The Thousands

Me and Lydia Lunch first hooked up back in my first year of uni. An ex-boyfriend put ‘Lady Scarface‘ on a mixtape and I immediately fell for Lydia’s big sexy noise (the boy, not so much). I used to crank it in my Sedan, try to make my voice raspy like Lydia’s and speak growl ‘We had a date, twelfth street at eight/if you’re goooonna be there dooon’t be late’.

Back then, all I knew about Lydia was that she was in a band called Teenage Jesus & The Jerks and was some kind of No Wave goddess. It was only LATER I found out that she made a film where she lubricated her asshole with black grease and got fingered by Marty Nation. But that’s who Lydia is. She refuses to "tow the corporate suck-off line" and is not afraid of her own asshole. Or Andrew Denton.

The Gun Is Loaded explores Lunch’s prolific career output in film, spoken word, art, theatre, music, but mostly, photography. Her first book Paradoxia (1998), a semi-autobiography, was a bit of a messed up affair, but this one’s way better. For the win is the chapter ‘All My Heroes Are Killers’ – ten pages of B&W portrait shots of nameless street urchins – bare-chested, dog tag clad, ciggie-puffing urchins. A pre pube boy sucks on the barrel of a gun, a grubby girl leans against a car making sexy eyes, small grabs of Lunch’s accompanying prose talk about "how fine their bones are." Lydia Lunch is one fucking amazing lady.