In Conversation: Laura Jane Grace
Ten years after Transgender Dysphoria Blues, she has a new album, a new wife, and a new lease on life. Just don't call it "a happy ending." Laura Jane Grace is still thriving in the middle.
When Laura Jane Grace came out as a transgender woman in Rolling Stone in 2012, it was the end of an excruciating period of suffering, self-loathing, and secrecy—many of the harsh details of which she shared in her 2016 memoir Tranny. But coming out in public sometimes means seeing your story reduced for public consumption; the demand for a “happy ending,” Laura says, persists in spite of the reality that coming out is more about the beginning of a new life than it is the end of an older one. Which is to say that, twelve years later, there are most likely sharper insights that have yet to be gleaned from the experience.
With the release of a new solo album, Hole In My Head, and the tenth anniversary of Transgender Dysphoria Blues, her landmark album with Against …