11 Country Mic Artists Who Have Come Out As Gay | Whiskey Riff

Contents:

• JOHN WATERS TELLS RED ROCKS “COUNTRY MIC MA ME GAY”
• COUNTRY MIC HAS NEVER BEEN MORE GAY
• 9 COUNTRY MIC ARTISTS WHO HAVE COME OUT AS GAY
• 11 COUNTRY MIC ARTISTS WHO HAVE COME OUT AS GAY
• LLIE JORDAN TELLS SHANIA TWA 'GOD MA ME' GAY, WHY HE 'QU GOG' TO CHURCH: 'I'M NOT A MISTAKE'
• FAMEWATCHER SEARCH PRIMARY MENU SKIP TO NTENT HOMECELEBRY HAIR TRANSPLANTCELEBRY PLASTIC SURGERYCELEBRY LEATHER JACKETBODY SHAPER SEARCH FOR: GAY MALE CELEBRI, HOT COUNTRY SGERSGAY MALE COUNTRY SGERS: EIGHT OUT AND PROUD COUNTRY STARS
• ‘I’M HERE, I’M QUEER AND I’M COUNTRY’: THE TOP 5 GAY COUNTRY SONGS

JOHN WATERS TELLS RED ROCKS “COUNTRY MIC MA ME GAY”

“I hate to say this bee some of you might take this the wrong way, ” he told the crowd, “but untry mic ma me gay. The gay Canadian untry star, who’s voice is often pared to Roy Orbison’s and Roddy Jackson’s, says he dons the telltale mask to keep dienc foced on the mic, not his inty. Part hipster, part gay, and part real untry fan.

The very first gay untry song is thought to be I Love My F by The Sweet Vlet Boys. At the band’s helm was (and still is) sger, songwrer, and guarist Patrick Haggerty, a lifelong gay-rights and anti-racism activist and sometime polician.

In 1970, jt one year after the Stonewall rts, Haggerty moved to Seattle, Washgton, where he beme volved wh the Gay Communy Social Servic of Seattle, one of Ameri's first such anisatns for the queer muny.

COUNTRY MIC HAS NEVER BEEN MORE GAY

Haggerty formed Lavenr Country 1972, and the band played regularly at gay pri events up and down the Wt Coast.

The album featur songs about jtice all aspects of society but most notably the gay muny.

9 COUNTRY MIC ARTISTS WHO HAVE COME OUT AS GAY

The stereotype of the flannel shirt-sportg, beard, long hair topped wh a tcker p, untry-mic lovg ‘hick’ has now bee emblematic of backward, and homophobic, thkg – as seen for example, Taylor Swift’s You Need to Calm Down mic vio which whe workg-class people are shown prottg agast gay rights. “Then the ‘70s when social polics took such a big turn wh the women’s rights movement, the gay rights movement, the civil rights movement,  wasn’t ol for middle-class people to be tolerant. “When I was le dancg I uld jt dance around and be a ltle gay boy and no one would judge me for , ” he rells.

“And I unrstand why people are choosg the more morate paths orr to get to gay stardom but [ my mic] ’s the raw real polic that people are attracted to. hen Brandy Clark lnched a untry-mic rerdg reer 2013, there wasn’t any template to follow for an openly gay artist Nashville.

Clark has been at the foreont of that shift and creds her iendship wh Shane McAnally — one of Nashville’s most succsful songwrers, who is also gay — wh givg her the nfince to pursue a solo reer. “Who knows who’s gog to be listeng to me the flyover stat that’s gog to draw strength om ‘Oh, she’s gay too?

11 COUNTRY MIC ARTISTS WHO HAVE COME OUT AS GAY

Man, if she’s gay and dog that, maybe I uld do that.

