Maximum RockNRoll Magazine issue 425
“There’s never been a better time for freaks getting into heavy music.”
“There’s never been a better time for freaks getting into heavy music.”
Renovated Victorian houses in Pittsburgh don’t change much, particularly not their basements. Layers of paint build up over decades, wooden stairs get replaced, leases expire. But the basement shows you can hear from the back yard are as driving and explosive as ever, the shows are still BYOB, the grass is still littered with cigarette butts, small crowds are still sardined together to be manically catharsized by the screaming freedom of rapid-fire three-minute hardcore songs punctuating the night.
But sitting down with Cecelia Martuscelli of Pittsburgh’s Het Ward Collective, all we can talk about is what’s different- what’s changed and how it’s enabled a small revolving group of post-punk and hardcore musicians to own their corner of the scene and drawing a crowd of similarly-alienated queer punks. The music is hard as hell, but at Het Ward shows men no longer own the scene and that means everything.
What experiences and feelings do you summon for No One Will Ever Tell Us How To Love Again?
The Collective started as just a side project originally with myself, Rye, Justin. Eventually after I was given the blessing from them to continue as a collective, a lot of the members who’d later go on to join would be transmisogyny-centered people. It was never intentional that it would be as such, it just happened as the end result of friends of ours stepping up and wanting to play these songs. Over time, from people emailing me and approaching me at shows, I started to see how much of an impact was resonating in the lives of other trans women. A lot of the newer content is more personal. It’s about processing some trauma from my childhood and its conjunction to further repression. It hits on a variety of different topics: More than Ever is a song about sexual assault and my experiences with feeling unsupported as a child from my family. Peel Me is in a nutshell a big Fuck You to the shame and forms of misogyny that you experience growing up. Feeling defeated in your own way or beat back into the closet. And getting past that. A lot of the newer songs are about experiences that a lot of people have and the ways they overlap.
That’s a lot of vulnerability to put into your art. How do you prepare to put yourself out there like that?
I try to focus on staying hydrated and fed. I don’t like to practice the day of shows, that’s something I’ve always been particular about. People in the Collective have conflicting feelings about that and that’s fair, more than understandable, but I will not practice the day I play a show.
What music scenes did you grow up in?
A lot of our earlier influences was late 80's New York hardcore bands. I grew up with that sound being prominent in bands I’d check out when I was growing up in Syracuse N.Y. in the earlier 2000’s. I’ve always had an affinity for that style of music music but at the same time felt detached and removed from the culture itself because it’s so hyper-masculine, and unwelcoming to queer folks and non-men. It always felt stifling. Syracuse punk and hardcore are a big part of who I am and the catalyst for a lot of important decisions I’d make regarding my own dreams and passions later in life, and I can’t discount how much Syracuse punk and hardcore has played a role in that, and I’ll always be grateful. But like any place it had its problems. The influence of violence of 90’s hardcore bands in Syracuse trickled down, and there was rampant misogyny from cis white men at the shows- very much the case for hardcore pretty much all over the east coast. In the early days of the band I wanted to reclaim that sound for queers and non-men.
In spite of the bullshit I witnessed over all the years, I was too in love with the music and the impact it had on my life to ever fully walk away from it. Eventually as I got older things kind of became less violent and got better. And the shows now make me feel like there’s never been a better time to be a freak who loves heavy music. It’s really refreshing, after having been going to punk and hardcore shows for over a decade now, to know that there’s a network of us everywhere now. It’s beautiful. Clearly it still matters to me, because here I am over a decade later still playing hardcore punk, a somewhat-adjusted transsexual and this point.
This new release is also influenced by 80’s NY hardcore punk, like Gut Instinct and Raw Deal, and Outburst. There are some newer influences on an ethical level regarding how I want to carry myself in the world, I’d have to mention GLOSS and HIRS as examples because…. Why wouldn't I [laughter] Non-men are taking over more forms of extreme music. There’s more of us now than there ever have been….
Good segue into my next question: do you see a lot of younger queer noise/hardcore bands and is their stuff different? Is it different from what you’re performing now, or were performing at that age?
Oh my god, the bands that exist today are MUCH better. The bands that are being started by people five to ten years younger than the crowd I grew up with have dialed into the sounds that we were ripping off. My honest opinion on how hardcore and punk are doing things nowadays, the bands are better than they’ve ever been. They’re tighter, more well-rehearsed, and not even just music-wise. The people who are five or ten years our junior are running circles around us in general. Seeing the way the youth is navigating their own spaces, and addressing interpersonal conflicts in their communities, and seeing how they kind of tied up the mistakes that the people of older generations of generation have made, is awesome.
Can you give an example of that?
When I was going to shows seven years ago, it didn’t happen that you’d see anyone reference a need to have safer or braver spaces. I’d never see on an event flyer “Hey, we do not tolerate racism, transphobia, sexism, ableism.” When I try to explain this to people who are seven years younger than me now, y’know, they’re shocked that people didn’t have access to the information and resources that we do now. There’s a lot to be said about the ability to access information and how rapidly that’s changed and influenced growth and development.
But I have so much faith in these younger queers and the work that they’re doing. I’m a big fan of bands like Transgression. Cloud Gayzer is like, our best fucking friends. Yeah, it’s a really good time to be a freak in punk and hardcore.
Tell us about your first Pittsburgh gig as Het Ward Collective. How about your favorite?
