Gay rap, the unthkable be realy | Hip-hop | The Guardian

Contents:

• 30 BT GAY RAPPERS (LGBTQ+ HIP-HOP ARTISTS)
• 21 BT GAY RAPPERS WHO EMBODY THE LGBTQ+ COMMUNY
• RAPPERS WHO HAVE COME OUT AS GAY
• HERE ARE HIP-HOP ARTISTS WHO EMBRACE BEG GAY, LBIAN OR BISEXUAL
• WHAT MAK A ‘GAY IN’?
• GAY RAP, THE UNTHKABLE BE REALY
• KG VON TELLS POLICE HE'S 'GAY' IN RURFACED JAIL VIO

30 BT GAY RAPPERS (LGBTQ+ HIP-HOP ARTISTS)

There has been a well-known stigma towards homosexualy hip-hop which has led to some artists’ reers beg tarnished by mors that they had associatns wh people of the same sex. While his h song “Old Town Road” was at the top of the Billboard Top 100 Chart for a rerd-breakg 19 weeks, Lil Nas X ma the brave cisn to e out as a gay rapper. This tweet, which was both ndid and wty, required a lot of urage to liver, particularly 2017 when beg a gay rapper was still a ntroversial topic the mic dtry.

She also discsed the prevalence of vlence agast butch-prentg gay women, highlightg the murr of several lbians a regn of Chile that has bee notor for s homophobic hate crim. “Beg ‘butch’ means wearg your sexualy on your sleeve, which, an age still explibly marred by homophobia, n have grave nsequenc all over the world, ” she stated. Although there’s a long way to go before the discrimatn agast LGBTQ+ artists be a thg of the past, the rise of gay artists is a sign that the hip-hop dtry has started to break away om the notns.

Emem, who famoly the slur “f*****t” multiple songs, claimed a Rollg Stone terview that he never equated the term wh homosexualy, but “[i]t was more like llg someone a b**** or a punk or a******. Pop star Lil Nas X me out as gay durg Pri Month 2019 while his song “Old Town Road” was number one on the Billboard Hot 100, tellg his fans “efore this month ends, I want y’all to listen closely to c7osure” wh a rabow emoji. ” Sce then, the artist has released an album lled Hedonism, as well as several extend plays and mixtap characterized by quickfire rap, aggrsn, and unabashed gay eroticism.

21 BT GAY RAPPERS WHO EMBODY THE LGBTQ+ COMMUNY

The artist’s name ntas a nod to gay slang, as he noted, “[i]n the gay muny, your backsi is lled your k, and I have a lot of that… [w]hen I thk about ke, I thk sweet, mpy and edible, which is one si of me. The artist has spoken out agast allegedly homophobic treatment after beg arrted Portugal and posted solidary wh Rsia’s LGBTQ muny after news of a police raid on a Mosw venue where Blan was schled to perform. Though he never explicly intified wh a gay or bisexual label, sger and rapper Frank Ocean ma breakg news after he posted a letter on Tumblr 2012 talkg about his “first love” wh another boy that the rapper met early his life.

We saw Snoop Dogg's famo 2013 terview wh The Guardian, when the "G and Juice" rapper claimed, "[Homosexualy is] acceptable the sgg world, but the rap world I don't know if will ever be acceptable bee rap is so mascule. Odd Future has long been cricized for s homophobic lyrics, so much so that the band was booted om Atralia's massive Big Day Out ftival 2011, acrdg to Billboard. Nohels, the Odd Future DJ wasn't exactly accepted to the gay muny, particularly nsirg Odd Future's ntroversial history (Tyler the Creator the word "f****t" 200 tim on "Gobl" alone).

He admted to "BBC Breakfast" that he didn't feel like homosexualy was "accepted eher the untry [or] hip-hop muny, " but he hoped fans would "feel fortable" wh .

