Automatic Pilot

Last updated

Automatic Pilot was a San Francisco, California band. Created in 1980 by members of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus, they were described by The Advocate as "a non-official offshoot" of SFGMC along with three official subgroups. [1] Automatic Pilot soon came into their own as an independent force, creating a niche at the fringe of the nascent gay musical movement and a new musical style.

Contents

They achieved notoriety early on with songs such as "Sit On My Face" and "Killer Purses" performed at benefits for the SFGMC, Theatre Rhinoceros, and the Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. They derived their name from psychiatric testimony [2] at Dan White's trial for killing Mayor George Moscone and Supervisor Harvey Milk.

History

The ensemble consisted of up to four part vocals led by Matthew McQueen, backed by pianist Karl Brown, with violin, flute/sax, and a string bassist and drummer from the San Francisco Lesbian/Gay Freedom Band.

With an acoustic parody of punk rock as a starting point, writers Brown and McQueen incorporated elements of jazz, classical, theater and the avant-garde into somewhat twisted song structures that are both interesting and accessible. Their sound, dubbed "erotic jazz wave" has been compared to cartoon music, klezmer, and Frank Zappa. Automatic Pilot anticipated the queercore bands by a decade. The post-punk genre fits best due to the time period, punk influence and experimental bent.

Automatic Pilot continued to perform in San Francisco at various venues including the Castro Street Fair, the On Broadway Theater and the Valencia Rose gay performance space, venturing as far as the Chute II Bar in Reno.

Automatic Pilot was covered regularly by local media including the San Francisco Chronicle . [3] [4] The Bay Area Reporter published four full length articles on the band between 1982 and 1985. [5] [6] [7] [8] Their music was featured on regional radio shows including KPFA's Fruit Punch. Nationally, they appeared in the New York Native [9] and The Advocate, which singled them out along with the band Orquestra Sabrosita as vibrant independent artists in contrast to "the financial concerns and artistic reserve of the larger gay cultural institutions" of San Francisco in 1982. [10] They were played on the nationally syndicated Dr. Demento radio show.

In 1983, vocalist Tony Kramedas set out to produce an album for major label release. These recordings, done over time as budget permitted, had a more electric 1980s sound with guitars, synthesizers and drum machines. The project came to a halt when Kramedas became ill; he died in 1985, as have several other band members. During Automatic Pilot's final months, Brown and McQueen became involved in writing and performing music for the original 1984 Theatre Rhinoceros production of The AIDS Show .

The master tapes sat on a shelf until 2002 when the Automatic Pilot website was launched, with many complete recordings in mp3 and ogg format of live performances and studio works, and a detailed history. The site also features music from The AIDS Show and newly rediscovered video (in both H.264/MPEG-4 AVC and MPEG-1 format) from Automatic Pilot's December 1982 performance at the Valencia Rose. The CDs were released in 2005.

Discography

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Mabuhay Gardens</span>

The Mabuhay Gardens, also known as The Fab Mab or The Mab, was a former San Francisco nightclub, located at 443 Broadway Street, in North Beach on the Broadway strip area best known for its striptease clubs. It closed in 1987.

The Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence (SPI), also called Order of Perpetual Indulgence (OPI) is a charity, protest, and street performance organization that uses drag and religious imagery to call attention to sexual intolerance and satirizes issues of gender and morality. Upon their move to San Francisco from Iowa City in 1979, a small group of gay men in San Francisco began wearing the attire of nuns in visible situations using camp to draw attention to social conflicts and problems in the Castro District.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Project Open Hand</span>

Project Open Hand is a California nonprofit organization that provides medically tailored meals and groceries to elderly and homebound people in San Francisco and Alameda County. Founded in 1985 to deliver meals to people with AIDS, it also took over food banks in the 1980s and 1990s and in the 21st century extended its services to include people with other acute and chronic conditions and to serve lunches to seniors. Its headquarters are at 730 Polk Street in the Tenderloin; its CEO is Paul Hepfer.