So the first Pittsburgh show was at Dream Haus, it was January 2016 and we played with Homo Superior and Empathy Box. I was originally the bass player and we had two weeks to go before the show, and then I’m like, all right folks how about vocals? We stare at each other and realized nope, none of us have practiced those. I knew something was gonna have to give and somebody was gonna have to learn them, so I put down the bass and proposed just singing. We only played four songs, and it was SO fucking sloppy in the best way it could be. I had such a good time, and people were so into it and responded so well to that set. I was shocked. It was a very special moment, Het Ward taking its baby steps. Things are so much different now, but I just remember… it was really sloppy, at the end it was like fuck people saw that… We literally went from a side project practicing once a month, month and a half, to having regularly weekly practices and tours, but that was our first. It was fun.
Favorite show is a hard one to pick! I’ll pick a local, and one from the road. No wait there are two from the road!
Honestly, gonna have to go with Blak Rapp Madusa and Medium Ugly at our record release at Roboto [Project]. We ended up doing an impromptu collaboration set with Blak Rapp Madusa, it was such a fucking powerful experience to be a part of, to have Melanie do that set with us and share our record release really meant a lot. I really love her, look her up, Pittsburgh hip-hop. There were a bunch of other shows that night but the turnout was still awesome.
Okay, on the road. I’m gonna have to go with Pansyfest in Asheville, NC last summer. We played a surprise set there, and it was absolutely wild. It was a room full of fifty to sixty queers that were leftover from the fest, absolutely losing their minds. I don’t think I saw one person standing still during our set. It was just beautiful to look out and see a group of people singing along, being four states away from home. It shook me to the core in the best possible way.
Then there was the show we played in Colombia, OH with Danger Boy and Trauma Queen. It was wild-we played in a fucking shed. There was a knife lodged in the wood of the ceiling and we were all nervous and really wanted it removed so it didn’t fall and stab someone during a set. For some reason we were all too nervous to ask, but someone took it out eventually. I forget who it was, but thank you.. Our friends from Ashville traveled down. People were losing it, they were swinging off the rafters and climbing on each other and singing along. I think people disrobed at one point, too. It was memorable. I’ve never played in a shed before and I don’t know if it’s ever gonna happen again. So those are my picks.
How do Pittsburgh shows differ from other PA shows or shows in other states?
God, Pittsburgh is a strange place, I absolutely fucking love it. For better or worse it’s such a lawless land. If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my time being involved in Pittsburgh hardcore and punk and DIY in general, there are a lot of people who will tell you that you have to adhere to a certain way of booking your shows, or you have to play a certain style of hardcore or punk to garner any kind of attention or have people appreciate it-- and that’s just bullshit. This really is the type of city where you can do whatever the fuck you want. Everything Het Ward Collective has done we’ve done against the norm for hardcore punk bands in Pittsburgh. We don’t play bars, we stick to all-ages venues. We mean what we say when we talk about how we facilitate our shows. We will not tolerate of people who make marginalized people uncomfortable.
And you have. It warms my heart and it’s something we will all miss about Het Ward Collective after you move on from the city. It’s been a treat to be around the scene you’ve cultivated.
Cecelia smiles thoughtfully to herself, eyes a little downcast. “I tried to make the best of my time here. It’s nice to know I’ll be leaving a positive impact. I definitely ruffled some feathers but…. I don’t trust anyone who hasn’t made an enemy”
What does Pittsburgh contribute to your creativity that your hometown didn’t have?
I loved being exposed to all those awesome bands growing up in Syracuse but I never ever for the life of me could get a band to last six months or a year, much less even consider touring. And that was where I grew up! When I moved to Pittsburgh it was a larger city and a larger music scene with more musicians and more access to places to play. I guess Pittsburgh had the resources that Syracuse didn’t have-- and had them for someone like me to access being a broke-ass, low-income trans woman. I don’t drive, and I can’t afford to purchase a vehicle. Without access to one, I can’t tour. Living in Pittsburgh, there’s an option to rent touring vehicles through Dave Rosenstrauss. Dave plays in Slip and Hounds of Hate. Used to play in Rambo. He is the reason why I’ve gone on the last six tours. I don’t think I’d have been able to do any of the things I’ve done living in Pittsburgh without Dave. So shout-out to him and thank you for providing that resource and making it affordable to low-come folks who want to tour and have music that they want to share. It boils down to resources. There was a time I was a little more jaded about leaving Syracuse but at this point I’ve moved away from that bias. I could have gotten a lot of what I’ve gotten living in Pittsburgh in Syracuse too but it would have been harder for me to find and obtain than it was to move here. Living in Pittsburgh gives me the means to do what I love and fulfill the dreams that I have, which are to tour the world and share my curmudgeonly-frustrated music with everyone.
That’s fantastic, although I think you’ve still got some distance to go on ‘curmudgeonly. Final thoughts?
Thank you for taking the time to do this interview. I’d like to take a moment to thank you and shout out to Rye and Justin, Medium Ugly, Alex from GetBetterRecords for always being so supportive of everything we do. All of the non-men making music right now. It’s amazing to be able to continue this Collective and know that it’s resonated with people. I want to close by thanking you for filling us with so much inspiration and love and- speaking for myself, additional purpose for existence. All of our experiences are invaluable. We love you all, you’re very valued.
Check out the artists who inspire and conspire with Het Ward Collective!
Transgression Hardcore: https://transgressionhc.bandcamp.com
Cloud Gayzer: https://www.facebook.com/cloudgayzer/Blak Rapp Madusa: https://www.1hood.org/artist/blak-rapp-m-a-d-u-s-a/
Danger Boy: https://danger-boy.bandcamp.com
Trauma Queen: https://traumaxqueen.bandcamp.com
Medium Ugly: https://mediumugly.bandcamp.com/releases
Empathy Box: https://empathy-box.bandcamp.com
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