Meet Queer Synth Band Probe 7

Meet the creators behind Probe 7:

Brent Heinze, Licensed Professional Counselor, author of Redefining Normal: A Modern Gay Man’s Guide to Happy and Healthy Living and its sequel More Perspectives on Happy and Healthy Gay Living, and former Senior Columnist for OFM.

Jasun Mark, prolific adult film director best known for Nightfall, Grind, and Splatter in the Grass, as well as documentary Fratmen: Going Down, owner of a truly impressive vinyl collection, and TikTok guru. 

Together, they are the band Probe 7, which Heinze founded in 1992 as a solo synth project. Mark came on as lead vocalist in 2021. 

Origins and History of Probe 7

Heinze has had a long music career spanning over 30 years, starting with Gehennan Scientist throughout the 90s and 2000s and Christus & the Cosmonauts in the mid-2000’s. “I had always played for other people’s projects,” he says. “Probe 7 was really an effort to write the music that was always in my head. It was an opportunity to do my own thing and for people to have to fall in line with what I wanted to do. 

“That was in 1992, and it was a solo project for 10 years. It was just me, and it was mainly instrumental because I can’t sing.”

Probe 7 went on to take on collaborators like Seth Moons, Adrienne O, and Charlie Harding, among many others, for single tracks, full albums, or even joining the project for long stints of time in vocalist, percussion, and other various roles. In 2021, Jasun Mark joined the project as lead vocalist.

Heinze says, “During the pandemic, I did an album of covers with vocalists from all over the world.” This was Parallel Universe, released in 2021. “During that process, Jasun and I started to talk about what it would be like to actually have Probe 7 go back out live after the pandemic.”

“I was a vocal major in college in the ’80s,” Mark explains. “I was in an indie band back in the 90s in Toronto called Plastic Palace People, and we were pretty successful on the indie circuit. It had been a long time since I had performed, and I really, I thought it would be fun to get up and sing. Brent and I had known each other for a while. The opportunity presented itself at some point, and we just decided ‘Hey, let’s see if this will work.'”

They went on to tell the story of Jasun’s informal “audition” for Probe 7. “I’m a metalhead, so I walked in to sing ‘Paint It, Black” by the Rolling Stones,’ Mark says. After he began to sing in that style, “(Brent) just turned to look at me and was like “OK, sing the notes.”

Heinze adds, “He’s like, ‘You don’t like my singing?’ and I said, ‘No, that’s not your voice.’ It took probably 10 minutes of just going. He did this thing, and his voice came through, and it was like, ‘OK, stop right there. That’s it.’ And it’s funny because the vocal on ‘Pretty in Pink’ is one of the most beautiful, effortless things that we’ve done together.”

When asked what Mark brought to Probe 7 that was unique among the others who had been a part of the project, Heinze says, “Jasun listens to music more than I do. His record collection is extensive.” Anyone who has seen Mark’s TikTok will know that to be true.

“We’re both rock guys. Jasun is way more into some of the heavier, darker, metal stuff as well, but we’re both music fans. We have a lot of crossover, but we have a lot of differences as well. I don’t think you want to work with people musically or have friends that think exactly the same way you do. I like the diversity and the ability to have different ideas.”

Pretty in Pink, 88 Lines, and Artistic Vision

Together, Mark and Heinze wrote the lyrics to “Pretty in Pink (Isn’t He?)” a tribute to the Psychedelic Furs track with a queer twist. The track made it onto Bear World Magazine’s Top 22 Songs of 2022 List. 

“We had just been playing in Salt Lake City,” Mark recalls. “On the way back, Brent hauled out his laptop, and we spent the five hours from Salt Lake City to Las Vegas writing the lyrics for that, and going back and rewriting, and then singing it together.”

Heinze adds, “Both of us tearing up at different points. We have been asked to be part of a tribute compilation to the Psychedelic Furs. I said, ‘Absolutely Probe 7 wants to do ‘Pretty in Pink.'”

