, and instead you took that school uniform on stage and then were able to take control of it and put your own message behind that. Now, when you're performing as Bosnian Rainbow, what's the role of the clothes that you choose to wear or the way you decide to present yourself?

I guess right now, I've stopped caring. What do I mean by that? That I'm not trying to limit myself anymore. Because, before, well, I think I was born with an OCD, where I'm always organizing, and I can't help myself. Like when someone eats something, I have to go after them and clean-up and right now I'm trying to work on that. And the first way to do that is with music. I love writing music and I should just stop trying to organize it and see what should fit into what. That's what producers are for. I'm trying to get away from the theme of it. Because, when I was very little, I swore to myself I was always gonna wear an apron spattered in blood, I'm always gonna have meat on my head, because the meat represents how women are seen in Mexico. But, you know what? I've been through that, And I don't feel like that anymore, I don't relate to the 17 year old that I was. And its only been what? Five years? People change so much with time. And right now I don't feel like I have anything to prove anymore, in terms of life. Life is too short. I wanna sometimes go on stage with no make-up, and jeans, and a shirt. Life is too short to put myself in this box of limitations. Don't get me wrong, back then it worked for me. Back then that was part of my, I don't know what the word is, ...process. It was part of my discovery, but now I'm like "OK, I don't need to limit myself anymore." I just want to enjoy the simple things. I'm sorry if I keep repeating myself. I'm just trying to understand myself as well, you know?

Can you pick out the differences between working on Le Butcherettes and working on Bosnian Rainbows?

Yeah definitely. Well, I miss Lia [Braswell]. She’s basically the same age as me. Right now on Bosnian Rainbows, I'm constantly looking up to Deantoni and Nicci and Omar, because they’ve been on the road so much longer than I have. So it’s like I’m always in school. I'm always writing about other music that I've never even heard of, because I wasn't alive at the time. And even when I started the band, it was me learning with someone. Like me and my best friend at the time, we were growing together. But I'm learning a lot, like from teachers, because, well, I look up to them so much. Not that I don't look up to Lia, don't get me wrong. I look up to her too, but we both have so much to learn. We're like sisters, and with them, it’s like they’re uncles.

So do you think of a day when you and Lia will work together again? Like after you've sort of gone though these types of schools and you've done these types of challenging things apart from each other?

Oh, definitely. We're still writing songs; when we're not together we email each other music. It's just on pause right now, because I’m doing Bosnian Rainbows, but our plans for touring together are in the very near future. But again, like you mentioned, it's hard to be apart. Even though it's so great having this family unit, sometimes I realize that I still have these other parts of my life. I'm like, "Oh! I forgot to call my mother, and I forgot to call Lia!” So, I’m working on being better about thinking about both families.

[bosnianrainbows]

The Austinist Interview with Teri Gender Bender & Omar Rodriguez Lopez

The mythology of At the Drive-In is wrapped up in bodies. The work of performance, the spontaneity of movement, the ferocious activity of channeling emotion into sound: their frenetic creativity brought these ideas to life and is now best preserved in clips that show off Cedric Bixler-Zavala’s howl and Omar Rodríguez-López’s throwing off guitar in favor of tambourine. In addition to the video archive, this corporeal energy is ever evolving through the projects the group spawned, generating a timeline littered with friendships and failures most recently embraced by Bosnian Rainbows -- the result of what happens when one protagonist of the above mythology meets a woman with an even greater passion for moving intensely.

Rodríguez-López first saw Teresa Suarez (who performs as Teri Gender Bender) at a venue in Guadalajara where her band, Le Butcherettes, took the stage even as a power outage had convinced other artists to cancel the show. Now, having produced and toured two albums as Le Butcherettes, they’ve reformed and come together with Nicci Kasper (Kudu, KRS-ONE), Deantoni Parks (John Cale, The Mars Volta) to define a new and all-encompassing aesthetic as Bosnian Rainbows.

You’re on a break from the tour at the moment. Where are you all staying?

Omar Rodríguez-López: We’ve all been living together in a small house, out in California by the ocean.

And have you been working there, rehearsing there, or working on new material?

Not really, just mostly on the time that we do have off, we just have communal living time. We have communal living time without the prospect of enterprise, or expression in that sense. We move around a lot together -- we did some time in El Paso, and Hamburg, Germany, and now this, because we’re here in California and we rented this little house. And so we just have a conversation, a communal conversation at 9AM, about what’s happening in the world, news topics, like 9 to 10 AM. We all cook breakfast together. We went into a long stretch where we were only eating broccoli and garlic and onion, only that. Then we went through a couple days where we all fasted together. And then movies at night time and then exercise and stuff, like midday, before it gets really hot. And then variations of that schedule, as well.

It sounds really idyllic. I wonder if you’re aiming to figure out this practical way of living as a family with your friends?

