38. Trans-sister Radio: Synth Icon Wendy Carlos

If you’ve ever enjoyed disco, EDM, changed your voice with
auto-tune, or danced along to Daft Punk, you’ve got the subject
of today’s episode to thank! In this episode of History is Gay,
Leigh is joined by guest host Hannah van Rhee (they/them) of the
QueerSounds Podcast to talk about Wendy Carlos, electronic music
pioneer, synthesizer queen, film soundtrack composer
extraordinaire, and trans woman! We’ll get into all the exciting
details, like weird stories about Stanley Kubrick during A
Clockwork Orange, comedy albums with Weird Al Yankovic, living
inside a faraday cage, and more cats than you can shake a dangly,
shiny stick at.


Our wonderful guest host for this episode, Hannah van Rhee, can
be found on twitter at @duchessofdeer, and you can follow their
podcast QueerSounds on twitter @queersoundspod, Instagram
@queersoundspod, and at www.queersounds.com.


Outline
00:00 – Introduction
5:01 – Main Topic: Trans-sister Radio: Synth Icon Wendy
Carlos
7:09 – Socio-Historical Context
13:06 – A Note on Sources
14:23 – Who were they? Bio Time.
48:09 – Why do we think they're gay? 
52:15 - 52:58 — Content warning: Descriptions of dysphoria and
internalized transphobia
53:23 - 54:07 — Content warning: Suicidal ideation
1:07:36 – Word of the Week
1:20:46  – Main Takeaways and Final Conclusions: Wendy
Carlos’ Legacy
1:28:54 – How Gay were They?
1:31:34 – Closing and Where to Find us Online


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