“When you’re writing lyrics where you’re trying to tell a story,” Mark says, “you do end up having to dig into your own experiences. There were a lot of not particularly good memories we ended up dredging up that were really emotional, so by the end of writing that, it felt very cathartic, and I think I lost a little baggage that day.” He went on to speak of the reaction to the song. “A lot of people are saying ‘Oh, my god, that’s what it was like for me too,’ or, ‘That’s what it was like for my son.’ That’s been really good.”

Heinze talks about plans for a video for the track. “We approached a local college about utilizing their queer and gender center to really have some people get involved to actually help tell that story.”

Being a Licensed Professional Counselor, Heinze spoke on his background and how it impacts his music. “The music and the subject matter I write about is almost all about relationships, emotions, feelings, pain, strife, success, challenges, hope for the future. I think most art is.” He says he doesn’t have a “therapist persona” in his practice, nor a “stage persona.” “It’s all integrated. I might have tattoos and piercings and look grumpy, but I’m not. I’m this big cuddly guy that cries at movies. And I live a really gay life. What I do professionally and creatively, for the most part, is pretty gay. I don’t think you can get more out.”

Mark says his day job as an adult film director impacted the way he produced the music video for “88 Lines About 44 Dudes,” but maybe not in the way you’d think. “I was a film student. I never finished my degree, but I always wanted to be a filmmaker from the time I was 8 years old and I saw Star Wars opening week.”

He says directing porn is “My day job, but it’s also my life’s work. It is a dream job and one that I’ve wanted since I was very young. And when you’re doing projects like that, you can’t really have crazy kinetic editing. It can’t look grungy. You can’t block the picture with scribbling on the film and that kind of thing, so the 88 lines video wound up being almost like ‘Here’s all the things that I’m not allowed to do in porn.’ One of the comments that I got said, ‘I almost got a seizure watching it.’ It really does feel like it’s reaching off the screen and slapping you in the face.”

About the song itself, Heinze says, “Most of the guys are either friends or fans of the band and people we’ve known for a long time. There’s a few people toward the end that are fictitious, but for the most part, these are all people we know, and it was really hard because we were trying to figure out ways of incorporating the thousands of friends that we have. There were some people that were like, ‘Ooh I made the cut,’ or ‘Why didn’t I make the cut?’”

Mark suggests, “We’ll do another one called ‘88 More Lines.’”

Covers

Cover songs are not new territory for the band. Transference contains two covers with reimagined lyrics that paint the songs gay, as well as a cover of the original “Pretty in Pink (Isn’t She?)” The album Parallel Universe is all covers, and Parallel Universe 2 is all remixes of those covers. “One of the reasons why I do cover songs sometimes is because they were songs that meant something to me or spoke to me,” Heinze says. “What I like to say is, I put my stamp on it. It’s about reimagining it. It’s about seeing their music through your eyes and ears and heart.”

Mark adds, “You choose songs you really love that speak to you that you think would work in that space of the band that you’re in. You don’t want to just copy what the performers are doing because if that’s the case, people are just gonna listen to the original. How would this sound if it were originally my song?”

“We covered ‘Jolene’ by Dolly Parton, and she hasn’t sent goons to kick our asses yet,” Heinze says. 

“That was a song that I kind of didn’t want to do live because it’s Dolly.” Mark says. “And Brent kinda forced it. The audiences loved it, and I enjoyed singing it, too.”

Plans for the Future of Probe 7

When asked about plans for the future of Probe 7, Heinze declares, “Take over the world.” He goes on: “One of the things I’ve always struggled with is how to get the music out there to the public. This project has always put out consistently interesting, different things. I really hope in this next year, we’re able to cultivate more relationships and opportunities to get people to know who we are and what we do.”

“I want to get back on stage,” Mark says. “I look forward to recording a new record. I’ve got a few ideas for songs that I want to work out with Brent. I would love to get a song on a movie soundtrack.” He says that his band Plastic Palace People had several songs in TV shows and movies. “We had music in Sci Factor, Nikita, F/X: The Series. We did a couple movies. It’s really fun to see people take your music and do something different with it.”

Probe 7’s 2023 album Transference is on Spotify, Bandcamp, and iTunes right now. For more information, visit probe7music.com or find them on Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube.

Image courtesy of Probe 7