Actually, that’s definitely the results of it, but again, it’s just an ideal way of living. You know, a higher standard of living, cause for me the high standard of living is not whether I have a lot of things, it’s like, whether I’m eating right. And what ideas are being put into my head. Basically whatever’s coming in, because all that stuff has to go out and it’s what we’re feeding our minds and our spirits with. So, luckily -- or by design, actually -- this group is comprised of people who all have very similar dietary beliefs, political beliefs, and moral beliefs. And so, that makes it easy to live together, but also, it makes it desirable to do that, because what else would we be doing, you know? And so it’s like, if you hang out with someone who just wants to poison themselves and buy into media culture and mass marketing and all this stuff, it’s like, you have a great relationship and a great connection, but at some point, when you get to a certain level, it’s strained, because one day they want to go to some corporate place to eat, and you’re concerned about whether the food that’s being put in your body has been genetically modified, or what the nutritional intake is, like, whether it benefits your body or not. So, it’s sort of, that type of thing, it’s a very strong belief in, like, how exactly you want to live your life.

And you feel like you’ve found a group of people who share these beliefs? And you’re able to build upon and understand them together?

Oh yeah, without a doubt. I mean, that’s why this group of people were put together. It’s like, we all have the same passions, we all have similar or the same tastes in music, painting, fashion, art, film, humor, sports. You know, everything you can think of, you know. Of course, I always like debate, but in terms of those things as individual concepts for, you know, how a human being is supposed to survive in this day and age of utter consumption, you know, we have similar concepts.

How does your ability to interact with and improve one another affect the way that you interact with other people as you travel around the world?

Oh, it affects everything. That’s a great question, I mean, because, god, no one’s even ever asked that. I mean, everything depends on that: the more compassion you can have for obviously your immediate family, but most of all people forget, like, the more compassion you can have for yourself, like not being hard on yourself, and believing in yourself, and feeling that you are worthy of, you know, good food and good sleep, and a good environment -- the more compassion that you have just in general, the higher you raise can that compassion level, the more that you see it everywhere you go. When you go on tour, there’s all sorts of characters out there, you know? Different types of people with different agendas and different ways of living coming at you, and you want to be able to share ideas and express yourself. We’ve worked on knowing what’s essential to us, and so when we talk to other people in the world we can exchange all that knowledge. and share those ideas with anyone that’s interested, you know?

You’ve talked in the past about being really taken with Teri’s ability to incorporate failure into her art, to almost use that failure as the art form itself. How have you seen that evolve in working with her?

Well, you know, I think that was already so strong in her that it was more than a question of how I’d seen it evolve in her. It was a question of how I saw it evolve in myself, you know. At least for me it’s that same thing about sharing ideas. Not in a preacher way, or a soap box way, but just by being, you know, like the best possible. It’s just by living and treating people a certain way, and being a certain way. Just being around her and seeing the way that she handles, you know, failures or criticisms, or interactions. It awakened this whole other thing in me, like this whole other way of seeing those things. And to see something in action in someone else, there’s no better way to actually take something in or learn something. It’s much better than you reading in a book, or it being explained to you, or something like that, you know.

At Fun Fun Fun Fest back in Austin this fall, you missed your first time slot and were rescheduled. But the surprise of the rescheduling made it really exciting. The audience had this, “Oh! They did make it after all!” sort of feeling. What was that like from the performer side?

Well, we were on our way to Austin and our van broke down. And so we actually missed our slot, and so we thought we weren’t gonna be able to play, and we went to Austin anyways because, you know, we have friends there. So we went anyways and then the people from the festival said, hey we had a cancellation, there's a slot and so we said sure of course, so then we just went and we played. And it’s a good example of something that could be seen as a failure: if you have this thing that's scheduled, and you're supposed to do your part and show up but then, the van broke down. And so you failed to meet your end of the bargain to show up, and you're like 'oh man, we missed that', and so you missed an opportunity. For somebody else that might be the end of the world, “oh we missed the opportunity to play”. But we just said 'oh the van broke down that's what happened, so let's just go watch a movie anyways'. So we drove the extra five hours or whatever, just so we could go hang out with them and watch a movie. And through not worrying or not obsessing about it and not even seeing it as a failure, this whole other avenue opened up. And we were there, had we turned around we would not have even been there. We were there to be able to say 'oh sure we can play that spot'. And we went and we played without thinking whether people understood or not who was supposed to be playing or what happened to the original act that was scheduled. And it was cool you know, it was like a great example of the whole failure thing, because I thought it was like the best show of that leg of the tour.

The way that you talk about a lot of this, you’re referring to almost a movement or a revolution in the way that you conceive of yourself in relation to your art and to the rest of the world. And, I wonder, maybe if you're not even referring to a large scale kind of revolution, do you think of it as something very radical and something very necessary to pursue?

