Ros (Lesbo Pigs) talks about the brand new label IRRK

I't's a shame cause she lived in my flat for 3 months and it's only when she left that I realized we should have made an interview !!!! So did we, but via emails ...

BiB/Oa: How did the idea of the label come about ? who´s involved in it ? do all the people involved have musical projects ?
Ros : The label is Lesbo Pig and Humousexual and a boy called Kasper. We are 4 people, irrk is our initials. We know each other from the diy queer punk scene, mainly from queeruption, queer mutiny ( the anarchoqueers from London). the label started because we wanted to do a lesbo pig / humousexual split 7 ". Lesbo Pig, and Kasper (the k of irrk) were involved in Youth Club Tape Club, a diy label, with some other friends, and Boitel from humousexual had done a 7 " with his other band, isso*keh. Our friends started this beat is lesbotronik, so then we wanted to do a 4way split (it was gonna be called " who´s up for a twos up ") with Sewing Circle (some other friends). After that some more people were interested ; we met Flamingo 50, Valerie and Hello Cuca through ladyfests in England, it got a bit out of control and turned into a compilation.

BiB/Oa: How did you chose the bands ? can you name them and give us a quick bio (where they´re from, line up) ? how long did it take to get everyone together
Ros : It wasn´t really a selection, it was our friends bands and then bands we really liked and we thought would fit in well with the whole project. It was quite easy to get it all together, mainly beause we only wanted bands that were really into the project to be involved, everyone was quite excited about it so it came together really quickly (the zine took a bit longer though).
. Bio - this beat is lezbotronik - Verity (keyboards, programming, vocals. From Brighton, UK, also in Electrelane), Lauren (main vocals. From Australia (Melborne Ithink), but she lived in London and was one of the ladyfest london organisers)
. Valerie - Jo (vocals and toys), Vix (guitar and toys), Elvis (drums and toys). They are all from Manchester, UK
. Humousexual - Boitel (one of the ´r´s in irrk, guitar, vocals, plays in isso*keh too, one of organisers of queeruption london, from Göttingen Germany), Victor (vocals, drums, organiser of homocrime, queeruption London, from Northumberland, UK but lives in London)
. Flamingo 50 - Louise (vocals and guitar), Morgan (drums), Karen (bass and vocals, but she has been replaced by laura now). They are all from Liverpool, Louise plays drums in millions of Liverpool indie bands.
. Sewing Circle - Joan (vocals, guitar, swansea, wales, aka truly kaput, member of the Battys et W-Squad), Ingri (drums, London UK, ladyfest London organiser)
. Denial - Daniel (everything, London/Brighton UK, queeruption London and homocrime orgnaiser)
. Hello Cuca - Lidia (vocals, guitar), Mabel (bass) and alfonso (drums) (they are from murcia, Spain, they do the label Rompepistas and the fempunk collective)
. Lesbo Pig - Ros (guitar, vocals, Oxford/London, UK, member of the Battys, Homocrime organiser), Irene (singing, W-Squad member, ladyfest London and homocrime organiser), Anna (violin, Stockholm, Sweden, member of the Battys, organises club puss (queer club) in Stockholm)
. Sara Jaffe (San Francisco, USA, singing, guitar, keyboard, member of Erase Errata, she does inconvieniant press+recordings)
. San Andreas - members: oakie, shahar, jesse. they are from san francisco.
SAN ANDREAS recently changed their name to THE HOT BEHIND YOU.
oakie is a DIY film maker. They're gonna tour with the Quails in the us coming autumn.
. Isso*keh - Ike (singing) and Boitel (guitar, member of Humousexual, organiser of queeruption London 2002) (Berlin, Göttingen, Allemagne)



BiB/Oa: What is the main concept behind the compilation ? was it hard to get it distributed (because of the queer theme) ?
Ros : The main idea was to show a small part of the international diy queer underground scene, to allow people to hear music that is not at all part of the mainstream, and to fight against the mainstream gay scene which is very powerful and very destructive to the idea of community…
It was actually easier to get distribution in the uk than it normally is, with youth club tape club we could never get distribution, mainly because even independant distributers are only interested in bigger labes (that do at least 2000 of a record). There aren't any small distributin networks in the UK, there´s distros and shops, but noone to distribute records on a slightly bigger scale (ie to all the UKindependant record shops). Our friends at Truck Records helped us get distribution in the UK through Cargo, the bloke from Cargo just said " lesbo stuff sells well " !

BiB/Oa: What image do bands with lesbian connotations have in the uk ? as you have all lived in different countries, have you noticed differences in the way people perceive you (as lesbians) ?
Ros : I dont really know the view people have of all that…. I think in the mainstream people think only of acts like KD Lang (very stereotypical lesbian) or Tatu (fake lesbians who use it to sell records, ie lesbians that appeal to straight men rather than to lesbians)
however, Electrelane are a very respected band in England at the moment, perhaps not in the mainstream but in semi-mainstream indie circles, they are a band with strong queer politics, and therefore 'lesbian connotations' (for want of a better translation…), but people dont seem to be that interested in that aspect of the band, they are more interested in the music. Its quite strange going to electrelane gigs because they appeal to so many different types of people, mainstream lesbians who read about them in diva and g3 (horrible mainstream lesbian magazines in england), people who are interested in queer politics who read about them in the internet and fanzines, straight muso beard stroking blokes who read about them in music magazines, gay mainstream guys, trans people…. Everyone really. And thats a good thing i think, its important to be anti-elitist, to appeal to people outside of your own community too, people who can discover that theres so much more going on than what you read about in the mainstream press. Anna (from les beau pig) says that people are much less prejudiced in Sweden than in England but that its still a very heteronormative society. I think in general people are the same everywhere (equally pregudiced) but it depends on the rules society imposes on us whether we have the courage to say what we think or not. And thats really destructive too, because you need to know what your preconceptions and prejudices are before you can question them. For that england is perhaps worse than say france or germany, particularly in the south because noone is open about their opinions. But i guess its more of an urgent issue in some countries, like for example with Belgrade pride, where they have to hire a security firm because there was alot of violence last year. So maybe its a priviledge to be able to say that people not being confrontational is destructive too...





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