if you want to know what phil would know if you see a series of attacks like tire rails that you dislike to analyze it to gauge the plot of the city you speak of my life whether they like it or not i got tackled this fall but the police tell me. how crazy the band is still going on in this world but you know it opened up a hill you know. he started pushing. greetings and salutations you know you can't have music without heart like revolution without dancing. and if you want to talk heart you sick of revolution you're talking about taylor alexander out of atlanta georgia was watching hawks strikes a chord. with me larry alexander. was called one of.

ha. ha ha. ha ha. ha ha. working for the man. who makes the money but it don't make sense given pay an excuse that's all you want to do this place was exactly climbing up the ladder. as like you do with the eyes on. the pond they keep an eye out and never make it out of the business of the top of the mob and there's really nothing mysterious peoples wakefield's nobody eats believe me usually hate. me doesn't really fit anything. i was shocked because the whole.

thing. to a close. one could be a story. i should not cut. ties is hard to conceive just good it's machine made for me if you out you good you thought it was about the work but. it's not about you know i don't step out to everybody i want to have a good time. is to the top of them up to. it's ready to deceive people it's misleading nobody to be going to pay for. it doesn't really need a. shot in the piece a whole lot. of snow.

came a slow leak. at the big client and the big smile is the big one if i make. a. baby with you ain't got the problem reduces their places but you get to keep the trophy apollo upon me i can trust you and some people to guess notices you. doesn't really pay. the full. to. the police. and. the plus side. doesn't really. fit the whole world. you get to.

like him so much. but if it's. going to. keep you think you're. taylor alexander. one of the hardest working drag queens in atlanta georgia. he's a drag reformer a community organizer a proud parent of 2 kept. and. it's really about creating art that people can connect to i know that's very cliche but i think for people who kind of share my background and my various identities finding something that they can connect to is really important i want to ask what is a d.i.y. performance artist as and what does a do it yourself performance artist and what was your journey to become one.

performance artist is a fancy way of saying that i do i create most of everything that i do so with my music i write i produce a creative director. i'm my own from owner and manager there's no force or label that behind me to push my music i'm the driving force. and really that reflects itself in every single aspect of my life you know being a performer in atlanta being a community organizer a lot of what i do is grassroots from the roots from starting with nothing ending up with something and knowing that you know it's all uniquely organic in a way and it's also a way for me to be a control freak so you know everything comes back to me i accept the appraisingly applause but i also know like if i mess up i have full accountability for that 0 it's all on you whether it was succeeded or failed it all comes down to you with

your on all the. let me one did music 1st touch you when to suddenly you said you know what it's music that's what i really it's one of those i really want to work so when i really want i feel like i can get who i am inside out through music one of the like feeling vibe inspiration 1st to you oh well i've always been making music i didn't seriously start creating music until 2015 you know back in like elementary school i took piano lessons i was in korea so i did all those things i've been. writing songs since i was 7. but yeah i didn't start seriously you know saying i'm gonna sit down learn how to produce learn how to you know full well rounded musician as well 2015 and i think it's because music allowed me to express myself in certain ways that other parts of my life couldn't even doing drag you know with you know being a drag performer off to sing other people's creations. and there's

a certain limitation with that and there were certain things that i couldn't say in my day job i couldn't say at my night job being a drag queen. i mean in music really. kind of like made it known to me and. allowed me to. talk to me a little bit about your music with what do you want to let you know the 1st track to recenter to be able to perform what do you want people to take away from that what would you want to inspire and people would listen to your music i always want to create music where people. i usually say i want people to dance to but also to think so i love dance music as you know a black person as a queer person and dance music has often been the driving force of a lot of different aspects of our cultures. but i want to create music where people can listen to it maybe here in a 2nd time here like a lyric again oh that's that's that's real like i want them to like relate to it

and i think that that's what i strive to do with my music and what you mention community organizing know a couple times women when did you start getting into community organizing you know the activists who were giving something back and what inspired you to get into that part of you know it's a little bit out of something with a problem in your life and work oh yeah i think it all start when i moved to atlanta in 2011 i'm born and raised in georgia but i moved in 2011 to go to georgia state university for college and so i started getting involved with local. organizations i started getting involved with a lot of the differently seen and so my community organizing background arose from wanting to be involved because where i'm originally from griffen georgia is a population of like 3400 people it's really small i was raised on a 400 acre fire and so there was no clear community there was no kind of like

community for people who express themselves and experience life like myself so i wanted to do whatever i could when i moved to the big city to give back and so that you know start off as a volunteer ing and then it went into performing and then also just uniquely finding how performance are in our in general can create ways to advocate being activists i think sometimes when we say the word activists we think about you know you had to be lobbying you have to be up in the senate you have to be up in all these different forms of government when really. the most radical changes that we can have in our communities day to day are grassroots and very d.i.y. and so that's kind of where i found myself being a part of community organizing because change really comes at a local level yes it's really i mean the things that we want there are national things that we want there's there's a world things that we want to see change politically community was but really it's