Oh, I think of it as something absolutely necessary. I think of it as the only thing that keeps me away from death. And, a revolution, yes, but only in the terms of the only revolution that truly matters, which is a personal revolution. All throughout history we see revolutionaries but they're only tyrants. As soon as they get any kind of power they become just as bad as the people that they overthrew. And so, when you read about those things it just seems like the personal revolution has to happen first. And, it's a much more attainable goal, and a much more important one, because what would you believe in if you hadn't figured out those things. I'm thirty six now and I feel like I’ve barely just entered my body. I've just become aware of my body and myself as a person. And, so that personal revolution is exactly right. That's everything. Your mind, and your body, and what's coming in. It's so important. And not buying into the madness of the time that we live in. I'm not against anything I’m just for the individual, especially the individual that wants to form part of a collective of a larger society. But you can't do it without that individual realizing his place or without a place in that society. And on a larger scale obviously, with all sort of movements that have happened-with the digital revolution, occupy wall street, occupy this, occupy that, someone should just occupy their mind first. Because I haven't occupied my mind my whole life and I have an idea of the preconceived notions that have been handed to me through conditioning and culture and society. And I’m just barely at thirty six just getting to a place where I’m starting to occupy my mind and my body and starting to become aware of things.

Speaking of minds and bodies, Teri, you’ve talked a lot about how the early songs for Le Butcherettes were written when you were 17 and sort of angsty. As those feelings have changed and you’ve grown, have you seen those changes reflected in your movements on stage?

Teri Gender Bender: Yeah so, I was very little and very angry because my father had died and we never really ever got to say goodbye. We left off on very bad terms and I felt very selfish. And so I was very angry. We moved to Mexico. I didn't want to go back because I didn’t write Spanish very well and there was a lot of anger that came across on the first songs. But now we are growing, and I realize that my problems are not real problems. Yeah, I lost my father, so what? A lot of people go through lots of things every single day. And they're not angry, they try to make the best out of it, so I think I have the opportunity to not worry so much. We're traveling, we're eating really good stuff. I started doing yoga. I never in my life thought I would ever do yoga, and it's great. You stretch and sweat and just appreciate the people in our lives, instead of obsessing over, "Oh, what could have been, what could have happened." I'm in love with life, and I love my mother and my little brothers, and so, music is a great expression for when you're angry or in love. So when I'm moving on stage, I still feel like sometimes like I have the blessing of being able to just be in a trance. Other people work out, there in a trance, and they're in their head. For me being up there and being able to move around without really knowing what I'm doing. It's like I'm free, I'm being able to tap into my father in a way. Yeah, it sucks, but I also have a blessing of being able to just be in my trance and think of my dad and life is very short and we're not gonna be here forever.

You had told that story about your school uniform, and how you wanted to wear pants and they wouldn't let you, and instead you took that school uniform on stage and then were able to take control of it and put your own message behind that. Now, when you're performing as Bosnian Rainbow, what's the role of the clothes that you choose to wear or the way you decide to present yourself?

I guess right now, I've stopped caring. What do I mean by that? That I'm not trying to limit myself anymore. Because, before, well, I think I was born with an OCD, where I'm always organizing, and I can't help myself. Like when someone eats something, I have to go after them and clean-up and right now I'm trying to work on that. And the first way to do that is with music. I love writing music and I should just stop trying to organize it and see what should fit into what. That's what producers are for. I'm trying to get away from the theme of it. Because, when I was very little, I swore to myself I was always gonna wear an apron spattered in blood, I'm always gonna have meat on my head, because the meat represents how women are seen in Mexico. But, you know what? I've been through that, And I don't feel like that anymore, I don't relate to the 17 year old that I was. And its only been what? Five years? People change so much with time. And right now I don't feel like I have anything to prove anymore, in terms of life. Life is too short. I wanna sometimes go on stage with no make-up, and jeans, and a shirt. Life is too short to put myself in this box of limitations. Don't get me wrong, back then it worked for me. Back then that was part of my, I don't know what the word is, ...process. It was part of my discovery, but now I'm like "OK, I don't need to limit myself anymore." I just want to enjoy the simple things. I'm sorry if I keep repeating myself. I'm just trying to understand myself as well, you know?

Can you pick out the differences between working on Le Butcherettes and working on Bosnian Rainbows?

Yeah definitely. Well, I miss Lia [Braswell]. She’s basically the same age as me. Right now on Bosnian Rainbows, I'm constantly looking up to Deantoni and Nicci and Omar, because they’ve been on the road so much longer than I have. So it’s like I’m always in school. I'm always writing about other music that I've never even heard of, because I wasn't alive at the time. And even when I started the band, it was me learning with someone. Like me and my best friend at the time, we were growing together. But I'm learning a lot, like from teachers, because, well, I look up to them so much. Not that I don't look up to Lia, don't get me wrong. I look up to her too, but we both have so much to learn. We're like sisters, and with them, it’s like they’re uncles.

So do you think of a day when you and Lia will work together again? Like after you've sort of gone though these types of schools and you've done these types of challenging things apart from each other?

Oh, definitely. We're still writing songs; when we're not together we email each other music. It's just on pause right now, because I’m doing Bosnian Rainbows, but our plans for touring together are in the very near future. But again, like you mentioned, it's hard to be apart. Even though it's so great having this family unit, sometimes I realize that I still have these other parts of my life. I'm like, "Oh! I forgot to call my mother, and I forgot to call Lia!” So, I’m working on being better about thinking about both families.