{"id":1602,"date":"2013-08-31T14:32:10","date_gmt":"2013-08-31T18:32:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/?p=1602"},"modified":"2016-11-11T14:55:54","modified_gmt":"2016-11-11T19:55:54","slug":"meet-schmekel-the-smutty-dorky-politically-provocative-trans-jewcore-band-from-brooklyn","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/meet-schmekel-the-smutty-dorky-politically-provocative-trans-jewcore-band-from-brooklyn\/","title":{"rendered":"Meet Schmekel! The Smutty, Dorky, Politically provocative Trans Jewcore Band from Brooklyn"},"content":{"rendered":"

Author | Hannibal Alexander<\/p>\n

If one of the main goals of starting a band is to stand out, than Brooklyn-based band Schmekel is doing an excellent job at hitting that goal. \u201cIf The Kinks, a klezmer band, Weird Al, and Frank Zappa has a weird baby,\u201d bassist Nogga Schwartz illustrates, \u201cthat kind of starts to paint a picture of what we sound like.\u201d And that\u2019s just the beginning of the group’s uniqueness that has made them stars in New York\u2019s rising Transcore scene.
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The four piece band is made up of loud and proud Transgendered Jews, with a name that means \u201clittle penis\u201d in Yiddish. Their debut album \u201cQueers on Rye\u201d includes shock-worthy titles like \u201cFondle the PSA Agent\u201d and \u201cTranny Chaser\u201d that balance being fun, funny, controversial and thought-provoking simultaneously. Lucian Kahn, guitarist and vocalist, adds \u201cOur songs are smutty and politically provocative, but hopefully not hurtful.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Schmekel\u2019s humor is what helped formed the group. After meeting at a transmasculine group in the West Village of New York City, drummer Simcha Halpert-Hanson explains, \u201cLucian made a joke about the hilarity of a Jewish transgender band called \u2018Schmekel\u2019. We also all wanted to play klezmer and punk rock in one band\u2026 Because we\u2019re dorks clearly.\u201d Of course the members had their musical aspirations before that conversation, with inspirations ranging from Tori Amos, Oingo Boingo, Smashing Pumpkins, and genres as diverse as jazz, metal and industrial goth.<\/div>\n

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In their personal lives each band members transitions affected their musical identity in positive ways. One example was the confidence boost keyboard and vocalist Ricky Riot experienced: \u201cI am more confident now that I am older and that my outsides match my insides. Wait, that sounded gross.\u201d While Lucian says his transition effected his vocals most, \u201cGetting a low, masculine singing voice was a complete game-changer for me; I suddenly sounded like my idea of myself for the first time in my late 20\u2019s\u201d.<\/div>\n

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Soon enough the band started recording and performing and making a name for themselves in the Transcore scene which Lucian says is \u201cstarting to gain momentum, with bands like GLTR PNCH, Girlcrush, and Penguin representing all sides of the gender spectrum.\u201d Schmekel\u2019s infectious performances of songs like \u201cThe Mohel Song\u201d and \u201cShark Attack\u201d have given them a wide range of adoring fans, Ricky comments on the positive effect their music is having, \u201cI didn\u2019t actually expect our music to be a source of emotional support for anyone. I feel blessed to be playing that role.\u201d Lucian says, \u201cI\u2019ve been surprised by the enthusiasm of my grandmother\u2019s generation. The media tries to depict old people as sort of stodgy and prudish, but there are a lot of 80 year old Jews who love dirty jokes.\u201d<\/div>\n

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The twisted humor in their song lyrics are meant to shock and embed themselves in the listeners mind, forcing them to think about the social and political issues the songs address. \u201cMost of what Schmekel says is from our own experience,\u201d Ricky says of the groups content, \u201cthe humor is intentional but the message just comes with the territory. When lyrics get described as \u2018offensive\u2019 or \u2018explicit\u2019, people often don\u2019t distinguish between having messages that are problematic and trigger people, and just being adult content. Schmekel doesn\u2019t try to push buttons, we have plenty to say without being nudniks.\u201d<\/div>\n

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There is a fine line in writing socially conscious yet somewhat satirical lyrics, which Lucian says comes naturally to him, explaining, \u201cI actually don\u2019t find the funny\/serious balance challenging, probably because of the way I was raised. I come from a long line of sarcastic New York Jews who use humor to respond to prejudice, illness, and death. It\u2019s basically in my DNA.\u201d<\/div>\n

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Schmekel promise to stick to their winning formula on their upcoming album \u201cThe Whale That Ate Jonah,” but they are also doing things a little different on the project, starting with more punk influences and just showcasing their evolution as musicians. Nogga also hints at a more collaborative feel remarking, \u201cthe writing process of this album involved more of a group effort,\u201d while Lucian suggests to expect \u201ca healthy dose of ridiculousness\u201d while tackling social and political issues like \u201ctransmisogyny, gentrification, anti-genderqueer sentiment, trans men in gay male spaces, trans identity in Orthodox Jewish spaces.\u201d<\/div>\n

 
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The near future for Schmekel includes more performing and recording and spreading their message as far as it can go, speaking proudly and openly about the LGBT and Jewish communities. Lucian seeks to use their platform to give a different image of the Transgendered community. He reveals, \u201cTranspeople are just people with a particular sort of obstacles and experiences. We\u2019re not space aliens.” While Ricky wants to continue entertaining people commenting, \u201cI just want everyone to laugh and dance and have fun, and know that they\u2019re not alone and that we\u2019re not alone either.\u201d<\/div>\n
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For more information visit Schmekel’s website:\u00a0http:\/\/transjews.com\/<\/a><\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Author | Hannibal Alexander If one of the main goals of starting a band is to stand out, than Brooklyn-based band Schmekel is doing an excellent job at hitting that goal. \u201cIf The Kinks, a klezmer band, Weird Al, and Frank Zappa has a weird baby,\u201d bassist Nogga Schwartz illustrates, \u201cthat kind of starts to\u2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1606,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2065],"tags":[61,155,157,153,152,81,57,156,44,135,134,38,151,62,154],"yst_prominent_words":[],"class_list":["post-1602","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-culture","tag-brooklyn","tag-hannibal-alexander","tag-hardcore","tag-jewcore","tag-jewish","tag-lgbtq","tag-music-2","tag-musicians","tag-nyc","tag-posture","tag-posture-magazine","tag-queer","tag-shmekel","tag-trans","tag-transcore"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/Schmekelpic_small.jpg?fit=1432%2C1432","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6QBV8-pQ","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1602","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1602"}],"version-history":[{"count":25,"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1602\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1633,"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1602\/revisions\/1633"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1602"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1602"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1602"},{"taxonomy":"yst_prominent_words","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/posturemag.com\/online\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/yst_prominent_words?post=1602"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}