Episo 8: Songs of the 70s: The Gay Pri Episo — For the Rerd: The 70s

Contents:

• THE 50 BT GAY SONGS TO CELEBRATE PRI ALL YEAR LONG
• GAY SEX THE '70S
• EPISO 8: SONGS OF THE 70S: THE GAY PRI EPISO

THE 50 BT GAY SONGS TO CELEBRATE PRI ALL YEAR LONG

In the 1920s and early ’30s, Prohibn’s end gave way to the “Pansy Craze”: baret drag performanc that brought gay nightlife to the mass and rried their athetics to mastream mil theater. In the mid-’30s, at the edge of the Great Deprsn, moral backlash—sometim disguised as enomic nservatism but ually explic s bigotry—shut down many of the clubs and formally crimalized gay sex at a sle that had never before been seen.

Jazz n’t be imaged whout the ntributns of giants like Billy Strayhorn (of De Ellgton’s band), who was openly gay, and, later, Cecil Taylor, who found that three-letter word was too limg. The ’70s brought glam and dis, genr play, and explicly queer nightlife back to the mastream; we n’t fet that ’s great gay pop in, Elton John, and s great bisexual on, David Bowie and Freddie Mercury.

GAY SEX THE '70S

Lang, the Indigo Girls), all the way to today, a moment that young pop star Hayley Kiyoko teasgly refers to as “#20gayteen. Their first gay kiss was junr high, wh someone wearg a matchg flannel, while listeng to Peter Murphy's "Deep" on shared Sport Walkman headphon. Manco’s crowd, which clud many gay men of lor, bellowed out the chos, refigurg the song’s addrsee as a new kd of Shore Commissn, ‘Free Man’ (1975)D.

-led dance spac that were exclive to gay men — ually whe, middle-class gay men — started to open Manhattan late 1972. Valento, ‘I Was Born This Way’ (1975)The first rerd to feature lyrics about beg an out-and-proud gay man me om the mil performer Charl “Valento” Harris, who released “I Was Born This Way” as an apparently one-off release on Gaiee.

” “The lyrics were perfect, ” she told me Summer, ‘I Feel Love’ (1977)Gay male dance crowds were drawn to rerdgs that featured Black female volists, often intifyg wh their emotnal exprsivens and strength the face of adversy, often to the surprise of the artists, who were ually gospel-traed. Patrick Cowley, ‘Mutant Man’ (1982)Patrick Cowley fed his reputatn as one of the world’s most progrsive synthizer players durg rerdgs wh the dis pneer Sylvter, cludg “You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real), ” perhaps the ultimate gay male anthem. ”A versn of this article appears prt on, Sectn D, Page 5 of the New York edn wh the headle: Sp Some Gay Dis.

EPISO 8: SONGS OF THE 70S: THE GAY PRI EPISO

This article will emphasise rock and roll songs wh a gay, bisexual, lbian, transgenr, androgyno, or crossdrsg theme. Some of the songs were nsired que progrsive durg the time they were released, when homosexualy was nsired a mental illns and crossdrsg was illegal. The song’s lyrics, which referenced homosexualy, were changed, to f to the nformist 50s mastream culture.

The reference to gay romance is found the lyric: “Number 47 said to Number 3, ‘You’re the cutt jailbird I ever did see.

There’s no implitn that straight people n turn gay or anythg (even then, ’s ol to experiment and sexualy is fluid). Mad About The Boy – Dah Washgton – Origally wrten by Noël Coward 1932 for mil revue Words and Mic, the song has a hidn gay meang.