RAPPERS WHO HAVE COME OUT AS GAY

NBC News noted his mic serv as a much-need opposn to a hip-hop culture where homophobic lyrics have tradnally been the norm (50 cent, famed for g the "f" word his songs, has sce apologized for past homophobia, as has Emem). " She also prevly told The New York Tim that she don't re whether people thk she's gay, but was important for her to mata a modicum of mystery around her personal life.

In 2012, he revealed he is gay and once claimed to be the first rapper to e out as such, though this is disputable (Frank Ocean's g out, for stance, cid wh Y-Love's). " He highlighted the signifince of livg his tth, revealg he spent years worryg about the potential effects g out might have on his public reputatn, before ultimately ncedg that his personal happs — and the value of reprentatn as a Black gay rapper — eclipsed a need for acceptance wh the hip-hop muny.

HERE ARE HIP-HOP ARTISTS WHO EMBRACE BEG GAY, LBIAN OR BISEXUAL

" She also discsed the prevalence of vlence agast butch-prentg gay women, highlightg the murr of a number of lbians a regn of Chile that has bee notor for s homophobic hate crim.

"Beg 'butch' means wearg your sexualy on your sleeve, which, an age still explibly marred by homophobia, n have grave nsequenc all over the world, " she stated. "I never knew where I stood [ the gay scene] until I looked around and realized that not only did a certa group of people fd me attractive, but the feelg was mutual, and that was the bear muny, " he revealed. He don't shy away om beg open his mic about his sexualy and sex life, which isn't unmon for straight artists to do hip hop mic, but not necsarily for a gay artist.

WHAT MAK A ‘GAY IN’?

ILoveMakonneniLoveMakonnen follows one person on Instagram -- jt 12 ls than Kanye Shropshire via Getty ImagThe Atlanta native who embolned to thk clubbg on “Tuday” was acceptable 2014 performed a bolr act this January when he announced that he was gay.

Given the hip-hop muny’s reputatn of homophobia, which is particularly geared towards gay men, iLoveMakkonen’s cisn to e out to the public was mendably unapologetic. Followg the the mass shootg at Pulse nightclub, Ocean took Tumblr to share his experienc wh homophobia followg the horrific attack which targeted the LGBTQ muny last June. Syd the KidSyd the Kid was formerly a member of hip-hop group Odd Grimwa via Getty ImagThe only thg better than an artist beg openly gay is listeng to them croon about their same-sex attractns their mic.

GAY RAP, THE UNTHKABLE BE REALY

”“It’s hard to be out genr where beg gay, or exprsg your sexualy, is owned upon, ” add platum rapper and sger iLoveMakonnen, born Makonnen Sheran, who rose to fame as a protégé of Drake and me out as gay 2017. ”Before the viral sensatn of “Old Town Road” turned Hill to a pop star and gay in, hip-hop was already reachg a turng pot s clivy, as more young black men explorg sexualy and terrogatg masculy their work are gettg mastream attentn.

Rap culture has always been powered by unbridled machismo, and one would be hard prsed to not fd a gay slur embedd the lyrics of any of the genre’s most famo archects. Slang such as “s” and “No homo” and “Pse” that e queerns as a punchle have been thrown around sually for as the old guard has been replaced wh a younger generatn unncerned wh rigid labels and unbothered by genre, today’s rap and R&B scene isn’t as exclively heteronormative as once was. “We know folks our muny have always been religly nservative, and beg gay is still seen as taboo, ” said Ebro Darn, the global edorial head of hip-hop and R&B for Apple Mic and host of “Ebro the Morng” on New York’s Hot 97 rad statn.

KG VON TELLS POLICE HE'S 'GAY' IN RURFACED JAIL VIO

”Over the past uple of years, Ocean’s former Odd Future llaborator, Tyler, the Creator, has transned om a bratty provotr who hurled gay slurs wh reckls abandon to a thoughtful nfsnalist, one who surprisgly and rather matter-of-factly raps about his own attractn to men. A diverse array of talents such as Brockhampton ontman Kev Abstract, Steve Lacy (also formerly affiliated wh Odd Future) and Skype Williams have all prented works this year that are eely crafted through a black queer his “Arizona Baby” album, -produced by Jack Antonoff (Taylor Swift), Abstract reflects on growg up gay and Corp Christi at the turn of the lennium.

