STORMY FOSTER RETURNS: Chapter Four
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CHAPTER FOUR: “I ONLY CAME TO DANCE WITH YOU.” TIME + PLACE: THE YEAR 1992 @ THE OFFICES OF ANSONIA RECORDS, FAIRFIELD, NEW JERSEY.
My phone’s been ringing off the hook today! I haven’t had any lunch yet, so I’ve got an excuse to have the receptionist hold my calls. Take a little break from the crystal ball, and sit back. You might already know this, but there’s a connection between me and somebody famous. Part of that connection is coincidental, and part of it is deliberate. It’s something I need to explain to you my damn self.
A master sergeant that I knew in the US Army pulled my coat to Il Salvatore - Stormy Foster, the Great Defender. Dude was a bonafide super-powered hero, even though history has branded him a criminal. During World War II, he foiled a plot by Adolph Hitler to scapegoat Gay people and distract attention from the activities of Nazi spies! In the Hawaiian islands, Stormy became a costumed legend but he ended his life as an ordinary US Army enlisted man. He died in combat on a European battlefield, leaving behind an incredible legacy of Gay activism.
Cherylanne was a stoned Stormy Foster fan; she collected all the pictures and newspaper clippings about him that she could find. Cher thought she might even write a book someday. Then she got hung up on another master sergeant in our platoon - dude looked like a cross between Sylvester Stallone and Hulk Hogan! And he got hung up on her, too. They started dating, and a few months later she married him. Her interest in Stormy kind of waned after that! Not mine, though - I took up where she left off, and became an even bigger fan.
First of all, Il Salvatore had the same nickname as me. That’s the coincidence. Now let’s get to the deliberate part. I started wanting to be like this dude! He had the rad-est costume ever: Pecs, lats and thighs for days, ragazzi. And the way it emphasized his glutes was nice, too - although those goofy white gloves he wore reminded me of Mickey Mouse. The original Stormy also had a sidekick: an awesome king-sized parrot with rainbow-colored feathers. The name of that pappagallo was reported as "Snooks" - it was female, and she got nearly as much newspaper copy as he did.
So, according to legend, Il Salvatore had power over the four elements: Air, water, earth and fire. He could make powerful winds blow, create water spouts in the sea, make trees spring up out of the ground, and even shoot fireballs from his fingertips! Just like a superman, he could soar high over the islands - molto kewl. But the dopest thing about the Great Defender is the kind of hero that he was.
Dude didn't fight super-villains or chase after space aliens or save women from burning buildings - although he reportedly did do the latter at least once. Not putting too fine a point on it, Stormy wasn’t concerned with the welfare of gender-conforming folks. He was an advocate for and a protector of Gay men, Lesbians and Transpeople - 'way back in the 1940s!
He was accused of being a male "Tokyo Rose" - if you never heard of her, she was an infamous Japanese propagandist, and Japan was one of the Axis powers aligned against America. Rose broadcast over a pirate radio bandwidth, and so did Stormy; they called his transmissions incitement to criminal behavior, but that was straight-up bogus! Dude wasn't fomenting criminality or undermining our national defense efforts - another lie that the media spread about him. He was sending out messages of Gay pride, and they were the first ones heard anywhere in the world.
Back then, if you were Gay or Trans - I don't use the word "Queer" because it's hella ignorant - you could be committed to a mental institution or sent to jail. Gender non-conformity was actually against the law, and you fucking had to hide. But in his radio broadcasts, Il Salvatore shot down all the scandalous shit they used to say about us - that we were sex criminals, child molesters, disease-spreaders and mentally disturbed predators. Faith leaders even claimed that we were gelo di satana . . . Spawn of Satan!
That was the main accusation thrown at us by an evil-ass evangelist known as "Deacon" Diamond Faws. This grande stronzo was preaching fire and brimstone against the mahu - that's a Hawaiian word for gender non-conformists - and his sermons would whip Gay bashers into a frenzy.
All over the islands, bashers targeted any dude with a switchy walk and any babe who wore a butch haircut and sensible shoes! The mahu got beaten, “correctively” raped, driven from their homes and all but lynched; but time and again, Stormy and Snooks the Parrot would open up a can of whip ass on those sporchi bastardi. They helped many victims of vigilante violence escape serious injury.
HERO OR VILLAIN? THE ORGINAL STORMY FOSTER.
You want a wine cooler? There’s some here in my office ‘fridge. I’m gonna have one; my throat feels dry. Ahhh, that’s what I needed . . . hope I don’t get buzzed while I’m talking to you! Where was I? Oh, yeah, Stormy’s heroic exploits. In 1943, The Great Defender staged a protest against the US military for excluding Gay recruits. Then he helped Hawaiian Lesbians fight back against i poliziotti when one of their secret gathering places got raided. That was twenty-five years before the Stonewall riots happened - incredibile, non lo é?
Some historians say that these events never happened, that both they and Il Salvatore are just tall tales; but there were witnesses, and thanks to Cherylanne, I've seen some surviving photos of Stormy Foster in action. One of them - my favorite - shows a "Gay is good" streamer that dude waved overhead as he glided over Oahu!
