Quickie with Joe Westmoreland
Vagabond writer resurrects Ecstasy-and-sex-fueled memoir
There are a few constants in Joe Westermoreland’s ‘Tramps Like Us’ – sex, hitchhiking, getting arrested, friendship, love, drugs, and, most of all, music. Joni Mitchell, The Ramones, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Blondie, Television, The Buzzcocks. The list goes on and on, mapping the slide from punk into new wave. It’s the type of ambient detail, overwhelming in sensory and descriptive power, that gives the recently reissued novel an epic, all-encompsing feel. A life. Joe’s language is generous, if simple. It struck me back to my most raw, early observations of what it means to be a gay kid in America. It made me reach out to my first ever kiss just to see how he’s doing. It made me cry.
Tramps Like Us also is a sharp reminder that gay culture is not linear. If the rightward political lurch of today confirms it, so does the irresistible feeling of liberation flowing through Joe’s ecstasy-and-sex fueled life in New Orleans and San Francisco before the death and fear took root. Or take the time when Joe’s homophobic dad clocks him for bringing home his friend, “that queer”. Joe retorts, “They’re not called ‘queers’ anymore. They’re calls ‘Gays’. Language is cyclical too.
In the early 90s, after arriving in New York, Joe started jotting down these tales in an attempt to hold on to the good times and make sense of the recent deaths of his friends, one by one. Throughout the 90s, the scope of the project expanded into the coming-of-age novel now reissued by MCD Books. Back then, at readings Downtown, people would walk out on Joe, uncomfortable with his realness.
Finally the book was due to launch on September 11th, 2001. We know what happens next. Despite praise from the likes of Denis Cooper, Hilton Als, Kevin Killian, and Sarah Schulman, ‘Tramps Like Us’ fell out of print and into obscurity. Now, the faggy bildungsroman is improbably resurrected thanks to a cadre of devoted fans, chief among them our lord and savior Eileen Myles. It’s a sure entry into gay literary canon for its uncommon honesty to self that’s both wide-eyed and infectious.
To get the lowdown on the wild book and Joe’s own sex predilections, I met him for a Quickie…
Andrew: Hi, Joe! What the BUTT is ‘Tramps Like Us’?
Joe: So it’s like a coming of age story. It started as a memoir, but then I had to make it fictionalized. It’s, like, my memory of what happened at this one special time.
It’s an amazing book. We’re so embedded in your world.
It’s an easy read… It’s kind of nasty, but also really innocent.
So the sex stories in the book, are they all real?
I just re-read the one where I met this guy on the street and he came over, then poured beer down my chest and made me dance for him while he jerked off. That was true.
You wrote a lot about unsafe sex, sharing needles and fucking around. Did you get much blowback for writing openly about such things back then?
Attitudes are much different now, it’s kind of like we know the ending. At that time, we didn’t know what was happening with AIDS. I’d do readings and talk about shooting up and having unsafe sex and, like, a few people in the audience would get up and leave.
I read that the book was originally supposed to be called ‘How I Got HIV’, which in the 90s was pretty blunt. Later it became ‘Tramps Like Us’. Why the change?
I started by writing about my friends and the very early 80s in San Francisco, before AIDS hit. In the 90s, I felt like everybody was talking about AIDS and how horrible it was, but there was this time right before it hit that was so much fun and so exciting. I was the right age to be there at that moment after gay liberation happened and we were reaping the benefits of it all.
How did you first get into writing?
I’m definitely from the zine world…contributing to Straight to Hell and Linda Simpson’s My Comrade – that was exciting. I had a zine called Joe Zine that I just did two issues of. Back then, we were all doing Xerox copies and cutting and pasting and sending issues to each other.
What turns you on the most?
First, I think music. I listen to music all the time and all kinds. In the book, I use songs as time markers across the years.
If that’s the turn on, what artist gets you in the mood for sex?
Definitely Barry White. That goes from the 70s to today. And Marvin Gaye. Once I had a boyfriend and we listened to Let’s Get it On while we were tripping on acid together. It still has a special feeling for me.
In the afterword, you wrote about how you felt safer hitchhiking on the side of a highway alone than in suburban Kansas City with your family. Do you think queer people construct and imagine safety differently?
Maybe it was just being young, but I didn’t really think anything bad was going to happen. But, like, back in Missouri, I’d walk down the street and people’d yell at me from cars. One time they followed me and my sister and pointed a gun at us. And then my dad was, well, you know… I just got away as quick as I could.
What would you hope that a younger reader would take away from the book in 2025?
One thing that they should know is that it could happen again if they’re not careful. You know, with the government cutting all this funding and HIV research and stuff, it’s scary to think about. In the very beginning, we had no idea what to do – we were all walking blind. That’s where friendship and community were really important. We weren’t getting any help from the government, so we had to figure out what to do ourselves.
I do find that a lot of young queer culture today is very self-promotional, a lot of individualism… It’s nice to be reminded that, while it was a time of crisis, it was also a time of solidarity.
At that time, the lesbians and gay guys didn’t really talk to each other. When I first lived in San Francisco, most of the lesbians lived in Oakland. Then when people started getting sick, it was the lesbians who came in and took care of us.
Speaking of lesbians, you became friends with Eileen Myles almost from the moment you moved to New York. It sounds like Eileen has been one of these caretakers in a way. Till recently even, when they encouraged you to to re-release this book.
They were after me to republish it for a while. Finally, Eileen said, ‘Just give me a couple of copies and I’ll take them to some people!’ And that’s how it all happened. I gave away my last two spare copies to them and wow! Here we are.
What’s next for you after this book?
I’m back writing again! I just call it ‘Book Number Two’. It’s about all the hospitals and doctors and these fever dreams I’ve had being sick over the last two decades.
Wow. Um, before we we end, I also wanted to ask – who are your top gay sex symbols of all time?
Joe Dallesandro, definitely. And you know who Paul Barresi is? He had a hairy chest, dark hair, Italian, kind of a daddy. The first time I saw him was in Playgirl in the 70s, then he got into like, spanking videos later. I think John Travolta dated him for a while.
So…John Travolta was spanked by him?
We don’t know but I think so…
Anyone you’re into these days?
These are the two porno guys who have caught my eye recently. The first guy is @thick_macho1 from Instagram. The other is @boyfriend_booty from OnlyFans. I’ll send you some photos by email…
Thanks. Speaking of porn, there was this moment in ‘Tramps Like Us’ when you were in Miami and this pornographer was trying to convince you to shoot a scene with him.
Yeah, right. I was rereading that and I was like, ‘Why didn’t I do it?’ (laughs) I think I was afraid that they’d kidnap me or something. It was some kind of inner voice telling me not to do it.
Well, if you had made the porn, would you be happy to see it today?
Oh yeah, definitely. I’d play it for everybody who came over!
‘Tramps Like Us’ is available this summer from MCD Books.
