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The guitarist and vocalist in Australian heavy metal band the Mark of Cain has come out as a trans woman, writing that seeing younger trans people live freely had “helped shine a light on the possibility that maybe I can finally be me in my autumn years”.
On Monday night, Josie Scott wrote a statement to fans on the band’s social media, announcing that her family know her as Josie or Jo and “given where I identify on the gender spectrum, I fit within the paradigm of being a trans woman”.
“As I’ve aged, and mortality is ever closer, I’ve decided to embrace, rather than endure, who I am,” the 63-year-old wrote.
Josie and her brother Kim have been in the Mark Of Cain since the band formed in Adelaide in 1984. Their debut album Battlesick was released in 1989 to acclaim, and later put out in the US by Black Flag and Rollins Band frontman Henry Rollins.
The band was inducted into the South Australian Music Hall Of Fame in 2022, joining the likes of the Masters Apprentices, the Angels and Cold Chisel.
Scott wrote that she has struggled with gender dysphoria since she was a small child. “I always assumed I’d just live my life, complain a lot, and die leaving some clues in my songs and journals for family to read and think, ‘Oohaahh what a very strange (albeit talented) person’,” she wrote.
Her gender dysmorphia has fed into the band’s music, she said, with their 1995 album Ill at Ease, which was produced by Rollins, touching on this struggle “though I was trying not to be too obvious”.
“TMOC was often interpreted as a very masculine, testosterone driven band, which greatly acted as a way of being as a ‘beard’ for me in many ways. Much of what was interpreted as masculine was often being generated from my internal rage about my own dissatisfaction about myself and the paralysis I felt in being unable to live as me,” she wrote.
It was while recovering from long Covid in 2022 that she began to consider “whether when the time came to leave earth, I could do so, with no regrets”.
“My answer was a big, ‘No, you’ve never been authentic’,” she wrote. “I knew I would always regret not having the courage of my convictions to live my life. Seeing so many young people now able to embrace who they are and live authentically without as much bullshit as existed when I was young helped shine a light on the possibility that maybe I can finally be me in my autumn years.
“It’s been liberating to finally live as myself albeit challenging at the same time, but the happiness I feel outweighs any obstacles I’ve faced so far,” she wrote.
“I feel that the real fans of the band, who found us through their own feelings of alienation or otherness will understand the difficulty I’ve faced, of feeling different, and being on the outside, and will be ok with my announcement.”
She said her gender would not impact the band. “We’ll continue to write, record and perform hard heavy music and I may look a little more androgynous but everything else remains the same.”
Hundreds of Mark of Cain fans responded with messages of support. “Listening to Ill At Ease on repeat helped me so much on my coming out journey when I was a teenager,” one wrote. “The most rock n roll thing you can do is truly be yourself,” wrote another.
“Absolute fucken legend,” punk band Frenzal Rhomb wrote. “Josie you rule.”