“Gee Stra or Gee Gay, there’s no difference, ” sgs Homan, who now liv Nashville. “Though a lot of people that work the dtry support me om a distance, there’s a difference between that and actually takg some steps to ph that further and sign some [gay artists], ” Homan says. In se you missed the news om last year, the Brothers Osborne ontman me out as gay, sayg his fay and close iends have known for que some time, but he wants to be his full self at this pot his reer.

Here are 9 untry artists/members of the untry mic world who have e out as gay over the years. Nashville native Cys is an unniable pop and rock star, fond of sgg vers by the Cranberri and Soundgarn, but her gut list at the Ryman was 100 percent untry: Brothers Osborne, Ltle Big Town, Mickey Guyton, Maren Morris, and the gay masked wboy Orville Peck.

LLIE JORDAN TELLS SHANIA TWA 'GOD MA ME' GAY, WHY HE 'QU GOG' TO CHURCH: 'I'M NOT A MISTAKE'

In juxtaposn to Wallen’s boorish behavr was Osborne’s vulnerable, public revelatn a Time magaze terview that he was gay. Bee the very ia of a gay untry star once seemed like a fantasy — the assumptn beg that untry mic’s fan base was overwhelmgly nservative and perhaps even bigoted. “Gee Stra or Gee Gay, there’s no difference” go another le that has sce end up on a T-shirt.

Homan, who’d left his ral Kansas home at 18 to e to Nashville to pursue both mic and an tn, hadn’t imaged there would be a time when the untry-mic dtry would be welg to gay artists. “It was like, ‘I n ntue to be fortable and out and gay, or I n do untry mic, but I fely n’t do both, ’” he says. Now, midway through 2021, that dichotomy appears to be fallg apart as artists stop worryg how they’ll be perceived for beg gay.

I intify as gay, and I’ve never said that to anybody else. In se you missed the news om 2021, the Brothers Osborne ontman me out as gay, sayg his fay and close iends have known for que some time, but he wants to be his full self at this pot his reer.

FAMEWATCHER SEARCH PRIMARY MENU SKIP TO NTENT HOMECELEBRY HAIR TRANSPLANTCELEBRY PLASTIC SURGERYCELEBRY LEATHER JACKETBODY SHAPER SEARCH FOR: GAY MALE CELEBRI, HOT COUNTRY SGERSGAY MALE COUNTRY SGERS: EIGHT OUT AND PROUD COUNTRY STARS

Ty Herndon me out as gay 2014, havg prevly earned a handful of No. ” That same year, Billy Gilman (who found succs untry mic as a child wh songs cludg “One Voice”) also me out publicly as gay.

Sce then, the untry mic dtry has slowly seen more openly gay artists and songwrers fd succs.

In the 2000s and 2010s, songwrers Shane McAnally and Brandy Clark, who are both openly gay, began havg succs as wrers. “We Shall Be Free” — and s celebry-filled mic vio — took aim at a number of social issu, cludg homophobia, eedom of relign, world hunger and racism.

‘I’M HERE, I’M QUEER AND I’M COUNTRY’: THE TOP 5 GAY COUNTRY SONGS

Includ on the group Lavenr Country’s groundbreakg, gay-themed, eponymo 1973 album, this song is a mil ray of sunshe, as the sger basks the happs of a new relatnship. Brothers Osborne’s TJ Osborne me out as gay an terview wh TIME 2021, and soon, the siblg duo released this song, crafted as a song to TJ’s younger self, filled wh enuragement and wisdom.

In an terview wh Shania Twa on the first anniversary of her Home Now Rad show on Apple Mic Hs, Jordan, 66, opened up about his childhood and what was like to be gay growg up a relig fay, as he talked about his recently released Company's Com'. "When I'm beg very dramatic, I say, 'Well, I grew up the church, but I walked away, ' bee the whole gay thg me around. After the wife of untry sger Jason Alan ma an ignorant post last year thankg her parents for not "forcg her" to be trans when she was a tomboy, other sgers, like Maren Morris, clapped back, sayg there's no room for homophobia and transphobia untry mic and that those clgg onto need to change or get out of the way.