Sat. October 1, 2005
By Eric Roldan
Not Just a Drag: Antony & the Johnsons, Kiki & Herb will touch your heart and kick your ass.
The first time I heard music by Antony and the Johnsons, I cried. It was at Schubas earlier this year, and my just starting relationship was looking for a date. We looked through the Reader and thought this show sounded interesting: an androgynous piano player with a trilling, angelic voice singing about not knowing what gender he was. We got to the song about falling in love with a dead boy, and my boyfriend and I wept like injured toddlers. With two albums under their belt, having been discovered by and having toured with Lou Reed, Antony and the Johnsons have just won the Mercury Prize in U.K. for best album. "I Am A Bird Now" (Secretly Canadian Records) boasts guest appearances by Rufus Wainwright, Lou Reed, Boy George and Devandra Banhart. It is haunting and gorgeous, and it is so rare to see someone bare themselves beyond naked without looking a fool.
If the word "queer" is going to become the newest way for language to work towards inclusivity, hopefully we'll see a new community free of hypocritical segregation. If art and music are going to help, Kiki & Herb and Antony and the Johnsons will be cited as work that saved us from empty performance by gender-queers. Please join me in welcoming them to Chicago:
Antony and the Johnsons will perform at the Park West on October 4, 2005, ticketmaster.com
Kiki & Herb will perform at the Museum of Contemporary Art on October 14, 2005, ticketweb.com
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