TMC interview: Nathan, bassist for the Gossip talks bullies, Beth and exclusively reveals his favourite cake

words by Anna Leach, pictures by Holly Falconer

Nathan used to get bullied at school. Kids would heckle and victimise him for looking gay though the nerdy kid from Arkansas, famous for being the bass-player in the Gossip has always been straight. I guess his penchant for goth t-shirts, heavy-rimmed glasses and Riot Grrrl music didn’t exactly give out a macho vibe in the small-town South.

When we saw Nathan in London after the Gossip’s Forum gig we didn’t heckle or victimise him at all, we gave him some cake, which he kindly ate for us on camera and then sat down and had a little chat.

To be honest, I felt a bit more intimidated by him, Nathan is a pretty cool boy. He is the straight man to Beth Ditto’s fashion femme and Hannah’s cute dykey drummer, and like a lot of straights who hang around with gays, he’s pretty Hipster, capital H.

Him and Beth started the Gossip back in 1999 when they both met as teenagers in Arkansas. Beth was obviously a pretty big personality even back then, but what Nathan remembers of meeting Beth and her friends was that they were funny. (And they really are… all of the band are GSOH-equipped, perhaps they had to be sharp-tongued kids, perhaps because they just are).

Part of the ethos behind the band was punky boredom – getting shit moving: “We started a band ’cause we were bored” they told MTV: “Our mission is to make you dance, and if you’re not gonna dance, just stay at home and listen to the oldies station.”

They’ve always been happy to stir things up politically as well as on the dancefloor. Partly because they all started off listening to Riot Grrrl, a movement where music has always been meshed with messages.

“Coming from a DIY punk rrriot girl background, politics have always been at the forefront of our lives,” says Nathan “I grew up being into Bikini Kill, Huggi Bear, and they always made feminist points.”

Far from feeling it distracts from the music or puts too much emphasis on Beth and Hannah as the band’s gay and female members – Nathan’s really proud of it.

“It feels good to be in a band that even when we’re at the pinnacle of mainstream success that we’re still speaking out and making political points.”

And what’s it like being a straight guy in a band with two of the most famous out-and-proud lesbians in the world?

“Being in a band with people with women that all have something to say, makes me feel happy with what I’m doing. So many bands don’t actually have a lot of political things to say, so I think it’s great that Beth and Hannah keep their sexuality in the forefront of their music. That’s something that’s a part of who they are and what we are.

“It seems very natural to me, to be in a band with Beth and Hannah.”

Alongside the hipster who has been linked to Peaches Geldof, loves Hackney (“I’d like to live in Hackney next year actually, yeah. Got a lot of friends that live there”) and name-checks London magazines, nights and labels I haven’t even heard of… Nathan is a guy with convictions happy to stand up for the fat girls, dykes, and bullied kids everywhere. He’s a nice guy.

And his favourite cake is carrot cake, with cream-cheese icing. Nice choice.

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Interviews with Beth and Hannah coming soon…