Pop/Rock » Alternative/Indie Rock » Queercore

Much as a new generation of gay men and women reclaimed the once-perjorative term "queer" as a badge of pride, honor, and identity, so too did gay punk bands defiantly christened their sexually charged music Queercore. What sets queercore apart from conventional punk is not its music -- which is typically intense, energetic, and raw -- but its lyrics, which explore themes of prejudice, oppression, and same-sex attraction with rare honesty and insight. The best and most provocative queercore bands, like Team Dresch and God Is My Co-Pilot, make records that harken back to punk's glory days, fueled by the same hatred of society's conventions and mores. The difference is that where punk once promoted nihilism and destruction, most queercore records are driven by an overwhelming instinct for survival -- the music celebrates its outsider status, refusing to cave in to the so-called moral majority's myopic definitions of what is right and natural. "Alternative" in the truest sense of the word, queercore is punk at its purest, giving voice to the hopes and fears of those whom the powers-that-be would rather silence.