As a soldier, I got to travel to Hawaii, and I visited a lot of the places where The Great Defender is said to have appeared. That's also where I learned to dance hula, which I later taught to my back-up dancers. In 1992, I went back to Honolulu and recorded two albums at Baby Grand Studios; that's where Stormy Foster's secret broadcasts are said to have originated from.
Fade out from my hitch in the military, which happened in the late 2010s, and fade into me starting my Rap career in the late 1980s. That's right - forty years earlier! That was the last time I got “bounced” into another era; I found myself in Milano, where Hip-Hop and Rap were starting to become a thing.
Not to brag, but I’ve always known how to rap. I’m damn good, too! In the 2020s I had occasionally MC’d at shows. After settling down in Italy and checking out the club scene, I decided to go for it in a serious way. From being "bounced" into various European countries, I'd learned to speak several languages. I picked up on Italian molto veloce, but I didn't know then that I actually had Italian roots. Back then, because of my dark skin I assumed that I was Hispanic. I was still using "Don Señorito" as my stage name.
Outside a Hip-Hop club in Viale Alemagna where I was MC’ing, I met this sunburned old beggar. O dio mio! Not for nothing, but dude was stank. He smelled like cum, piss and raw shit! They called him "Gabinetto" just for that reason; but I took a liking to him in spite of his hygiene problem. I got Gabi into a bathtub, got him some medicine, food and clothes, and then we started hanging out.
And would you believe it? Gabinetto told me he was born in Hawaii, and that he'd been alive when Stormy Foster was on the scene. What's more, he practiced an ancient Hawaiian religion called Kauwa; it teaches that Gay people were the founders of humanity and ambassadors of peace from the gods. He believed that Il Salvatore had also been a divine emissary. Gabi didn’t convert me, but dude damn sure raised my consciousness.
During this time, I got hip to an organization called the Diamond Trust. Headquartered in Rome, it was the source of some seriously fucked-up propaganda! Basically, it was the same old cassata that Diamond Faws had peddled in the ‘40s, only with a wack gender identity twist; and just like before, it was stoking molto anti-Gay hostility. The name rang alarm bells; could this Diamond Trust be somehow affiliated with the notorious Deacon Diamond? It could be and it was, but I wouldn’t find out just how until much later.
It knocked me flat on my culo marrone when I saw the CEO being interviewed on TV. Maybe she called herself Alexandra Diamond, but I would’ve known her anywhere: it was Cheryl-fucking-Blossom! And right after I saw that interview, those hella scary waking dreams started again; this time, I saw Cheryl watching me from a distance and beckoning me to come to her.
Figlio di puttana! I hoped that I wouldn’t be “bounced” through time again; I wanted to confront that bitch and find out what the fuck she wanted with me. What did she do to me? Was she responsible for my time-jumping? I also wanted to clap back at that toxic rhetoric she was spreading. It wasn’t my only motivation to start writing Gay Liberation Rap songs, but it definitely was the main one.
STORMY FOSTER DROPS IT LIKE IT’S HOT!
Back off, baby!
I can't dig that song.
You sayin' my body's wrong
For my gender?
Why don't you quit it?
I ain't be down with it!
What I am, I'm gonna stay.
Ain't no shame
In my sissy man game!
"Trans" and "Gay" are not the same.
No sex change for me today,
Ain't no fuckin' way!
Your Queer Theory rap is
A friendship-ender.
I actually tried to go see Ms. Alexandra Diamond at her office in Rome. No luck: That Diamond Trust building was locked down tighter than a maximum security prison! You couldn’t just walk in, and if you weren’t somebody important you didn’t stand a chance of getting an appointment with la direttrice. Maybe I wasn’t an important person yet, but I fully intended to become one; my raps were gonna make that happen, and after they did I’d go back there. She wouldn’t refuse to meet with a star.
Soon after hooking up with Gabinetto, I got myself a manager - my man Albert Fox. Foxie is Gay but very much "On the DL" - getting him to admit being una dama was like pulling teeth! But we got together both professionally and personally. The booty aspect of our relationship wasn't permanent, but it was jood while it lasted!
A STORMY FOSTER BOOTY CALL.
One of the reasons I hired Foxie was because he knew all about The Great Defender legend. If anything, he was even more caught up in it than I was! Dude told me that I resembled pictures of Stormy Foster - Cherylanne had said that, too. He really got turnt when I told him "Stormy" was my nickname! That's when that devious music biz mind of his started working overtime.
Foxie figured that since I was becoming known for my Gay Pride raps, why not leverage that resemblance into an off-da-hook Rap act? Dude wanted to promote me as the reincarnation of Stormy, right down to wearing a facsimile of his costume on stage!
Veramente, I didn't want to do it at first; it seemed kind of disrespectful. Besides, I was like most rappers in that I only wanted my music to make people dance. Was I going to be on some kinda holy mission now? That's a seriously heavy lift.
Only one man could convince me to do it, and guess who it was? Sì, Gabinetto. Gabi reminded me that I was committed to the same ideals that Il Salvatore had stood for. He kissed me on the forehead and said: "This is the will of the gods! You are the reincarnated Great Defender, and you’re going to raise the consciousness of our people, just like he did during the War." Square biz, y'all - it felt like being anointed!
