We’ve also been working to write a cover album of early resistance music. We chose to define resistance music loosely as songs that depict survival, struggle and perseverance of the human spirit. We decided to focus on “early” music because 1. We thought it would be fun to discover resistance music from the 1930′s, 1920′s and earlier, and 2. We wanted to make these songs accessible to modern day listeners.From our research we’ve settled on the following 12 songs:

1. The Red Flag by Jim Connell 1889

2. Bread and Roses by James Oppenheim 1911

3. Get off the track by the Hutchinson family singers 1844

4. Which side are you on? Written by Florence Reece 1931

5. Hard time killing floor blues by Skip James 1931

6. Johnny I hardly knew ye – early 19th century

7. A las barricadas by Valeriano Orobon Fernandez in 1936

8. Undzer shtetl brent! (our town is burning!) by Mordecais Gebirtig 1936

9. Follow the drinking gourd – pre American civil war

10. Maculine women, feminine men by Edgar Leslie 1925

11. B.D (bull dagger) woman’s blues by Bessie Jackson 1935

12. Keep woman in her sphere by D. Estabrook pre women’s suffrage (US)

We’re really close to finishing the writing and getting ready to start recording. This has been a really exciting project for us. We’ve learned a lot and can’t wait to share our work with all of you! Stay tuned!

We hope 2011 is equally productive. We finally finished recording our second Album “Rid of you” which we plan to release on vinyl as well as digital downloads sometime by March of 2011. We have one show booked in January here in town but other than that we’ll be laying low and working on our third project, a cover album of pre 1922 resistance music.

We want to thank all of our fans, our friends – new and old, our families, our partners, the Lexington music scene, all the queers and everyone who has supported us this year. We couldn’t have done it without you.

xo,

The Qs

You’d be crazy to miss out on this event!
Join us for a monumental night of music, drag, free food, prizes, and fun!
Doors open @ 6:30
Music @ 6:30
Enjoy the tantalizing sounds of the Spooky Q’s & Fair Heron
Drag @ 8
Imperial Court of Kentucky as well as local performers

$4 cover at door.
Half the proceeds will be donated to the Bluegrass Rape Crisis Center.

Bring your friends and your $1 bills…
See you there!

Spondored by EKU PRIDE Alliance

You can check out the rest of the tiles here.

In addition to recording we’ve been getting some shows scheduled for the fall. We’ll be heading to Columbus Ohio on November 13th to play a radical queer convergence organized by queer in flux. On December 10th we’ll be back in Chicago at the Jackhammer for the flesh hungry dog show. Hopefully there will be a few more in there too.

That’s all for now!

xo,

the qs

Here is the description from the films website:

“Whistlin’ Dixie invites the viewer to travel along as filmmaker Meredith Heil explores American’s Southern heartland in search of queer sound. The film journeys through the region’s independent, queer lo-fi scene, tracking down the LGBTQ musicians, fans and activists that are actively using DIY music to build safe spaces and strike down prejudices, therein altering the political and social climate of the new South for generations to come. Through personal interview, rich landscapes and riveting performance, the film considers the complex historical relationship between Southern music, personal identity and political resistance. “

Meredith and Amber also hung out with us for the weekend and we got to show them all of the beautiful things about the horse capital of the world

Day 1: We kicked our tour off in Lexington at the Green Lantern bar. It was a fantastic show, and so many people came out. We sold out of sweatshirts that night it was crazy! 8″ Betsy rocked it out as usual. Thank you Lexington for always being so supportive. We love you guys.

Day 2: We played at Havana nightclub in Columbus OH. Again we had a fantastic time, and sounded great thanks to our sound guy. Ondine’s mom cooked us a vegan Indian dinner and then her parents came to the show. So cute. After we finished with the show we hit the road for an eleven hour drive to our next gig in Pittsfield MA.

Day 3: Before hitting up Pittsfield we stopped in Brackney PA to rest up at Liz’s dads alpaca farm. I just want to say that alpaca’s are both one of the cutest animals that I’ve ever seen and also the weirdest.

We also jumped into a freezing cold pond. After drying out and resting up we hit the road for the final three hour stretch. About 30 minutes outside of Pittsfield we got pulled over. For driving too slow. That’s right. A couple of vans of rockstars driving under the speed limit. HOT. Apparently Meghan didn’t have her pants on either, ’cause you know, why would she? We didn’t get a ticket, just a stern talking to. Around 6:30pm we made it to Rebel Records, which is a cool independent record store right in the heart of downtown. In addition to some really awesome records for sale, they also had t-shirts and zines. The back room is set up for bands to play, and the venue is all ages. The show was a lot of fun, especially because we got to network with other musicians. It was also pretty fortuitous that we played with the Jesse Minute from Rhode Island. They were one of the first bands the Spooky Qs ever played with in Lexington, back when we were a baby band without a drummer. It was nice to show them how far we’ve come. We spent the night with Liz’s friends who had two dogs; a st. bernard and a pug (I know right!), two adorable girls, and several chickens. It was a zoo and we love that. They were really sweet to put all seven of us up, and I hope we all get to hang out again.

Day 4: We hit the road again and ended up in Baltimore Maryland for our show at the Metro Gallery. We got to play with our old pals Pariah Piranha, and had the honor to share the stage with the Degenerettes.

Day 5: We drove up to Harrisburg PA to hang out with Tony from Pariah Piranha. It was nice to chill out and take a day off.

Day 6: From Harrisburg we trekked to Durham NC to play at the Pinhook bar, co-owned by our good friend Kym Register of Midtown Dickens. For our friends from Lexington, the Pinhook kind of reminds us of a cross between the old dame (back when it was awesome) and the old busters. It was quite a treat. What was also really a treat was having the opportunity to meet Pink Flag. PF is an all-girl three piece punk group from Durham. We were especially taken with Jessica, their drummer, who just destroyed. It was also really nice to see women of color in a punk band – punk rock has been dominated by white musicians in this country, and it was nice to see something different.

Day 7: Chilling in Durham with Melissa, co-owner of Durham records label, 307 Knox. I’m not sure yet what adventures are in store. We have a few days off before having to play at Mondo Homo on Saturday, so there is some talk about hitting the beach. We shall see. We’ll definitely keep you updated! See you all soon

Day 8: We did end up going to the beach. It was sunny and beautiful, and lucky for us the water was clear.

Day 9: We got to Atlanta early and stayed with the fabulous Lady Jane. Some of us explored the city at little bit. We ended up at a delicious vegan restaurant on Highland called Soul Vegan. If you’re ever in the ATL you’ve got to check it out.

Day 10: Mondo Homo. We are so honored and happy that we had a chance to play with at this festival. The performances were amazing, the people were friendly — everyone was so incredibly diverse and open! If you ever have a chance to go to this, then do it.

Our first tour was a huge success. We had a great time, we got to know each other better within the band, we got to spend time with our friends from 8″ Betsy, we met some beautiful and amazing people along the way, we got to travel, and we played our hearts out. We can’t wait until we can do it again.