Travis Jhue: 1. How have you been lately Gary, anything good and new going on?

Gary: I am fine, as one gets older the body falls apart a bit but you get used to it. I have been doing The Buddha Brothers for a few years now its blues and country and I love the band but it is changing a little and i am trying to get the sound more raw, simple, you know. I do a two man thing with Doug Hilsinger on guitar and me playing harmonica and singing now and then. And i do lots of art. I had a show in Austin during SxSW.

Travis Jhue: When you first moved to Austin, were there any problems with your sexuality in the scene there? cause I know in all, that scene was and still is very diverse.

Gary: Not really, we were not into it to look pretty or whatever and there were a few of of us queer punks in the club we were mostly big and not that nice if fucked with. A few "fags" now and then could be heard but we would shoot back "we are all going to take you out back and beat your fuckiing ass". And soon all the best bands had a queer or two so it was pretty smooth. We all had the common enemy of the Frets. It was better to save the fight for them,

Travis Jhue: "The Dicks Hate The Police," any good story you could tell us that brought that on, or is it just the simple fact that "a good cop is a sorry myth".. and they all suck

Gary: Glen Taylor wrote most of that song. He came in one day and had the music and most of the words I added just a verse or so, I am a Buddhist now and really do not want to hate anybody, some people make that hard, though. Cops are weird, very odd indeed. A friend long ago in Austin was playing music very loud at night and the police came to tell him to turn it down and when they pounded on the door he was playing "Hate the Police" they told him to keep the music down, then said "So, you like the Dicks, do you?" when he told me that i sort of was proud and freaked out.

Travis Jhue: Dave Dictor, how did that friend ship all start?

Gary: He and I hung out just the other day at a radio sation he's in SF being interviewed, he said we met once with me hitch hiking and he picked me up. I don't remember so that sounds good to me. I moved into a house he had lived in in Austin, The Dicks and M.D.C. all started around the same time.

Travis Jhue: What do you think about bands like Limp Wrist?, they actually wrote a song about you and other's as well titled "Ode" right? Same as the Butthole Surfers as well. How did all that make you feel in the end?

Gary: Limp Wrist are some of the nicest people in the world, no joke. Very respectful of me and the other old fags who were doing it a long time ago and I love them. The BHS wrote Gary Floyd because I freaked them out by some of my stage pranks way back in the really early days and I feel really happy and proud when bands I respect very much sing about me, shit yeah!

Travis Jhue: How did the 2004 and 2005 reunion shows go?

Gary: Good enough that we play a couple of times a year now, we have shows in Texas coming up in Oct, anyone could be the last one but so far we are having fun being old punks, god knows being young ones was a blast.

Travis Jhue: How did it feel being one of the first openly gay musicians in the punk scene back in the early 80's? was it hard to get shows out of Austin with bands like The Big Boys etc..?

Gary: It never seemed weird to me because I was so open, I met up with plenty of people who hated me I'm sure because I was gay but I had some pretty rough guys in the Dicks, so they left me alone, and really I usually was nice enoough and real enough that things were smooth. I was lucky that we played with bands like Fear, Black Flag, Minor Threat, Circle Jerks, Mike Watt etc. And they all really liked us and they liked me so no body beat me up or even said shit to me.

Travis Jhue: I have to know this cause Dave Dictor once told me this story when I was living with M.D.C. in Portland but was it true that you would post flyer's for fictional venues before The Dicks actually even started playing?

Gary: Yes. All the time. I couldn't see why not really having a band to play should stop me from pretending to have a band. Then when I met Glen and Buxf i told them i had a band but needed some new players, they loved the story that we were a LIE for a while.

Travis Jhue: Was San Fransisco a good move on the bands part to relocate to?

Gary: I thought so but the other guys didn't. They moved back and I stayed, it was a weird thing to do on my part but I did it. It was a very sore spot for a few years but we are like brothers and got over it after a while.

Travis Jhue: What got you into Punk?

Gary: It was like the Cultural Revolution in China, the new overthrowing the old!! heads had to roll. It was new and real and the poor folks could do it better than the rich folks. It was alive and took on a life beyond what any of us thought, but soon it and the record industry started sniffing a buck and some of the punks got into the industry like the Cultral Revolution it blew it self out now 30 yers later you see kids dressed EXACTLY like we used to dress I mean a copy of 30 years ago, that's funny and sad to me.

Travis Jhue: The Rock Against Reagan Tour. Did you meet any new friends with the bands that played?

Gary: That was a crazy tour, but yes I made a few life time friends, one of the tour managers Christy Robb was a wild woman and she and I have stayed close over the long years. The Crusifucks were life savers during the whole thing. Doc Dart was a real wonderful guy. Steve, the drummer, who has played with Sonic Youth was one of the nicest guys in the world, lots of nice people, MDC were already friends, and we, The Dicks, got a lot closer during the three months we were on the road. To bad we broke up when it ended.


Travis Jhue: Any good stories from that tour?

Gary: Everyday was a new weird story, I think I told you about Doc chasing people in the crowd with a razor. Good times.


Travis Jhue: Looking at The Dicks then and now everyones older and all that jazz, at first you guys were labeling your selves as a Communist band right? now going on almost 30 years later (wow, has it really been that long haha) what are your views on that now?

Gary: I have a big ole spiritual side that I am loving and have been into for a little over 20 years, sort of Hindu and sort of Buddhist that, and my lover are the high points of my life, then comes music and all that. I am still a communist in my heart though a 'small 'c' communist. No member of any stupid party or any thing like that, I am an anarchist-communist-hindu-punk, nice to meet you!! we are older now and as always feel no need to live up to anything, or live down anything, just old mean men with big hearts.

Travis Jhue: What caused The Dicks to split?

Gary: They wanted to return to Austin and I wanted to stay in San Francisco. That did it. Although other things were happening that looking back would hve broken us up, that different vision of what we all saw as best for the band split us up. I reformed some good people and named us the dicks but it really wasn't the Dicks at all. I wish I had just kept doing the songs and renamed the band, But I did not do that. I thought at the time I was doing the right thing. We live and learn. The 'new' Dicks put out a great album These People and the e.p. No Fucking War, and I Hope You Get Drafted but Alternative Tenticals won't put it out on C.D., I don't know why!!

Travis Jhue: Any last words?

Gary: Just, Bee Happy, Buzzzzzzzzzzzz

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