Written by Catie Keck
For a generation of queer women, Uh Huh Her, the seminal synth-pop project formed by duo Camila Grey and Leisha Hailey, arrived at a very different moment in visibility. Both artists are successful in their own right. Grey is an active musician who’s toured with acts like Morrissey and Adam Lambert. And Hailey, most renowned for playing the beloved character Alice Pieszecki on The L Word and later on The L Word: Generation Q, has had her hands in various musical, acting, and creative projects. (Hailey hosts the podcast PANTS with fellow L Word alum and longtime collaborator Kate Moennig.)
When Grey and Hailey formed their band in the mid-2000s, queer women were making music and building audiences, but they weren’t often afforded the kind of mainstream exposure enjoyed by many of today’s openly queer artists. Grey tells Lesbian Culture Club that she remembers having to “fight a little bit just to exist on stage.” Now, more than 15 years later, she can see a shift in the cultural landscape. Younger artists, she says, may not have to expend the same energy explaining or justifying who they are at the time she and Hailey were coming up in the scene. At the same time, she acknowledges many of the same—and some new—struggles exist for queer artists today.
This summer, Grey and Hailey released music together again. The duo had remained in touch over the years, but as Grey puts it, they “never expected to come back together like this.” That changed after Kill Rock Stars pitched the pair on getting the band back together. The conversation eventually led them back to their iconic Nocturnes, with Grey spending nearly a year searching her old AOL email for Tchad Blake’s original mixes of the record.
Those mixes became part of Nocturnes: Redux, a new version of the album that also includes two new tracks. Even now, the reunion feels a little surreal. But for a band whose first chapter came together almost as fortuitously as its second, the fact that Grey and Hailey are making music together again still feels like a long-awaited, if not overdue treat for fans.
Your work has always been in dialogue with artists who came before you, from your band’s name, which is a nod to PJ Harvey, to covering “Kool Thing” by Sonic Youth. How do you think about those influences? What draws you to certain artists as touchstones?
Each album we do, I’m always a synth girl. I’m always going back to Depeche Mode, the Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees. That’s just in my blood. When I grew up as a kid, my dad had this incredible vinyl collection, and he would play me records from the time I was two to when I left the house. So my father and his love for music was such an inspiration for me. And there was just so much art behind music back then because I feel like the game was different. It wasn’t commodified as much as it is today.
So when we made the record, I was in a bit of a ’70s mood. And I was listening to Led Zeppelin, all these old albums where the drums were kind of on the forefront and the guitars were super crunchy. And that’s kind of where I started producing. And Leisha put her two cents in, and she had these references like Siouxsie and the Banshees and Liz Phair. It was a magical time for sure.
When Uh Huh Her emerged, queer women were present in music, but they weren't always given the visibility they are today.
Not like they are now. We’re still having to kick doors down a little bit, but obviously paved by the k.d. langs and Melissa Etheridges of the world. But now, to your point, we have the Brandi Carliles, Reneé Rapps, and the Chappell Roans who continue that legacy. But it was built on the shoulders of so many people. It’s fun to be a part of that door opening. We have so many people saying, ‘you changed my life,’ or, ‘you made me come out to my parents,’ or ‘you saved my life.’ You never think you're doing that when you’re doing it because you’re just creating art. But it makes me so happy to know that.
The culture has shifted significantly around queer artistry. What do you think needs to change still?
I feel like the earlier generations, we had to fight a little bit just to exist on stage, and now the younger artists don’t have to spend all that energy on explaining who they are. They can just kind of exist and focus on the work, and I love that. I think it’s hopeful. There’re still doors to be knocked down, but there’s no one way to be queer anymore. It’s so open, and it’s so multifaceted and nuanced, and I also love that. But there’s still struggles, with trans rights and all these things. So we still have a long way to go.
I have to ask about something that’s become part of the band’s mythology: being removed from a flight after you and Leisha kissed. It’s such a wild example of how something completely innocuous can become politicized. Looking back, what do you remember about that experience?
It’s still shocking to me to this day that I got kicked off an airplane for getting a kiss. That’s so crazy. It was so long ago, and from what I remember—and by the way, we weren’t making out by any stretch. I was a bad flyer back then. Now I fly nine months out of the year and I’m fine. But back then. I’d had an experience flying through a hurricane coming from Australia to LA, and I was just an awful flyer. So I needed a little reassurance, and I think she just honestly—she gave me a kiss on the cheek. It was nothing. It was, like you say, so innocuous. There was no one near us. I remember being on my phone and canoodling a little bit, but it was like, ‘Babe, it’s fine, don’t worry about the flight.’
And it was my reaction to what the stewardess said that caused us to get kicked off. Leisha, poor Leish, was just trying to buffer me being feisty with the stewardess because of the verbiage that she had used. And basically she said, ‘This is a family-oriented airline. I need you to stop.’ And we were like, wait, what? And Leisha said, ‘You mean I'm not allowed to kiss my girlfriend because this is a family-oriented airline?’ And the lady with her big fat wedding ring on was like, ‘That’s exactly what I mean.’ I’d never had that thrown at me. And I just reacted from such a guttural, soulful place of feeling like, how dare you? How dare you say that to us? And also we weren't doing anything. We were on our phones. What the hell?
And then it made headlines because Leisha was brave enough to text about the ordeal. And then the next thing we knew, our publicist—I think she got 60 press requests that day or the next day to go on CNN, and Diane Sawyer wanted to interview us. And we had a record coming out. It was coincidentally Nocturnes, and we didn't want it to look like a PR stunt or that we were trying to work some sort of weird angle with it. So we denied all the press about it, and then it kind of just slowly went away. But I wasn’t out of the closet at the time. I was out to my family and friends and all that, but publicly I had never really said anything. And so it kind of blasted me out there for a minute, and that was kind of hilarious.
I can’t imagine that happening in that very specific way today.
At that time Southwest had—I don’t know if you remember—but it was going through this pure nightmare because they kept kicking people off the planes for certain funny reasons. They kicked Billie Joe Armstrong off for having saggy pants, and then a month before that they had kicked Kevin Smith off for being too fat. So they were having a really bad time. I’m happy to be a part of that lore. I do forgive them. I tend to have to fly with them. I eventually was like, ‘I need to search deep in my soul to forgive you.’ It was funny.
I know you’re really into meditation practice. Where are you on that journey now?
I always need to kind of come back to the ground and center. Deepening the practice is always so hard because life is so chaotic, especially now. We’re getting so inundated with constant news cycles and trauma and chaos throughout the world. And we’re digesting it. And it’s so important to be able to quiet your mind. And then I studied Reiki with a woman called Marla Mavis. She’s based out of Hawaii. So I became a Reiki II certified practitioner with her. Life’s so fast right now, and especially with music and the music industry. And the way I’m touring right now, I have to be able to mentally take care of myself.
What’s inspiring you creatively right now?
Silence.
I love that.
I’m not even kidding. I say this to people all the time. I just need to stare at a horizon, like a beautiful landscape, and just be still. That is more inspiring to me than anything right now because, again, I’m so sick of having to inadvertently digest the chaos of the world. I mean, we’re all in it right now. We’re all in it together. You have to put it somewhere. And so for me, it’s my ultimate priority right now just to be silent and still and be mindful. That’s it.
This story has been edited for length and clarity.
For more on Uh Huh Her, including new music and upcoming performances, follow the band on Instagram or explore their latest release, Nocturnes: Redux.
