I'm Still Gay and You're a Little Sharp: Why That "Gay Ass White Shit" Band Still Matters

As I steadily work my way out of an unfortunate chemical mess, I find myself revisiting probably the single most life-changing factor in my personal life: the self-proclaimed industrial jungle pussy punk band Mindless Self Indulgence. What started as a teenage obsession turned into a profound lesson in acceptance, self-respect, good humor, business ethics, communication, sexuality, and practical marketing. And now that the band is slowly exiting the realm of "indefinite hiatus" and I'm using my unfinished website as an excuse to be productive, my favor with them is quickly returning. Their last record did nothing for me. In fact, that entire promotional era left me feeling cold and disgusted, sometimes even with them as people. But as I've been typing out their discography, transcribing old press, and God forbid watching the infamous "Molly (Live)" video on DVD, I've remembered what made them so great. And what still makes them great is being able to feel all of that pain and self-loathing and knowing that no matter what that you're a unique and beautiful person and that sometimes all you need is to have fun and not give a fuck. Maybe I haven't followed that advice lately. But I have been listening to their work again, and it's bringing out the inner-geek and cynic in me again. That's a step forward.

The weather is beautiful outside; it feels like September. Tying in with all of the Mindless talk, I get extremely nostalgic for the band when it feels like this outside. I remember starting high school and feeling like I knew music's best kept secret, almost like I belonged to something special that nobody else at the time did. I was similarly depressed out of my mind at the time; chemically, I had never been in worse shape than I was at the end of May and into June 2006. I never really figured out why, but I would guess my recently discovered sexuality came as a shock to me and was hard to deal with. That fall I met the first guy I felt strongly for and we together felt like the biggest MSI fans on the planet. There were a lot of complications in the end and I may have gotten the shorter end of the deal, but I still had my favorite band. And at the time, every new discovery with Mindless was an event. The remix singles, the bootlegs, the official youtube channel, the tongue-in-cheek insults, everything. It was through Mindless I made some of my first long-lasting friends and established a place within the music industry. By chance, it's also how I met Bill H and became involved with BRAT Marketing. I'm not sure I would have ever discovered Tori Amos had I not become involved with the Mindless community, for that matter. So I'm very nostalgic today; I'm grinning from ear to ear. There's nothing I want more right now than to have some of my best high school friends over, watch Mindless Self Indulgence on VHS, talk about how much better Tight is than You'll Rebel to Anything (not something I'd necessarily agree with in that context now), wonder what "Lights Out" sounds like - knowing how awesome it's gotta sound, and complain about how we don't have studio versions of "Revenge" and "Unbelievable Animal."

James said that "everybody's who's famous sucked a dick to get where they are today" and that the "only difference between [the band] and them" is that "[Mindless] swallowed it." Sometimes I think that juvenile, backwards logic is the smartest of all. Maybe my problem's been that I've long forgotten the lessons of my widely-extended family. Right now, I'm going to try and fix that.

Love you James. Love you Steve. Love you Lyn-Z. Love you Kitty. Love you BillH. Love you Galus.

All of you at Mindless Camp are wonderful. Thanks for raising me right.
-Always, G