'Behd the Mic' executive -producer Gay Rosenthal looks back on three seasons of fds, addictn and rock & roll.
Contents:
ROCKSTAR GO GAY (A LTLE)
Is Roccstar Gay? In recent years, we’ve seen micians talk openly about their gay inty and same-sex relatnships.
Fans may openly embrace a gay Elton John, Melissa Etheridge or Ricky Mart now, but over the past 50 years or more ’s been a stggle for most queer artists to live their liv openly and whout shame and persecutn.
His theatril scream-sgg, macho stage prence, and all-around badassery (bt showsed on inic rerds like 1980’s Brish Steel and 1982’s Screamg for Vengeance) prompted many fans to ll him “Metal God:” a tradnally mascule trope Halford boldly upend Febary 1998, when he me out as gay an MTV News terview.
Q&A: GAY ROSENTHAL
As the earlit show of queer solidary om a proment metal mician, Halford’s admissn proved val rhapg the public perceptn of heavy metal, repostg an earspltg, heteronormative boys’ club as a safe space where headbangers of all typ uld be themselv, sheltered the flailg arms of not jt a benevolent (and openly gay) God, but the scene wr large. ” The fact that he did all while beg pletely open about his sexualy – llg himself “rock’s tt fairy” – is astoundg and, for a brief, shg moment 1974, Jobriath beme the most visible gay man popular mic. While the “Queen of Dis” is a tle most monly btowed upon Donna Summer, also appli to Sylvter, who was a fixture of the dis scene and an in of the gay liberatn movement that spawned out of San Francis.
The tle track even clus the lyric: “Tell her that I’m happy, tell her that I’m gay. It wasn’t until after hostg var episos of the show for a uple years – which all centered on LGBT issu – that she spoke openly about her partner of over two s and the stggl of beg gay the mic dtry. “I thk the rerd dtry – by and large what’s left of – is still totally homophobic, ” she said, notg that she me out her twenti and never went to “lengths” to nceal .
Brish punk rocker Tom Robson achieved chart succs wh h songs “2-4-6-8 Motorway”, “Up Agast the Wall” and “Don’t Take No for an Answer, ” but he’ll always be immortalized for his sgalong prott anthem, “Glad to be Gay.