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Nicole Rachelle Really Blows... That Sax by Mackenzie Worrall “Thank goddess for second chances.” One of my all-time favorite ploys as a journalist is to weasel someone’s life story out of them, and then turn around and ask them how it would read if it were a Tweet. Nicole Rachelle (saxophonist for Fabulous Johnson Brothers and Hairplane!) gave me this gem. Which sounds like a great idea for a song. Nicole has been with local act the Fabulous Johnson Brothers since the mid-2000s. Together, they’ve run the gamut of very popular to not-so known and back again. If you don’t think you’ve heard of them, you may know the band from either this year’s Pride performance, or from Fox’s 2007 reality show, The Next Great American Band. They placed as alternates, but that’s pretty good compared to the other 6,000 bands that applied. Local act, national résumé. A fair portion of the drive behind JBros is Nicole Rachelle. Which is no surprise when you know how driven she’s been her whole life. Raised in Ashland, OH, Nicole suffered from the same small town mindset that many LGBT youth do. The town has a sign proclaiming itself to be “The World Headquarters of Nice People,” but they mean it in a good, Christian way. There were opportunities for the budding musician, though. Her high school had an award winning jazz band, and Nicole traveled to the Richland Academy in Mansfield to take jazz improv classes. For college, she escaped to Capital University (where she met a slew of queer people for the first time) and graduated with a Bachelor’s of Music in Jazz Studies. She then went on to front Urban Jazz Coalition for 11 years, where she was instrumental in their popularity. The coalition is still around, and Nicole is still in Columbus. Her parting from them was heartbreaking and necessary. “Although I was very successful with that band and we were just reaching the beginning of the gravy-train, I was very unhappy because I was struggling with my identity,” Nicole says. Her journey to being an out-and-proud trans woman has presented challenges in her professional career as a jazz musician. When she
30 sept 2012
was 23, her therapist suggested meeting some LGBT people and hitting the scene. Long story short, a trip to Wall Street affirmed for Nicole that she was not a gay man. Shortly thereafter, she realized she was not a man. Her therapist then referred her to Meral Crane’s Gender Program. In a short time, she began taking hormones. That’s when the Urban Jazz Coalition stood in her way of happiness. “The bandleader, who was unable to cope with my changes, demanded I stop using hormones,” Nicole says. “I made a big show of throwing them in the trash, but later refilled the prescriptions and starting taking them again. […] One day in 2005, Urban Jazz Coalition had a photo shoot and I neglected to use ACE bandages to cinch down my growing boobs, and the meds were giving me nipple-hard-on. While standing in close quarters for the photo, my breast rubbed against the bandleader’s back, and he was done with me.” Sometimes when your world falls apart, you can put it back together the way you want it to be. The day job Nicole used to pay the bills became her job-job. The circle of people she had was gone. All she still had was hormone therapy. Soon after, several bands welcomed her with open arms and Nicole’s musical life was back on track. Two bands, Jamnesia and Flypaper, got her back on her feet. Brian Yarbrough and Jim Mayr played trumpet for both Jamnesia and the Fabulous Johnson Brothers. One night at Skully’s, Jamnesia played in a doubleheader with JBros, and they decided then and there to offer her a spot in the band. “My chemistry with the JBros was instant,” she explains, “and I gave my heart to them.” Nicole’s life, her fabulous and promising life, embodies her gratefulness for second chances. She’s ended up in a good place, with a band that’s going, and has gone places. With JBros, Nicole also makes contact with agents and bookers around the country, part of which involves creating videos and electronic press kits. “This is my next big push. Right now I’m looking for a job as a bartender to finance business trips to California so I can meet with the agents I have established contact with, so I can push my own
Hairplane! is my product of choice.
career and the JBros forward into bigger markets.” The woman is not afraid of new challenges, and that’s something I really admire about Nicole. “I am a hacker,” Nicole says. “I hack computers, I hack cars and I hacked my own body.” Having spent time as a technician, Nicole definitely knows about computers. And, since she went on after this to explain how she’s fixed up both her and her wife’s cars in words I didn’t even recognize, I’m willing to take her at her word on the car knowledge. The moral of the story is that she makes objects do what she wants them to do. Computers, cars, even the human body. Nicole doesn’t take ‘can’t’ for an answer. In the next month, you can see Nicole in a lot of places. Whether its with JBros or Hairplane!, the smooth jazz sister band of JBros, you’re going to have a good time. Here’s the schedule: 9/06, 7p, Fabulous Johnson Brothers @ Columbus Commons outdoor and family-friendly 9/08, 8p, Hairplane! @ Hot Times Festival 9/14, 10p, Fabulous Johnson Brothers @ The Lazy Chameleon 9/16, 12p, Hairplane! @ North Market Microbrew Fest 9/21, 10p, Fabulous Johnson Brothers @ The Barn 10/06, 10p, Fabulous Johnson Brothers @ Park St Tavern Last year’s Comfest was a highlight for Nicole, but she thinks this year’s Pride tops that. “I think I did way better in 2012,” she says, “mainly because I’m finally getting my wardrobe together. It’s challenging as a woman who grew up as a boy, because I had to go through the 12-14 year-old makeup and clothing catastrophe while I was in my late 20s, publicly, and on stage.” She’s modest about her dancing too, but credits Brian Yarbrough and the rest of JBros for getting her to the point of graceful. We salute Nicole for being successful by being herself. Cheers to the continuing success and improvement of Nicole and her band mates. See them before they’re even more famous. For more info on the Fabulous Johnson Brothers see http://thejbros.com. For more info on Hairplane! see http://www.facebook.com/pages/Hairplane/137328659620907.
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