leisha hailey, sx news, katrina fox journalist sydney

<html> <head><script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/bundle-playback.js?v=HxkREWBo" charset="utf-8"></script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/wombat.js?v=txqj7nKC" charset="utf-8"></script> <script>window.RufflePlayer=window.RufflePlayer||{};window.RufflePlayer.config={"autoplay":"on","unmuteOverlay":"hidden"};</script> <script type="text/javascript" src="/_static/js/ruffle/ruffle.js"></script> <script type="text/javascript"> __wm.init("https://web.archive.org/web"); __wm.wombat("http://www.katrinafox.com:80/jaynecounty.htm","20060905194411","https://web.archive.org/","web","/_static/", "1157485451"); </script> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/_static/css/banner-styles.css?v=S1zqJCYt" /> <link rel="stylesheet" type="text/css" href="/_static/css/iconochive.css?v=3PDvdIFv" />  <title>leisha hailey, sx news, katrina fox journalist sydney</title> <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=iso-8859-1"> <meta name="" content="lily tomlin, sx news, katrina fox journalist sydney"> <meta name="keywords" content="john waters, sx news, katrina fox journalist sydney"> <meta name="description" content="There was no big coming-out for Lily Tomlin."> </head> <body bgcolor="#FFFFFF" text="#000000" vlink="#FF0033" alink="#3300FF"> <table width="99%" border="0" height="424"> <tr> <td width="77%" valign="top" align="center" height="1521"> <table width="100%" border="0" height="156"> <tr> <td width="80%" height="165" valign="top"> <h2 align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><a name="top"></a>Complete and Utter County</font></h2> <h4 align="center"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">First published in SX News, 24 August, 2006</font></h4> <h4 align="center"><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">©Katrina Fox 2006</font></h4> <h3 align="center"> </h3> </td> <td width="20%" height="165" valign="top"> <p><img src="/web/20060905194411im_/http://www.katrinafox.com/SXdivacover.jpg" width="109" height="135" border="1"><br> <font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><b>©SX News 2006</b></font> </p> </td> </tr> </table> <p align="left"><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><b>Legendary transgender punk rock pioneer Jayne County went up against Gene Simmons of Kiss recently - and won. She spoke with Katrina Fox.</b></font></p> <p align="left"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">When rock star Gene Simmons from Kiss announced on his reality TV show, Gene Simmons: Family Jewels a couple of weeks ago that his son Nick's new band would be called The Electric Chairs, he obviously didn't anticipate protest letters, phone lines to the show jammed, and even death threats. Blondie frontwoman Debbie Harry joined in the outcry, along with Chrissie Hynde, Boy George, Ru Paul and a slew of people from the downtown East Village scene in New York. The reason? Simmons was attempting to co-opt the name of Jayne County's band from the '70s - known then as Wayne County and The Electric Chairs before her transition to Jayne.<br> <br> One of the original stars of John Vaccaro's Playhouse of the Ridiculous - New York's queer, political glam-punk-glitter theatre of the late 1960s - along with Patti Smith and Warhol superstars Penny Arcade, Jackie Curtis and Candy Darling, County made her music debut in 1972, before taking the US and British punk scene by storm with hits such as 'Goddess of Wet Dreams' and her signature tune 'If You Don't Wanna Fuck Me Baby, Baby Fuck Off'.<br> <br> Speaking to SX from her home in New York, County is unimpressed with Simmons' actions. "I actually gave Kiss their big break by letting them open for me at a big loft party in NYC eons ago," she says. "In fact at my gig is where the record company, Casa Blanks, showed up to see me but signed Kiss instead. You see quite frankly, Kiss are just Pat Boones in costume. I am the real thing, and so that freaked them out. I am a real trans glam/punk pioneer, and Kiss are straight men pretending to be freaks."<br> <br> After posting the news and a call to action on her Myspace site, things turned around in a short space of time, County recalls, with relish. "I got support from all around the entire world. The Kiss website got emails galore and Gene backed off pretty soon."