From Issue
#2 June '99
SUBLIME CHAOS! ZINE
It's around ten o'clock
and The Toilet Boys have only just recently arrived for their Toronto performance
at eleven thirty, they've missed their soundcheck and bassist Adam Vomit
is sitting in the dressing room packing explosives and the glitter gun
for the show tonight. Miss Guy, the band's beautiful singer, is writing
out set lists and debating whether to give one to the sound man or not.
Guy hasn't finished his make-up yet, but his high cheekbones and wide eyes
give him the sort of permanently pretty status allotted only to the real
divas of the world. In another corner, Rocket tunes his guitar, and the
whole tableau, so terribly normal in its appearance, seems strange, being
that it's The Toilet Boys and all.
There's an aura of excess
and danger that seems to waft around this New York quintet, perhaps because
of the explosions and fire that rock their shows or because their singer
is an androgynously divine Debbie Harry lookalike. Whatever it may be,
there's a sense that when you're around The Toilet Boys something, anything,
might happen. So tonight, sitting in the grungy dressing room at Toronto's
legendary El Mocambo club, it seems a bit of acomedown to just be, well,
sitting. But such monotony doesn't last long. Adam wanders off with his
ventriloquist's dummy to amuse tonight's headliner Dee Dee Ramone and Guy
shoos out the promoter who doesn't realize the potentialities of smoking
near explosives, and the air of strangeness and danger is sufficiently
present to start the interview. Not that anyone is really in the mood.
The Toilet Boys have
been doing interviews ad nauseum since they appeared on the scene a few
years ago as a last-minute opener for Debbie Harry in New York City. Guy's
been grilled about doing her make-up and the prospects of an opening slot
on the Blondie tour a thousand times, not to mention the zillions of questions
he's been asked about his gender. But we talk about tour stories and groupie
adventures and Guy getting pulled into a bathroom after one show by some
rather frisky fans and all seems to be going well. Until I ask about the
short piece printed in Interview magazine. In it, Guy talks about how record
companies have asked him to tone down and change his look in order to get
signed. Why, I ask, is he resisting? He frowns, "I like the way I look
and the band likes the way I look and it's exciting," he says, an edge
of anger in his voice. "And what is toning down? OK, I'll wear a nude lipstick
instead of black, or less mascara, a t-shirt instead of a glittery top.
Someone's idea of toning down is different than mine, but when you're going
onstage who wants to tone down?"And what ridiculous record company employee
would ever want to dumb down something so electric and enticing?
Guy, with his tight,
shiny outfits, pin-up queen make-up, sexy swagger and sultry vocals is
The Toilet Boys. He's the sticky-sweet icing on their dirty, sweaty tattooed
cake. It's over Guy that girls salivate and boys think lusty thoughts,
all the things that record companies could use to their advantage, one
would imagine. "They think they know what's best, but the don't necessarily
know the show business side of it and we do," says Guy. "They think that
it won't work outside of New York and and L.A. and San Fran but then
we played in Norfolk, Virginia and the kids loved it. It actually works
more outside of major cities; kids are dying for what we've got to offer.
So that makes us feel a little better. "I think it's also record companies
seeing how far they can push the control issue and if we'll just go 'OK,
yeah,' but I just shook my head no. There's no way I would ever change;
there's no need to. I don't have any desire to be seen any other way. None
of us do."
These are words that
no doubt bring a sense of relief to the band's fans who have grown to expect
both the dirty, crunchy guitars and the exotic swagger that Guy adds to
them. The band, whose sound is somewhere between KISS and The New York
Dolls with a bit of Ramones-esque punk thrown into the mix, will be just
as outrageous on their upcoming release, Saints and Sinners and on the
full-length that they're recording for their new label Roadrunner. The
band toured several cities in Europe in May and will be hitting cities
in North America on a tour scheduled for either June or August. Guy assures
everyone that all of these shows will be the smoky, fiery rock 'n' roll
spectacles that the band is notorious for. "We're following our vision
and we know our vision is the only way. We have no doubts. I've never
been so sure of anything in my whole life."
