Austin Lucas is a veteran of the punk and hardcore scenes that have birthed many Americana favorites now: Tim Barry, Laura Jane Grace, Cory Branan, Jason Isbell, John Moreland. The last time Austin and I spoke for the Adobe & Teardrops podcast, they were stuck in Germany on what was decidedly the right side of the quarantine line with their long-term partner. They recorded their blistering album Alive in the Hot Zone on livestream, and came out to their audience as pansexual at that time. When they got home, they joined Paisley Fields and Lavender Country on the historical Roundup tour — it would be Lavender Country’s last. As the tour progressed, Austin began to perform in dresses and skirts.
Recently, they released an EP of Against Me! covers titled Reinventing Against Me! (a take-off of the band’s Reinventing Axl Rose.) The album is a country-fied take on the punk band’s best songs. It’s been on streaming for a while (buy it on Bandcamp Friday!) and is finally available on vinyl.
To read the full interview, including Austin’s reflections on the Roundup tour, subscribe to the Patreon for as little as $2 a year!
Do you know Laura Jane Grace? I imagine you’ve worked together.
We’re both on it at different points. I’ve never toured with Laura Jane Grace. I’ve played shows with her many times over the years. I would say we’ve been friendly and cordial peers since about 2001. I’m not super close with her, but I’ve always admired her songs. And as a songwriter myself, I have very few songwriters who are of the same age group of myself wwhose whole body of work is I consider worth celebrating. She’s one of those rare exceptions where it’s like she’s got such a way with writing that it actually inspires me to want to play her songs.
I don’t do very many covers traditionally in my life. An entire album of covers was really not like something I thought about and it just sort of happened by accident. I kind of got goaded into it online! I floated the idea and she was like, “oh my God, I would love to hear that!” And I was like, “bet!”
At first I was just gonna record a couple of songs and then it turned into eight, so it’s a full length. You go into the studio thinking you’re gonna do a couple and they just keep popping out.
I really enjoyed how you made them a little countrified.
I always heard that in them, even if they didn’t use that imagery. I mean, they were a folk punk band to start off with before they fully electrified and became an anthemic punk band. But they always had that aspect in them. When I first heard “Sink Florida Sink” in particular off of Eternal Cowboy I was like, “this is a high lonesome Country song!”
Even though that was the song that put the thought [of Reinventing Against Me!] into my head, it wasn’t the first song that came to my mind when I began recording.
Do you find that as you are going through the process of better defining or exploring your sense of your gender identity, and knowing of course that Laura Jane Grace has transitioned, do you find that singing these songs is relating to that process?
I knew that I was not a man, you know what I mean? I’ve known in some way that I was not a man since I was really young. When I was young, I wanted to be a mom. During the Pandemic, I wrote that song, “The Times” for Alive in the Hot Zone, and that was the song that like made me start to come to terms with these things that I’ve always felt.
How other men treated me, or even how women treated me, I was always spoken over, which gave me a very serious set of social anxieties and also turned me into the performer that I am. The greatest things that I’ve ever done in my life that have made me happiest spring from that and a lot of the worst parts of my personality that I wish I could fucking, just have cut out.
At the beginning of the pandemic I was simultaneously being encouraged by my partner to grow my hair long, she would kind of stroke my hair and tell me how beautiful I was. She had no idea how important that was for me. I had started like my femininity like more and more. I was openly bisexual through my twenties, and then as I started having a career, I just stopped talking about that.
And even because of my own inner homophobia, denied it in myself for a long time. My whole life has been la series of me being angry at myself and wanting to change. Trying to make myself what I felt society wanted me to be, and being afraid of people finding out what I actually was, even when I didn’t understand exactly what I was.
And the big difference is that now I just have language to describe it. The first time that I discovered what pansexuality was, all of a sudden I felt seen by a fucking word.
When I discovered like what being non-binary was, I fully processed that I was in that spectrum or that I would want to use they/them pronouns rather than masculine or feminine pronouns. I was like simultaneously fascinated and also confused by it.
Is there anything you wanna make sure we talk about or anything that I didn’t ask you about yet?
I’m getting ready to come on tour. I’m just another queer person out in the country sphere doing my thing. I’ve been at it for a long time, which means I’m not a new face. I just want to remind folks that I’m here and I’m really excited to be out on the road again. I was just injured and I had to cancel two weeks of shows. I’m really hoping that like that I get to have a good time and that I see a lot of old faces and a bunch of new faces, too.
One of the hardest things that’s been for me, in coming out, is I’m definitely reaching people whom I’ve always wanted to reach. I feel like the queer country set is like the scene of musician of music fans and musicians that I’ve been trying to foster since the very beginning of my career.
But it still hurts when I see people who were with me for so long that just all of a sudden aren’t there anymore. Sometimes I see people hit that unfollow button. Or they are still passively following, but I’m coming to their city and like they just aren’t excited whereas they were excited the last every single time.
It’s just such an interesting thing to constantly be growing and changing as a human being and noticing the people who just aren’t comfortable in the spaces that you’re trying to take them to.
It’s disheartening to realize that people feel like they can’t take space there or that they feel like they just don’t wanna be in that space. The point is is that like this is space for everyone as long as you’re not an asshole. We are trying to make the world a safe space. That means that as long as you don’t wish us harm, then whatever space that we’re in is your safe space, too.
I want to provide a safe space for people in country music. If you like feel like normal country music is not a safe space for you, I promise you that this place is. You are invited.
You can purchase Reinventing Against Me! in any format you’d like here.
Catch Austin on tour! Get more information here.