Randy Shilts was an American journalist and author. After studying journalism at the University of Oregon, Shilts began working as a reporter for both The Advocate and the San Francisco Chronicle, as well as for San Francisco Bay Area television stations. In the 1980s, he was noted for being the first openly gay reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Culture of San Francisco</span>

The culture of San Francisco is major and diverse in terms of arts, music, cuisine, festivals, museums, and architecture but also is influenced heavily by Mexican culture due to its large Hispanic population, and its history as part of Spanish America and Mexico. San Francisco's diversity of cultures along with its eccentricities are so great that they have greatly influenced the country and the world at large over the years. In 2012, Bloomberg Businessweek voted San Francisco as America's Best City.

Bob Ross was the co-founder and former publisher of the Bay Area Reporter and a key gay rights and AIDS activist in San Francisco. For his lifetime work he was inducted into the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association Hall of Fame for creating two of the "most well-respected and enduring LGBT publications in the country".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Bobbi Campbell</span> American nurse and early AIDS activist, born 1952

Robert Boyle "Bobbi" Campbell Jr. was a public health nurse and an early United States AIDS activist. In September 1981, Campbell became the 16th person in San Francisco to be diagnosed with Kaposi's sarcoma, when that was a proxy for an AIDS diagnosis. He was the first to come out publicly as a person with what came to be known as AIDS, writing a regular column in the San Francisco Sentinel, syndicated nationwide, describing his experiences and posting photos of his KS lesions to help other San Franciscans know what to look for, as well as helping write the first San Francisco safer sex manual.

Theatre Rhinoceros or Theatre Rhino is a gay and lesbian theatre based in San Francisco. It was founded in the spring of 1977 by Lanny Baugniet and his partner Allan B. Estes, Jr.. It is a non-profit theater company dedicated to the production of plays by and about gay and lesbian people.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jim Provenzano</span> American journalist

Jim Provenzano is an American author, playwright, photographer and currently an editor with the Bay Area Reporter.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus</span> Worlds first openly gay mens chorus, credited with creating the LGBT choral movement

The San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus (SFGMC) is the world's first openly gay chorus, one of the world's largest male choruses and the group most often credited with creating the LGBT choral movement.

Carol Leigh, also known as The Scarlot Harlot, was an American artist, author, filmmaker, and sex workers' rights activist. She is credited with coining the term sex work and founded the Sex Worker Film and Arts Festival and was the co-founder of BAYSWAN, the Bay Area Sex Worker Advocacy Network.

Audrey Joseph is an American record executive, nightclub owner and manager, and LGBT rights activist.

Henry "Hank" Wilson was a longtime San Francisco LGBT rights activist and long term AIDS activist and survivor. The Bay Area Reporter noted that "over more than 30 years, he played a pivotal role in San Francisco's LGBT history." He grew up in Sacramento, and graduated with a B.A. in education from the University of Wisconsin–Madison in 1971.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Valencia Tool & Die</span>

Valencia Tool & Die, (VT&D), was a 1980s San Francisco music venue and art gallery founded by Peter Belsito and Jim Stockford, that presented punk, new wave, and new music performances, as well as performance art, film, and visual art shows from 1980 through 1983.

Dr. Kathleen Alison McGuire is a choral and orchestral conductor, arranger, composer, music educator, vocalist and multi-instrumentalist. Known also for her work with social justice and human rights organizations, from 2000 to 2010 she served as the first female artistic director and conductor of the San Francisco Gay Men's Chorus – the world's first openly gay choral organization – and in 2010 she established Singers of the Street: a choir of people affected by homelessness in San Francisco. She became a US citizen in 2011 and in 2013 returned to Australia to serve as director of music at Queen's College and co-artistic director of the School of Hard Knocks. In 2006 she was a grand marshal in the San Francisco LGBT Pride Parade. Her contributions have officially been recognized by the California Senate and State Assembly, and "Kathleen McGuire Day" was designated twice in her honor by San Francisco mayors Gavin Newsom and Edwin Lee.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Walt Odets</span> American clinical psychologist and author

