Christine explains her experience in the music business:
"I struggled with describing myself as a 'pioneer' but before my band
Glamazon (1995-2001) very few transsexual heavy metal musicians made it into
working bands. Certainly, punk rock has had a few, and countless guys
have played up androgyny or did drag onstage, but actual transsexual
women in working heavy metal bands were unheard of. Given the masculine,
"cock rock" aspect of metal, it's unsurprising few transwomen regularly
performed live or released CDs. In that sense 'pioneer' is accurate.
"It wasn't until I joined the US Air Force that I overcame my insecurity
enough to learn guitar or dared to sing. By the time I had talent worthy
of other muscians I had begun my transsexual transition, and my poor
reception as a TS woman by other muscians and the public in general made
me despair I'd never perform in a band. In 1986 I found three other
rocker transwomen but our dreams of an all-transsexual rock band fell apart
because we were all drug addicts. When I crippled my left hand during a PCP
blackout in December of that year I wrote off ever being a musician.
"I got clean and sober two years later, but as a left handed guitarist
I was a shadow of my former self. In 1993 I met an unparallel female
guitar player and we founded Glamazon. Having a transsexual lead singer
and a female band leader made a rhythm section difficult to fill, but by
February of 1995 we had played our first gig in San Francisco. The next
year we recorded our first and only CD.
"While our unique gender composition worked against us, the metal genre
we favored had begun its decline years before we founded the band. Like
most other bands we struggled to build an audience, and like many we
became dispirited. As I approached my 44th birthday I finally admitted
I had grown too old to balance the stressful hours of an indie rocker
against my corporate day job. Thus I quit Glamazon at the end of 2001
and we went our separate ways.
"I continue to play guitar and sing every day though, save for parties
and one-off solo appearances, for the most part my only audience is my
cats. I continue to use my band-acquired sound engineering skills and
knowledge in my filmmaking projects and have played guitar on some of
my film projects. My cofounder of Glamazon and I plan to work together
on an untitled music project. Currently she does music scores and
music consulting for me."