1 song Ameri and jt eclipsed a chart rerd that Mariah Carey and Boyz II Men set 23 years ago wh “One Sweet Day, ” a song spired by the AIDS crisis and the tragic peril brought to so many black gay men this untry. Walter Thompson Innovatn Group back 2016 found that only 48% of 13-20 year-olds intified as exclively heterosexual, pared to 65% of the generatn before is an dience that shgs when Tyler, the Creator do an about-face the way he did on 2017’s stellar “Flower Boy” where he sually rapped about beg attracted to men after years of g gay slurs — a topic he still ref to addrs outsi of the mic (he cled to be terviewed for this piece). “Tth is, sce a youth kid, thought was a phase / thought ’d be like the phrase; ‘poof, ’ gone / But, ’s still go’ on, ” he that’s not to say the rt of the mic dtry is that much further mic had lacked an openly gay superstar before Adam Lambert and Sam Smh ma history wh their chart buts and Grammy victori, rpectively.

And spe their stat as legendary rock hmakers and gay ins, there was much hand-wrgg over how bpics for Queen and Elton John would handle the queerns of s evolutn hip-hop is signifint, albe more gradual and ls pronounced than the larger shift pop culture over reprentatns of black male was Fox’s hip-hop drama “Empire, ” which ma a powerful statement by makg one of s leads a gay black R&B sger (for a time, the rerds released by the character — played by Jsie Smollett — were the only mic by an out gay black man gettg mastream rad play. )“Moonlight, ” a g of age tale about a gay black boy, won bt picture at the Amy Awards 2017 and for the first time queer people of lor outnumbered their whe unterparts on TV, acrdg to GLAAD’s annual TV diversy report. Seri such as “Queen Sugar, ” “Dear Whe People” and “This Is Us” feature storyl abound nuanced black LGBTQ characters; meanwhile, Ryan Murphy’s “Pose, ” which has exposed the world to a part of black queer culture that has spired pop divas for s, is up for two Emmys, cludg one for Billy Porter, the first openly gay black man to receive a lead actor nod.

” And Emem has yet to retire his age of “faggot” the 18 years sce he famoly performed wh Elton John at the Grammys as a PR-orchtrated act of good will agast his vicly homophobic lyrics.

A wave of black queer rap artists, cludg Le1f, Zebra Katz, Cak Da Killa, Mykki Blan and Hoe of LaDosha, broke out of New York at the start of the wh mic and visuals that upend the very same genr nstcts that have been weaponized agast gay men for the last century by pairg hyper-feme athetics — high fashn looks, weave, manicured fgertips — wh braggadocs’ rhym.

”Jt a few weeks ago, New Orleans rapper Young KSB went viral wh a glorly rnchy o to anilg that’s as sexually explic as anythg domatg Spotify playlists — but ’s impossible to image that viralns transng to the as Hill was celebrated for breakg rap’s gay glass ceilg, the jok about his sex life also ma to the news verage. When asked about Hill’s g out, Young Thug — a rapper who jumped on an “Old Town Road” remix and has toyed wh genr norms by drsg uture gowns — said that Hill “probably shouldn’t have told the world” he was gay. The self-proclaimed "big and Black, gay and vol" star was nomated for bt new artist at the 2021 Grammy Awards and has no tentns of mimizg who she is for anybody.

After he me out as gay 2016, he stated Brockhampton's "Junky" that he would ntue to rap about beg gay bee there aren't enough gay rappers the dtry that are willg to talk about their own experienc. As I read the Facebook ments for the article and the ments on the actual Instct se, I realized that some rears were takg away the msage, “Rap is homophobic/Rappers are homophobic, ” and that’s simply not te.