<br> <br> Born in Georgia, County spent her youth in Atlanta's gay subculture, becoming a "screaming queen". She and her friends would wear make-up, walk down the street literally screaming at people - an activity they called 'wrecking' (as in wrecking people's nerves). Now 60, County still takes great delight in wrecking the straights and the conservative contingent of the gay community. "Walking down the street with a friend and waiting for the people who are walking towards me to just get up to where I am and suddenly, throwing my arms up in space and screaming 'Oh honey, his dick was sooo big, all I could do with it was throw it over my shoulder and burp it!' That is a good one," she laughs. <br> "Another one is going into the men's room and getting just behind the men that are peeing and suddenly screeching at the top of my lungs, 'Ooh, don't waste it guys, don't waste it! Woohoo!' That one is really funny - once this guy freaked out so bad, he jerked his zipper back up so quick that he got his dick hung in it!"<br> <br> While shock tactics have always been County's trademark (Divine and John Lennon stared in disbelief and Bianca Jagger left in disgust when she turned up to the opening night party of Sergeant Pepper on Broadway in 1974 wearing rubber tits), her antics stem from a desire to retain personal integrity in the face of religious fundamentalists and conservative queers. "There are a lot of conservative gays that hate drag queens and trans people in general," she says. "These so called 'masculine' or straight-acting queens are so unsure of their own masculinity that they have to take out their insecurities on the 'nelly' queens or trans people. This is a disgrace to the entire gay community."<br> <br> It's not only conservative gays that County, who took part in the Stonewall riots in 1969, has no time for, it's anyone who she feels uses and abuses a friendship with her. In addition to Simmons, David Bowie also comes under fire for this. "I used to work for David Bowie and we had a very brief fling, but he was ripping me off like crazy,' she says. "He took my song 'Queenage Baby' and changed it around to 'Rebel Rebel'. Then he took my 'Wayne at the Trucks' show and changed it to 'Diamond Dogs'. Oh, it goes on and on. Plus, he's a horrible kisser!"<br> <br> Today, she's happy being an "old maid" with no sexual relationships on the horizon. "I have had it with boyfriends," she shrieks. "The last one almost drove me into a mental institution!" And while she may not have attained superstardom like Kiss, County remains a popular and underground cult figure, still touring, releasing CDs (a double CD compilation is due out soon and Wayne at the Trucks is available now), completing a documentary about her life, and painting pictures of "famous people being crucified on cumming penis crosses". <br> <br> As someone who's survived a lifetime of prejudices and continued to do her own thing regardless, she offers the following words of advice: "Stay away from negative people and always strive for your dream, no matter how crazy people will think you are. Every inch of progress in this world has been made possible by 'crazy' people, so let your freak flag fly!" </font></p> <p align="left"><font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif">Visit <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20060905194411/http://www.jaynecounty.com/" target="_blank">www.jaynecounty.com</a> and join Jayne on Myspace at <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20060905194411/http://www.myspace.com/waynejaynecounty%20" target="_blank">www.myspace.com/waynejaynecounty </a></font><br> </p> <p align="left"><br> <font size="2" face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><b>SX News is one of Australia's leading gay and lesbian arts, entertainment, news and culture magazines For more information visit the magazine's website at <a href="https://web.archive.org/web/20060905194411/http://www.sxnews.com.au/" target="_blank">www.sxnews.com.au </a></b></font></p> <table width="100%" border="0"> <tr> <td><b><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><a href="jaynecounty.htm#top">BACK TO TOP</a></font></b></td> <td> <div align="right"><b><font face="Verdana, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif"><a href="sampleswork.htm">BACK TO LIST OF ARTICLES</a></font></b></div> </td> </tr> </table> <p align="left"> </p> </td> </tr> </table> </body> </html>

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leisha hailey, sx news, katrina fox journalist sydney