Meet Early Girl, a neon grunge indie punk band based in Iowa City. Its members consist of frontperson Aaron Longoria (any pronouns), Max LeaVesseur (he/him), Aaron Moseley (he/him), and Chloe Weidl (she/her). Weidl gets drumming support from Connor Woods (he/him) of Hambone and the Maple Babies and Second Half whenever she’s on tour with her other band, Thelma and the Sleaze.
The band rehearses in a house in Lisbon, surrounded by lush trees and greenery against a red brick road. I recently stopped by to see the band and get a tour of the house/studio DIY space; there’s Willy Wonka-type wallpaper and trinkets sprinkled everywhere, including Woods' medieval sword collection. Pretty soon the rest of the band came trickling in, hiking their instruments upstairs to the attic, their rehearsal space.
It’s toasty in the attic, but it’s a kid’s dream hangout space, a place to escape to, one where you can create your own world. Amps and XLR cables litter the wood-paneled floor. The drums sit right against a window, microphones hanging over them, zip tied to the ceiling. In the back is the band's makeshift recording booth — an even hotter room with curtains hanging against the walls. It’s very much DIY, and that’s how Early Girl likes it.
Longoria used to make solo music under the name tomato boy. When forming this band, they were looking to stay in theme; as an old bandmate rattled off tomato variants, Early Girl stuck out.
“The flipped gender felt significant considering how I had begun identifying comfortably as nonbinary by that point and liked the fluidity,” Longoria says. “We were almost named Better Boy.”
Punk has been a sanctuary for Early Girl, as it provided them a way to just be.
“The folks here [are] pretty accepting of everybody and just let you go,” Moseley, bassist, says. “I overthink and get too caught up in my own thoughts, so it’s nice to just be able to [play], and people appreciate what you’re doing.”
“I think it kind of adds accessibility and community building,” LeaVesseur, guitarist, agrees. “I grew up [with] more of a formal music background, and it’s pretty easy to feel like you’re not good enough.”
Longoria met everyone else through mutual passion for the DIY/punk scene in Iowa City, either by going to each others' shows or playing alongside each other before they were officially a band.
“There’s a deep mutual respect we have for each other’s artistry and musicality that drew us to each other as friends in the first place,” Longoria says. “We all share a vision of wanting to be more than a band making music, but a group that is tangibly creating community and providing a space where we can uplift other artists and voices.”
There are permanent support beams in place within the punk and LGBTQ communities, and they hold each other up with a strength and message that’s very universal: music is for everyone.
“For a long time, being in the closet [in Iowa] just felt super, like, ‘Oh, I’ve got to conform to this idea of living in a small town in Iowa, otherwise I’m worried about being targeted,” Woods says. “But I think punk definitely has that special place. Not only are we going to be super accepting of all the people in our community, but we’re not going to be afraid to really stand up and say, ‘Hey, this stuff that’s going on [in the world] is really messed up and we need to be more vocal about it.’”
“[Punk] really is just that refuge and sanctuary for a lot of queer and trans people,” Longoria says. “Especially in Iowa, [where] rights are being stripped away, it just transcends drama and beef. It’s just person to person, you’re there for each other.”
“Everybody’s just being very genuine,” Moseley adds. “I feel like a big issue we have in the world today is disingenuous personalities. So, with the punk scene and everybody being themselves, it makes me feel more comfortable being myself.”
Fashion ties the communities together as well. The cliche “punk” outfit rocks chains, black clothes, teased and spiked hair, facial piercings and tattoos, with the queer community bleeding into that alongside their own unique styles.
If you’ve seen Early Girl in concert, a big piece of their appearance is their hand-stitched pink and purple uniforms, crafted by Longoria.
“I make our outfits and people are like, ‘Wow, you kind of look like Alice in Wonderland,’” Longoria laughs. “And I’m like, ‘Yeah, but that’s punk.’”
But punkness is not about what you look like on the exterior; it’s the way you act.
“Punk is a style and an aesthetic, but everything’s like, ‘blank-core,'" Longoria says. "And while that does describe the sound and people who look a certain way [or] make music sometimes in a certain way, I see punk as an ethos. It’s really more about what you’re actually doing and the actions.”
The punk/LGBTQ solidarity is also intersectional across race. In the 2020 Census, Iowa’s population was majority white, at 82.3%.
“When I first started getting into the scenes it was a lot of white boys in basements,” Longoria says. “I started to go to more shows and that’s when I started seeing a lot of queer people on stage. I was like, ‘Cool, I can do that.’”
It’s hard to find bands like Early Girl in this state, especially with Longoria at the front.
“I love all the fat, brown and not-passing trans people,” Longoria says. “Based on how the media landscape is, [punk] is just relying so much on the visual, [which] is a huge detriment. If [people] are looking on their phone and looking at punk sh*t, it looks a certain way and it’s turning people away from punk because they don’t feel like that’s their space."
With Longoria as the most visible face, Early Girl presents themselves as a ‘queer’ band. While some members don’t identify as part of the LGBTQ community, they’re staunch allies.
“I think any community is only as strong as those supporting it and the allies that come and step up … that’s what makes me really happy about my band,” Longoria says. “I have people who are incredibly supportive of me and who are willing to put themselves out there as a queer band.”
Early Girl was the very first band I ever saw in when I moved to Iowa, so it felt like a full-circle moment when they booted up their amps and rehearsed a few songs for me. Right before they started, Longoria flashed me a pin on their guitar strap that says “DIY F*G.”
Man, I love queer punks.
Early Girl is set to play the Iowa City Pride Fest on June 20.
