by LORRAINE CARPENTER

“I don’t really enjoy wearing women’s clothing,” says Justin “Destroyer” Moyer, aka Edie Sedgwick. “Basically, what I’m doing is gender blackface, and nobody blinks. It’s very troubling.”

Arguably more troubling is Moyer’s apparent obsession with celebrities, as exposed on his album Her Love Is Real But She Is Not, the sophomore effort of his solo Edie Sedgwick project—he’s also a member of Supersystem and Antelope. Borrowing the name of the mid-’60s model and Andy Warhol “superstar,” Moyer dons mini-dresses, platform heels and make-up to sing songs about Robert Downey

Jr., Molly Ringwald, Arnold Schwarzenegger and such. But couched within the superficial absurdity of the songs (not to mention their rich noise and exhilarating beats) is a mirror image of America’s star worship. In keeping with the theme, he writes a haiku about a different celebrity every day on MySpace.

As satisfying as it may be to whittle away the hours penning poetry at home, letting loose on stage and addressing homophobia via a song about deleted scenes from Aliens, Moyer longs for controversy. He wants feminists and gay men to question him, heckle him, or worse.

“I wish—instead of playing some mediocre, boring show where there’s no reaction at all—that I would get screamed at and someone would get in a fight with me,” he says. But he’s resigned to the fact that cross-dressing has become commonplace, acceptable even for heterosexuals such as himself.

“Using drag as a schtick doesn’t seem morally appropriate, but for gay men—and this is arguable—it’s their cultural paradigm. They can do what they want—they’re an oppressed minority. I’m the total opposite of a minority. I’m white, I’m rich—”

Rich?

“Yeah. You think I can make a living in these bands? I make money, but I have to supplement my income from family money that goes back through the ages. I think it’s important for people to be honest about their life, and for me to pretend that I’m a struggling artist is a little absurd.”

So it seems Moyer shares more with the real Edie Sedgwick than her name and her love of black tights. Sedgwick also came from money and, before her death in 1971, was a sucker for punishment. She didn’t crave verbal and physical abuse, however, just massive quantities of uppers, downers and alcohol. But as a short-lived “superstar,” forever linked to Warhol and his philosophy of fame, she was Moyer’s “perfect vehicle.”

“She’s just cool. She’s kind of an icon but she’s underground, she’s sort of famous for not quite anything, she’s the Paris Hilton of her era, and she’s sufficiently in the past that people don’t really know who she is.”

That may soon change, with Sienna Miller playing Edie in an upcoming Hollywood biopic called Factory Girl. Moyer acknowledges that this film, and the recent cancellation of The West Wing (his song “Martin Sheen” states that the titular actor’s presidency is what makes the USA great), could cast a negative light on his project, and because he’s the same age Edie was when she died (28), he’s had dark thoughts.

“I’ve actually contemplated killing her off,” he admits, “but I don’t know if I can quite let go.”

With Bahai Cassette and Germans at
Zoobizarre on Feb. 13, 9 p.m., $10

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