starting to started right at the local level you see a problem in front of you with them doing something about it to try to fix it. you know. you grew up as you say you know in this small town 3500 people you know what was it we did you know that like you know what this is who i am and i'm proud to be who you know but now i'm growing up in a town of what 3500 people you know was there any kind of acceptance for who you are what was that journey. it was maybe me being an aquarius but i just really didn't care it was you know i came out in 8th grade the 1st time i came out as a on going process i came out in 8th grade in high school i was the 1st person ever started a gay straight alliance at my high school even though i hadn't fully come out like my parents you know like friends at fairs and it just i knew what i needed and i knew way i would want to see happen and whether that you know had certain repercussions was completely 2nd to anything else so you know being in

a small town you have a lot of eyes on you you know you go to the local wal-mart or the local grocery store the flea market and people talk about things and so it's a very small fishbowl kind of community. but i think here i knew what i need to do and whether that got me in trouble with the principal or my parents didn't really care for other well for other kids out there like you you know growing up in a small community or at least a close minded community you know what advice would you give them you know do in terms of what. you know whether it's coming out or just you know how to make you know how to make their to really better understand what they're going through my how wonderful they are well i think what we talk about. you know people in kind of more vulnerable situations and like smaller communities i think sometimes we forget about safety a lot of the narrative is come out and you know because you'll be more honest and

things like that i think that's a terrible framing i think people should mind their safety in a space where you're you're you might be physically or emotionally or mentally you know harmed if you come out mind yourself like take care of yourself 1st. but also . being out sometimes in small spaces in communities like that can really. just bring up a whole new community can really show to other people hey there's somebody else like me and we can form some kind of general bond. but i definitely think in terms of like small community sometimes you have to mine your own and take care of yourself and then eventually once you get a proper footing you can develop some kind of like connection to a community and build from there i.

that's kaiser's financial survivor they say money the bellatrix close to losing the central bank supported by a plumber is going to call them right now so stop the. i'm

going to fulfill the repeated promises apologise to the people come on you know we will box you we're going to. leave really really. pretty good. if you want to work. you know.

or be. released. from the south when you talk about being you know. a queer and. you always hear about it's amazing in new york it's amazing california it's amazing in seattle chicago the south it's only talked about queer and transmedia or in the context of you know there's the statistics you know atlanta's rising hiv rates or you know queer homeless youth rates or things like that we're always used to sticks and we're never fully humanized the south east the south region of the united states has the largest population of queer and trans people in america we

have so many historical figures and moments and figureheads we have our own stonewall we have so many vibes. in communities that are constantly negated under this idea that the south is incredibly conservative and it definitely is in certain pockets but to completely erase the existence and the reality of a and entire quarter of the nation. is harmful i think and so that's part of why a southern flank where pride came up because we see ourselves our president in media we didn't see ourselves as you know black and brown trans you the poor people's sex workers. reflect and we needed to build community in that regard and so we started in 2014 and it's been you know 5 amazing years of building community because there wasn't. enough for us. as marginalized people so hard so from the from so from the outside looking in like you know what do you

think is like one of the biggest misconceptions you know of community you must solve what do you know for folks never even realize that exists and it's so strong like what do you think it's a bigger misconception is that if you're going to struggle with even to get into music oh well i think. i think people have a major misconception that. we're all miserable that we're all just waiting for some kind of like savior to come along and save us from the south we don't need to be safe from the south i think yeah this idea that southern people are just so overly oppressed by republicans and conservatives and whatnot. which does play out sometimes and political races and things like that. the idea they were miserable and that we need saving we don't need saving we just need. assistants we need respect and we need to be thought of

a considered as legitimate communities. and i think in terms of like me when putting my music out there you know obviously i am a beautiful drag queen and through i think a lot of people think that drag is a very limited and it only exists in one kind of form of lip sinking top 40 hits and then performing in bars and clubs and so when you put that on top of being in the south is just like. you know how it is even work i think people think that you have to make some kind of great. to new york city where you find yourself and love yourself and that's not the case i want to stay at the wall file so that land where my life when you sit down when you sit down to write a song you know what you're doing ok you know you're what do you look for you know what inspires you just song by song is that you know the conversation you had or is it just thoughts were going around you're like what what does that process when you sit down and said ok i'm going to put pen to paper put in you know figure out how

to make a hit song i it varies you know sometimes i'll get like a melody stuck in my head and so i'll take my voice. on and be like this is a songwriting create like you know i record that i build upon it sometimes as a phrase so like the song one started off with a phrase that i thought about what does one mean and it was right after i had read invisible man by ralph ellison and so there is a portion of that book that talks about where that coming here to work from like a pain factory and the trying to make the purest form of white and any kind of a little dot of anything which is completely messed up and thought about like you know what are some situations where i feel like the one that messes up the situation or the one being encroached on by a whiteness so really it's just like you know it can be anything you know melody can be a phrase it can be a certain kind of feeling. i get inspiration from anything really. this song is

called. we don't know. if you've. got questions let's take a 2nd. post. show. on the screen. it was because. you need to log disconnect take some time just so. you need to log off disconnect takes time to so. this is how you do you. think is trying out shame. because how do you keep our. economy is truck option.

