Humpday Hotties: Larz Brogan (dæphne)

Laura "Larz" Brogan, pictured with Sriracha and a sweater she stole from her mother.

March is a month spent yearning for the bygone romance of February, the most amorous of months. It’s like the candy hangover you wake up with after binging on heart-shaped chocolate, leaving me with nothing to do but daydream about my Valentine’s Day and sweep shameful amounts of Hershey’s Kisses wrappers from under my couch. This Valentine’s Day, more commonly known as The Day That Kanye Released The Life of Pablo, Larz Brogan and I took shelter from the sub-freezing weather with a romantic dinner date at Roxy’s Grilled Cheese, where we discussed love, life, and the pursuit of discounted chocolate over beer and Rookie Melts. No disrespect to my boyfriend, but I can’t think of a more romantic way to have spent my V-Day than by dissecting modern love with this cute creative powerhouse (and hogging that one big table in the back that’s clearly meant for, like, eight people).

This Humpday Hottie spent her Valentine’s Day going to a “totally lesbo hockey game” at Harvard Stadium with Ellen from Palehound. “It was way better than my Valentine’s Day last year,” she says, dunking the tip of her grilled cheese in a cup of Sriracha. “Last year [my ex-boyfriend] and I went to a P Funk concert. And I think it was because all I had that day was a heart-shaped pancake and then some SoCo on the rocks, but I fucking passed out. And it sucked, because it was right in the middle of my favorite song. So this year’s been better, going to a gay thing.”

Besides being one of Allston’s most eligible crushes, Larz is also known for singing and playing bass in dæphne, as well as drumming in Rictus Grin, Gay Sin, and Sexy Coyote. She’s smart as hell, she’s funny, she’s creative, and she rocks green hair and a dope sweater she stole from her mother with the cool ease that only True Crushes have. Smitten? Obviously. Peep her ~crush stats~ here:

Sign: Cancer, Sagittarius Rising, and Venus in Gemini, meaning this cuddly crustacean has an idealistic wanderlust to her (and perhaps some commitment issues. Shout out to Gemini).

Status: S-I-N-G-L-E. “Right now, since I just got out of that serious relationship, I’m just doing my own thing. Kind of babe-ing out here and there. I don’t really have one specific person that I’m after, if you will.” 

First Kiss: Curt Ford, her fifth-grade bully. “He would buy this specific brand of Sprite. It was this fruity thing… You know how they have those weird flavors that are once-in-a-lifetime? It was one of those. So he would drink that, and we would make out under the fucking slides. And I was like, wow, this tastes so good! But he was a dick.”

Ideal First Date: In this universe: “Playing a lot of Zelda and Tony Hawk and eating a lot of pizza and chilling.” In another universe: “We would turn into motorbikes together and then drive through the desert and swim at the bottom of a lake, as motorbikes. And maybe eat some applesauce, like, as motorbikes. The applesauce would go into the exhaust pipe. And then we wouldn’t be motorbikes anymore. We would turn into a tree, and Eryka Badu would be singing about us because we’re an apple tree.”

Celebrity Crush: Lady Gaga, Kristen Stewart, and “Stevie Nicks, but not in a lusty way. I just wish she was my mom.”

Least Favorite Types of People: People who misgender other people, people who think football is more fun to watch than hockey, and gear heads. “You have, like, the shitty gear dudes, which is about ninety-five percent of them, and then there’s the cool dudes who actually know a fuck ton about gear. Ryan, who’s in daephne, he knows so much about gear, but he’ll never man-splain at you.” Nice work, Ryan!

Favorite Types of People: No phonies need apply. Larz’s ideal crush is all about honesty and chillness. “I’d like someone I can hang out with and vibe with, someone in touch with themselves and not fake. Someone who’s a cool hot dog with ketchup on the side.”

Opinion of Kanye West: Not favorable. “I don’t like him. His head is way bigger than his dick, and I think doesn’t have enough intelligence to back up all the shit that he spews from his mouth. I haven’t listened to his new stuff. I saw mixed reviews on Facebook—some people thought it was dumb, some people thought it was good. I just see him as a celebrity in the same way that Donald Trump is a celebrity–by being an asshole.”

Stats aside, what truly makes Larz crush-worthy are her astute opinions about Allston’s music scene. She doesn’t suffer fools well; she has no tolerance for people who sexualize or belittle female musicians, but she notes gradual improvement with these issues over the past few years, at least in Allston. “I think straight, cis men tend to have this sort of predetermined mindset where they minimize women because they think women can’t be as good,” she says. “But there are a lot of men out there who are very respectful and are trying to make the scene a better place with safe spaces that incorporate shows with female-identifying musicians. Because how boring and old and stale is it to go to a show and see acts that are just white dudes? More people seem to be kind of over that.”

The same goes for instances of sexual assault in the community–to put it plainly, people aren’t tolerating as much shit as they used to, and safe spaces are more prevalent than ever. “Things like sexual predators and assault, people take very seriously, which I think is great,” she says. “Even five years ago, some of this stuff would have just been brushed off… It’s interesting, because in this kind of scene, this Allston DIY one that I’m in, I think female-identifying musicians are taken a lot more seriously than they would be in other places. If anything, they’re sort of respected more, because of what they have to put up with.”

Larz preaches tolerance for all artists who are willing to work hard and stick their necks out, which is the ultimate Allstonian turn-on. And though Larz says she may be fickle in romantic situations, it’s apparent that she’s a softie at heart. “I think my ideal person is someone who just wants to hang out and be with me,” she says. “Someone who doesn’t care that my feet smell.” And isn’t that what love really means, when you get down to it–finding someone who doesn’t care that your feet smell?