PHOTOGRAPHY BY JJ CA
+HIRS+ I N T E R V I E W W I T H J E N N A "J P " P U P B Y K AY L A G R E E T
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ith a home base of Philadelphia—for now—the +HIRS+ collective has been around since the late ‘80s, has had hundreds of people contribute to it, and has released close to 300 songs. Even their TBA upcoming record has over 30 contributors. “The place of origin is still debatable. We’re from all over the place,” says Jenna Pup, who goes by JP. While the lyrics are often unintelligible, +HIRS+’ bandcamp page lists all of them for fans to decipher. They cover themes like hating cops, trans experience and transphobia, racism, religion, survival, and the epidemic of violence and murder faced by trans women. “When was the last time you heard of a trans woman dying of old age?” asks JP. The tunes are brutal and heavy with chugging guitar and some really
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intense blast beats, all screamed at the audience as loud as possible. JP founded the collective, but didn’t come out as trans until after the band was up and running. She says she “knew something was up beforehand, but was unsure until shortly after performing several shows and releasing a handful of records with +HIRS+.” Their record Worship was written entirely by JP about her life at the time, including the realization that she wasn’t born cisgender. As the collective exists now, they primarily perform as a two piece, which certainly has its benefits. “It’s way easier when it comes to decisions for the band with just two weirdos,” JP shares. “It may look like two of us playing shows, but [we] really feel like one in that moment.” Though there
are also huge cons to having only two members, such as loading a ton of gear by themselves, especially since they bring enough equipment for a full band.
The reaction to the group on the local level has been extremely supportive. Unfortunately, for every positive action, there is often an equal but opposite reaction. There was a time when +HIRS+ used to attract, as JP puts it, “fuckboy tokenizing metal dudes trying to put us in their pocket so they could wear us like some ‘look at me! I’m not transphobic, because I listen to +HIRS+’ badge.” While it can be difficult at times to gauge fans’ sincerity, the collective has done their best to weed out the pretenders. +HIRS+ are stoked that the mainstream media and social media have begun shining a spotlight on transgender people, and cite the Internet as a fantastic tool for connecting queer and trans people all over the
world, but JP clarifies, “I don’t think it is in any way easier for trans folks to survive now because of this. We still have to struggle, but at least there are a bunch of us putting ourselves out there for other trans folks.” +HIRS+ prefer to be referred to simply as a punk band with no other frills or subgenres, partially because it describes the sound, but mostly because it describes their ethics. They’ve released two LPs that clock in at 100 songs each, with most of the tracks clocking in between eight and 30 seconds long. Most of their catalog has been self-released, though just last year, the collective got a boost from Get Better Records. JP says that they had just released a cassette with Peeple Watchin’ when Get Better reached out to them and offered to make it into a 7”. After that, she says they “became quite good friends, and we could not be happier to work with them.” JP says +HIRS+ show no signs of slowing down, as it is “impossible to stop a collective of freaks, faggots, and weirdos who are always changing and often anonymous,” but the collective’s motto sums them up best: “Looks like hell, sounds like shit, queer as fuck.”
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