fake laugh out loud cry. you need to log off to take time to so because how do you. do you need. to take time to stop because. you need to log off this is going to take time so because. you need to log all this. time so. you. think you. literally i was like scrolling on facebook you know as one. hours and you don't see anything and it's like reading people status is just you know. i didn't really say anything and it's like i feel like people sometimes think they can solve all their so problem with social media and that's just not the case so literally i was like you need to log off you need to

disconnect and i was like. this could work into something and so at that time when i was writing the songs on my 1st hologram. a lot of the songs already talking about like ways that we kind of communicate to the world outside like we think we know who we are internally that's great but trying to communicate to the world to be like social media technology just like person to person interactions. with logoff it was really about you know. are we actually affectively communicating who we are to the world outside is the algorithm that we're all playing into really like doesn't mean anything if they completely delete it it's a camera facebook where we are like where would your self value the person d. lake form self value as a person on the internet or is it like in here within you it was just a lot of questions i had i thought i had the answers. but yeah like a lot of who was me to logoff disconnect and take some time to self reflection to

great so it's a really great song it's a great message you know it's interesting because it also kind of in that internet world or in the you know online world that we exist in you know i think it's easy to talk about the enemies it's easy to draw a lot of a better word if you talk about those who would stand against us whether it be our or you know our religion our gender or sexuality or whatever may be a lot of people can stand against us but them at the same time. allies or an interesting kind of mix too because wall a lot of people kind of say change my avatar to be this picture or you know i. you know being online and soon you know but you know what should allies really like how can allies truly help how can they truly make a difference when they're fighting for a cause you know beyond just kind of giving you a verbal hey you're doing great you're all believing you i think you know this is something that i've always had conversations around because you know there's

a lot of people who are really fervent supporters of like any kind of marginalized community you know when you think about. a community you think about how some people think that the last a ally or that you know in the black lives matter movement that it wouldn't be successful without you know the allies and i think you know in even as like a marvelous person within myself obviously i don't get taken all the identities in the world so obviously i'm an ally to other people i think if you're in a situation where you're trying to support a movement or a marginalized community and you constantly hear your words your voice more than others you're probably you shouldn't that shouldn't be happening i think sometimes you have to listen and show up and not so much be heard i think sometimes. it is very performative is very a look at me i'm doing this i use all the pronouns i showed up to the protest i made a sign i'm like agree but like. you know you need to sometimes take

a seat back and realize that you know whatever community or cause that you're trying to be an ally to these are very harsh real lived i didn't use the realities and taking up space and talking over people and trying to perform being an ally honestly i think sometimes i don't even like the word ally i think sometimes that you should just be a decent human being in this should be expected things that we have as people like you shooting it like a trophy for like showing up for like women and you shouldn't get a trophy for showing up for like i don't know where trans people you shouldn't you know just be like natural things that just come from being a decent human being but you know i think that's also asked me to my you know what you are going to say thank you for saying that because it's one of the things the black i see a lot amongst in all the kind of ally community and things like that i'm like you guys are you stop performing for yourselves you know stop performing serious selves actually see how you can truly help people and elevate other voices not your own

would your popularity does not help. you. you know but that's kind of the other question i have because it's fascinating to me and you know it's great talking to someone who is right out there both artistically impersonally and making a difference in this world like yourself you're putting out really great music and you put yourself out there that takes a lot of courage and can also take some tonne of creativity and you have both. you know so i want to kind of finish up and ask you this and it's an interesting question that opposed quite a bit to other musicians who sat across from me in these chairs what do you want your legacy to be. there's no right or wrong answer. no i think my legacy. i want to. when i eventually disappear and turn into like

a pile of glitter i want to be remembered as somebody who. really tried to leave things better than when at what i have found you know even if the smallest change i'll be completely grateful i want to be remembered as somebody who love the art of you know southern square and trans people who was always trying to create spaces when they when there weren't any and so as long as like that attach to my legacy that's totally you know i think. there's this great quote from dorian corey in paris is burning and i think it's actually the quote and . she's like give me shoot an arrow and it goes are a high rate for you and i think that's really you know i i don't really get caught up and wondering who's going to remember me when i when i die i think i focus more

slay what am i going to actively being right now being the person the people in the you know my being the person that i need myself to be and as long as i'm very present right now i think the legacy will inform itself and that is our show for you to remember everyone in this world we are not told that we are loved and so i tell you all i love you tyrone but you are watching the hawks have a great day and night everybody.

a fairly significant portion with a little try to get there was a news new york at the salon in china to start with you shirtless with a chick we just like you feel and i mean the streets full well for your clothing or not only do it is made for push me i will push for the sugar i mean keep it us no sugar the financial center. the world is driven by a dream shaped by one person. no

dares thinks. we dare to ask. headline news the european union shuts its external borders for a month in a bid to limit the spread of covert $98.00. the white house scrambles to shield the us economy from a further stock market battering over the coronavirus and then a unveiling a huge stimulus package. plus australian special forces face a backlash after graphic video images showing a shoulder soldier shooting dead an unarmed al. close right. those stories are. on the. all but inevitable global recession.