Walt Whitman Odets is an American clinical psychologist and author. He has written about the early development, psychological and social experiences of gay men and their communities. Odets' earlier writing focused on the lives of men living in and surviving the early AIDS epidemic. The spring 1996 issue of Positive Impact Journal called him "an important voice in the AIDS education and prevention arena." Odets's 1995 study, In the Shadow of the Epidemic: Being HIV-Negative in the Age of AIDS, was listed by The New York Times as among the "Notable Books of the Year 1995." Additionally, In the Shadow of the Epidemic was the No. 1 bestselling book purchased by gay men in the late fall of 1995, according to The Advocate, and was confirmed as a "Gay Bestseller of 1995" by the Feminist Bookstore News.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">LGBT culture in San Francisco</span> Culture of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people in San Francisco, United States

The lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) community in San Francisco is one of the largest and most prominent LGBT communities in the United States, and is one of the most important in the history of American LGBT rights and activism alongside New York City. The city itself has been described as "the original 'gay-friendly city'". LGBT culture is also active within companies that are based in Silicon Valley, which is located within the southern San Francisco Bay Area.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">San Francisco AIDS Foundation</span> American nonprofit organization

The San Francisco AIDS Foundation (SFAF) is a nonprofit organization dedicated to providing services for people with HIV/AIDS, with a mission to end the AIDS epidemic in the United States. They were founded in 1982, at the beginning of the AIDS epidemic. SFAF is one of the largest and oldest community-based AIDS service organizations in the United States. SFAF has an 87.67% overall rating, and a 97% accountability & transparency rating, at Charity Navigator.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Esta Noche (gay bar)</span> Bar in San Francisco, California, USA

Esta Noche was the first Latino gay bar in San Francisco and notably contributed to queer Latin culture. It operated from 1979 to 2014 and was located at 3079 16th Street between Valencia Street and Mission Street in San Francisco, California.

Henry M. Tavera was an AIDS activist, artistic director, and archivist based in the Mission District of San Francisco, California; his 1979 move to the region put him at the forefront of the AIDS epidemic via his involvement in various HIV/AIDS service organizations as well as AIDS theatre. He also did work around Chicano Gay Activism and teaching/advising. Tavera died on February 27, 2000, at 56 years old from kidney cancer.

References

  1. ↑ Guthman, Edward: "Merry Musicmakers from Coast to Coast". The Advocate, March 5, 1981
  2. ↑ San Francisco Chronicle, May 10, 1979
  3. ↑ "Satiric-Erotic New-Wave Band", page 61. San Francisco Chronicle, September 1, 1982. (Blurb presented as a short article, not a calendar listing)
  4. ↑ Guthman, Edward: "AIDS and the Arts: How the Bay Area Has Been Hit", page 22. San Francisco Chronicle, December 7, 1986 (On the death of Automatic Pilot singer Tony Kramedas)
  5. ↑ De Gracia, Jerry:"Automatic Pilot Soars Into Uncharted Territory" page 32. Bay Area Reporter, April 1, 1982
  6. ↑ "Which Wave?" page 19. Bay Area Reporter, September 30, 1982
  7. ↑ Keane, Peter: "Automatic Pilot Slips Into Cruise Control" page 28. Bay Area Reporter, February 17, 1983
  8. ↑ Sugar, Jon: "Karl Brown: A Crackling Thunderbolt in the Darkest of Skies " page 22-30. Bay Area Reporter, November 14, 1985 (Interview is mainly about Automatic Pilot)
  9. ↑ "San Francisco," page 57. New York Native, April 11–24, 1983 (uncredited performance photo; correction published page 55, April 25 - May 8, 1983)
  10. ↑ Thompson, Mark: "1982 Reviewed: The Promise and Problems of Gay Culture Spotlighted in San Francisco", pages 51-58. The Advocate, January 20, 1983
This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.