The Nonconformists
Originals, iconoclasts, nonconformists—whatever word you choose, they are artists who don’t take kindly to rules. In fact, they make their own. Laura Jane Grace, of the nearly two-decade punk vets Against Me!, whose own personal evolution from her previous identity as Tom Gabel, informed the band’s bold new sixth album Transgender Dysphoria Blues; Big Freedia, New Orleans’ “Queen of Bounce”, star of her own reality show on the Fuse network, who is undeniably a nonconformist; and Sharon Needles, the take-no-prisoners 2012 champion of RuPaul’s Drag Race, as unapologetically unfiltered as a drag artist has ever been, who released her debut album, PG-13, last year. John Norris, the former MTV News anchor and current supervising producer at Fuse News, will moderate this conversation, that will look at first, each of these individuals' own stories—how they got where they are through not always easy paths, and how their own identities have impacted their music.