Against Me!

Against Me! is an anarchist punk band founded by lead singer Laura Jane Grace in Gainesville, Florida in the mid-1990s. The current band roster is Grace (vocals/guitar), James Bowman (guitar), Andrew Seward (bass), and Atom Willard (drums).

Against Me! grew out of the DIY punk scene in North Central Florida. Grace put together their first demo tape, Against Me! (Demo), at her mother’s house in 1996. The band released their first three albums through indie labels, and toured heavily to support them. They gained a significant following, and in the 2000s they started to receive critical praise and attention from major labels.

After being courted by record labels on and off for years, they finally signed a two-album deal with Sire Records. For the band members, the years under contract were the most stressful in their history together. The albums were well-received generally, but some veteran fans saw the record deal as a betrayal of the principles the band was founded on.

When the band’s affiliation with Sire ended in November 2010, Grace and Against Me! returned to the comparative freedom of indie labels and self-released material. Privately, however, Grace had been suffering for years from gender dysphoria. She came out as transgender to her band members, and consulted a publicist to decide how to come out publicly. The decision was made, and in a Rolling Stone interview published in May 2012, she came out to the world as a transgender woman.

Not all of the band members stayed, but after some personnel changes, Against Me! resumed touring. In 2014 they released their sixth studio album, Transgender Dysphoria Blues, to critical acclaim. While earlier albums had some lyrics that hinted at feelings of gender dysphoria, this was the first to confront the topic unabashedly.

Against Me! continues to be an important and influential punk band; Grace herself has become a trans icon. To date, the band has released seven studio albums, two live albums, and four EPs. Their most recent album, Shape Shift With Me was released in 2016.