Against Me! - Transgender Dysphoria Blues (2014) [FLAC] vinyl

  Genre: Pop/Rock
  Styles: Alternative, Punk
  Source: Total Treble TTM003 vinyl
  Codec: FLAC
  Bitrate: ~ 1,000 kbps
  Bit Depth: 16
  Sampling Rate: 44,100 Hz

  01 Transgender Dysphoria Blues
  02 True Trans Soul Rebel
  03 Unconditional Love
  04 Drinking with the Jocks
  05 Osama bin Laden as the Crucified Christ
  06 FUCKMYLIFE666
  07 Dead Friend
  08 Two Coffins
  09 Paralytic States
  10 Black Me Out

  To call Transgender Dysphoria Blues the album of Laura Jane Grace's life may be accurate, but it also suggests that this, Against Me!'s sixth studio record, is autobiographical, which isn't strictly true. Originally, Grace conceived the project as a concept album about a transsexual prostitute, but during the record's earliest stages, Grace revealed first to her band and then to the world at large (via a 2012 article in Rolling Stone) that she herself was a transgender woman. Once Grace went public with her transition, the dynamics of the record and the band itself shifted. Already braced to return to independent status after a stint at Sire, the group splintered during recording at the band's own Total Treble Studios; by the end of the sessions, the rhythm section had been replaced, leaving only Grace and guitarist James Bowman. It is to their considerable credit that Transgender Dysphoria Blues never sounds like the work of a band falling apart; if anything, they're reinvigorated, playing with a purpose lacking on 2010's softly unfocused White Crosses. 

  Indeed, that drive derives from Grace's decision to transition. By design, Transgender Dysphoria Blues pushes Laura Jane Grace's story to the forefront. She and Bowman cleverly constructed the album to be musically universal and lyrically specific, easing listeners into identifying with a struggle they may otherwise deem foreign. Jettisoning any of the amorphous explorations of White Crosses, not to mention the folk-punk of their earliest records ("Two Coffins" comes the closest to folk), Against Me! favors nervy, direct rock & roll, the kind that can fill either a club or stadium -- singalongs inspired by Strummer and Springsteen and any number of their followers, populist punk that underpins songs that tell the tale of an individual experience. Perhaps the details pertain to Grace's life and perhaps they don't; ultimately it doesn't matter because Transgender Dysphoria Blues powerfully conveys the experience of transgender dysphoria: the knowing that you don't belong in the body in which you were born, the alienation that follows, the acceptance that comes with confession, and yet that move doesn’t soothe all the pain. The trick of the album is how the music -- simple, hookier than most Against Me! music -- sells t