Pansy Division at The Eagle

In a story that's become increasingly common over the past few years, San Francisco's famous Eagle Tavern is facing closure at the end of this month due to landlord issues. The leather bar has not only been a cultural hot spot for decades, it's also a fantastic music venue, where Thursday night lineups of bands like Pansy Division, Kelley Stoltz, Carletta Sue Kay and The Fresh & Onlys bring hoardes of gay and straight fans to the bar.

Though last night there was a huge gathering of support inside The Eagle to discuss the issues at hand and find out if anything can save the bar, it heartbreakingly appears there is really nothing to be done; the landlord has decided he wants to open his own bar on the premisis.

The final Thursday night show at The Eagle will be April 28 and will include Oxbow, The Hellenes (ex- Rain Parade) and The Liar Script. No doubt it will also be a huge goodbye party for one of SF and the world's most iconic gay bars.

Jon Ginoli is the beloved founder and lead singer of the revolutionary gay rock band Pansy Division. He has recently completed a book about his experience, Deflowered: My Life in Pansy Division, which is available now! To celebrate, Jon will be embarking on a book tour, crossing America and hitting everywhere in between! Check out the dates here. There will be a veritable blitz of Pansy Division in the coming months! Their 7" single "Average Men" is out now and features Jello Biafra; the band also has a full length album called That's So Gay to come very soon AND the release of a documentary about the band-- Pansy Division: Life in a Gay Rock Band. Information about screenings of the film can be found here. Following the book tour, Pansy Division will be touring as well! Dates will be up soon on their official website. Read on to learn more about Jon's fabled career, PD's future plans and what to expect from his book tour dates. For a past interview Jon and I did click here.


Miss Ess: How did this book come about?

Jon Ginoli: Over the years I'd tell people stories about my experiences with the band, and it was often suggested that I should write a book. Eventually, I did. I worked on it on and off for a long time before making a final push to get it done.

As typically seems to be the case with any published "best of" music list, not everyone agreed with the recent Top 100 Gayest Albums of All Time compiled by Out Magazine, which was Amoeblogged about here on September 6th. After reading over this list many disagreed with numerous entries, suggesting certain additions and/or deletions. Most did agree however that Out Magazine's Top 100 list, based on a survey by the respected gay publication of 100 gay music authorities, was a pretty darn good list, albeit not perfect.

"There are a lot of omissions including The Cure, Nina Hagen, a ton more disco artists -- and of more recent artists Basement Jaxx and Miss Kittin" was an Amoeblog comment posted by A.D.Depp.  "It seemed to be a little hipster heavy. It seemed like it missed many gay iconic artists," critiqued Amoeblogger Gomez Comes Alive. Meanwhile Larry Bob of the SFQueer.com website, who updates the exhaustive dally Queer things to do in the San Francisco Bay Area list,  posted this comment to the Amoeblog, "No Pansy Division? Ridiculous. At least they managed to get Team Dresch and Fifth Column to rep the queercore. Also no Tribe 8."

The SFQueer.com webmaster is absolutely right, especially about Pansy Division (pictured above and whom FYI are the number one most popular act, by a landslide, in this Amoeblogay music survey series, which runs over the next few days).  In fact, besides lacking in the queercore department the Out Magazine Top 100 albums list also displayed a glaring lack of any so-called homo-hop from artists such as the Bay Area's Deep Dickollectivelike  (DDC), whose song "Straighttrippin' (feat. Doug E)" from their album BourgieBohoPostPomoAfroHomo was featured on the Independent Sounds: Amoeba Music Compilation Vol. III -- another omission that the ever astute Larry Bob also noted.

The Bay Area's own Pansy Division are the stars of a new documentary chronicling their blood, sweat and tears as one of the country's first out queer rock bands. The title of the film is, appropriately, Pansy Division: Life in a Gay Rock Band. It will have its first US festival screening this Thursday, June 26 at 7pm at the Victoria Theater as part of this year's Frameline LGBT Film Festival. For more info on the screening click here.

The film was created out of older footage and recent band member interviews and was directed by Michael Carmona. Bass player Chris Freeman has a film degree and was the editor of the film! I spoke to band member Jon Ginoli about it and he related that the documentary is "an outsider's perspective with insider's access." 

The band will be in attendance at the screening and there will be an afterparty at the fabulous Eagle Tavern, where Pansy Division will perform!