Since breaking out of the New York dance underground in the early 2000s, the Scissor Sisters have set a stellar example of how to be glamorous.
They combine eye-popping runway visuals with vibrant pop music that has equal roots in classic Elton John and Barry Gibb, all of it shot through with tongue-in-cheek humor and a dedication to flamboyance. That Scissor Sisters are opening for Lady Gaga at the KFC Yum! Center says a lot about their aesthetic.
In other words, it isn't the kind of band you'd expect to have its roots in Lexington, Ky. But that's where the band's co-founders, Scott “Babydaddy” Hoffman and Jake Shears, met in 1999.
Hoffman's family moved to Lexington when he was young, and he lived there until leaving for New York's Columbia University. Shears came to Lexington to visit Hoffman's best friend, and they immediately bonded. They met again when Hoffman was road-tripping in Seattle; then Shears moved to New York, where they began writing songs together.
“We bonded over music, video games, terrible movies,” Hoffman, 34, said. “We're big fans of horror fiction, sci-fi and all of these crazy things. We just got along instantly. He's a funny yin to my yang. I enjoy people who have that kind of energy because I'm a lot more laidback.”
Their interests and personalities are clearly manifested in the band. Scissor Sisters music videos are playfully elaborate and often surreal, like video games combined with the Syfy Channel, and Shears is a manic entertainer who commands the stage while Hoffman holds everything down in the background on a wide variety of instruments.
The band, which also features singer and songwriter Ana Matronic, guitarist Del Marquis and drummer Randy Real, is huge in the United Kingdom. Two of its three albums — “Scissor Sisters” and “Ta-Dah” — have been No. 1, with the new “Night Work” peaking at No. 2, and the band has sold millions of records. It has also had two Top 20 albums in the United States but not nearly the album sales.
“Especially in the U.K., we're sort of press darlings,” Hoffman said. “For some strange reason, they don't really want us to fail like a lot of tabloids want certain artists to fail.”
Scissor Sisters is wildly popular in the gay community, with Hoffman, Shears and Marquis having openly declared their homosexuality, but it would be inaccurate to describe it as a “gay band.” The music has many elements of vintage Top 40 pop from the 1970s, frequently augmented by a bounce that can be traced directly back to the Bee Gees, circa “Jive Talking.”
Hoffman described himself as an alternative-music fan while growing up in Lexington, with a lot of MTV thrown in, but he also loved his classic rock.
“I think my first show at Rupp was Genesis, with my family,” Hoffman said. “I saw Motley Crue there, I saw Aerosmith. I saw Poison. It was a fun place to see a little bit of everything. I was kind of a hard-rock kid, and that slid right into grunge. I remember Guns N' Roses came there and I was at summer camp, and I was devastated that I couldn't see them.”
Hoffman's parents still live in Lexington and will be at the Lady Gaga show, but Hoffman has lived in New York for a decade. That's where he and Shears honed their songwriting and met Ana Matronic, whose over-the-top theatricality completed the Scissor Sister circuit.
Hoffman said that moving to New York changed his life.
“Oh, it was everything. Because what I found were a lot of people who really wanted to do the same thing, and a lot of people who wanted to help us and had the resources to make it work. It was all about the New York club scene. That was the place, in my mind, where you went if you wanted to be someone or do something important.”
He does stay in touch with friends in Lexington, especially with Gaga on the horizon.
“Everyone's begging for a ticket, but even I can't work miracles,” Hoffman said, laughing.
