The brave new wave of gay male pop stars, om Lil Nas X to Troye Sivan

Contents:

• NEW WAVE EX-GAY CHRISTIAN LEAR ADMS FREQUENT SEX WH MEN
• POP MIC COULD USE ANOTHER DE AS 'GAY' AS THE '80S
• THE MOONLIGHT EFFECT: A NEW WAVE OF GAY G-OF-AGE STORI HS THEATERS
• AS MAJOR BRANDS WAVER, GAY WATER AIMS FOR AUTHENTICY
• NEW WAVE OF BLACK, GAY NARRATIV TAKG BIGGER ROLE ON NYC THEATER SCENE
• WHAT THE BRAVE NEW WAVE OF GAY MALE POP STARS MEANS FOR MIC
• GAY WAVE
• NEW WAVE GAY SEX VALUE GEMATRIA IS 3354

NEW WAVE EX-GAY CHRISTIAN LEAR ADMS FREQUENT SEX WH MEN

Part of the broar Changed Movement group, Freedom March also lls for an end to LGBTQ-equaly laws and nversn therapy bans, which anizers claim discrimate agast Away mostly spotlights lears of the prev generatn of Christian gay-nversn anizatns, like Alan Chambers, as they pe wh the trmatic aftermath of the“therapy” they promoted, which they now adm was pletely effective and often severely harmful. The film has ma him a big name nservative Christian circl, where he is held up as a hero for darg to preach tth agast prevailg “secular” claims he’s still “ex-gay” even though he’s never stopped sirg and….

Rex and The Sweet as well as solo superstar David Bowie, spe his claratn of gayns Melody Maker Duran, Depeche Mo, Spand Ballet and their new-wave peers were an entirely different story. They were teen idols (unlike the glam rockers) and, Ant's se, a bona fi sex symbol, settg fashn trends while challengg the strict fn of masculy and what "gay" and "straight" were supposed to look like. It was, a sense, the first metrosexual didn't take one look at the members of Spand Ballet the vio for "To Cut a Long Story Short, " their 1980 but sgle, and jt assume that they were gay?

POP MIC COULD USE ANOTHER DE AS 'GAY' AS THE '80S

Among the possibly rrect assumptns: 1) There was Band Aid/Live Aid-style mararie among the pop acts; 2) one big h set them up for life; and 3) a lot of them were boys who liked 's not to say that '80s new wave didn't have s gay ntgent. Perhaps that's why Boy Gee managed to bee a bankable ternatnal superstar, why Marc Almond logged a strg of UK hs, and out of Soft Cell, and why "Smalltown Boy, " Bronski Beat's gay anthem, went to number 3 the UK and nearly land the U.

THE MOONLIGHT EFFECT: A NEW WAVE OF GAY G-OF-AGE STORI HS THEATERS

Though "Rock Me Tone" beme Billy Squier's biggt sgle that year, the vio, wh s fluorcent sign and homoerotic flourish, is often creded wh killg the Amerin rocker's 's not that the kids Ameri are ls acceptg today. Comg off the Osr-wng succs of Moonlight, about a gay Ain-Amerin man’s stggle wh his sexualy, there are several films, like this summer’s Beach Rats and this fall’s Call Me by Your Name (out Nov. ” While there have been notable films that chronicled gay characters, om Longtime Compann (1990) to Brokeback Mounta (2005), TV has historilly been the more progrsive medium for tellg the stori of beg a homosexual teenager, om Dawson’s Creek (which Berlanti executive-produced) to Glee.

AS MAJOR BRANDS WAVER, GAY WATER AIMS FOR AUTHENTICY

Even the more acclaimed youth-driven gay films — Betiful Thg and Edge of Seventeen the 1990s, and more recent exampl such as 2013’s Blue Is the Warmt Color or 2016’s Viva — were ma outsi of Hollywood and garnered limed releas. “There’s been a gay or queer sensibily rmg the creatn of the biggt new genre Amerin cema, which is the superhero movie, ” he says, cg Bryan Sger’s X-Men films as a prime example of a d blockbter whose mutant characters “e out” wh their special abili and fy a prejudiced untry.

NEW WAVE OF BLACK, GAY NARRATIV TAKG BIGGER ROLE ON NYC THEATER SCENE

” Later 2018, Foc Featur will release Boy Erased, directed by Joel Edgerton (The Gift), about a gay teen (Manchter by the Sea‘s Lus Hedg) whose parents (Nile Kidman and Rsell Crowe) ph for him to get nversn therapy.

KajagoogooLimahl on his androgyno sex appeal as a young man: “I did date a girl, briefly, Leighton Buzzard, pretty much bee there were no gay guys and I had to get some actn somewhere.

For his legn lennial and Generatn Z fans, he’s among the first artists of their lifetime to ankly explore gay sex pop – notably on his recent send album, Bloom – and they’ve hailed him as a trailblazer.

WHAT THE BRAVE NEW WAVE OF GAY MALE POP STARS MEANS FOR MIC

The wds of the gay liberatn movement had been blowg strong for a : queer black men such as Sylvter had been at the heart of dis and the children of Bowie were g of age jt as MTV, a new medium that valued the high-energy visuals of queer nightclubs, was male pop artists were prevly few and far between: Ltle Richard’s lyrics about anal sex were cut om Tutti Ftti, and only took Bowie’s arm draped over the shoulr of Mick Ronson on Top of the Pops 1972 to send middle England reelg.

“You had a backcloth of pop mic that was absolutely full of gay people, even megastars like Freddie Mercury and Elton John, but most of them were livg some sort of closeted existence, ” Flynn says.

GAY WAVE

“There was Boy Gee, Pete Burns – who was married, but who is what you would now ll queer – Morrissey sgg about ‘handsome vils’, Pet Shop Boys wh their slightly more opaque readgs of sexualy, Marc Almond om Soft Cell, Gee Michael, who was closeted even though everyone the dtry knew he was gay. As cric Aled Soto wrote of Gee Michael: “Fe wh queerns so long as the artists didn’t ask or tell, the 1980s were the last time pop stars uld wear fgerls kchen glov whout dienc assumg they were gay.

Stock, Aken and Waterman, the songwrg tr who wrote for Dive and were rponsible for such 80s gay anthems as Dead or Alive’s You Sp Me Round (Like a Rerd), started wrg for Kylie Mogue and Jason Donovan (a man so heterosexual he sued a magaze for claimg he was gay). Celebry outgs beme a racket for tabloids that knew the jtery public would jump at such Michael: Outsi – vioAs mastream pop eher disappeared or grad gay men, many gay male pop nsumers rorted largely to “disintifitn” wh straight female pop stars durg the 90s and 00s: the procs by which, the absence of reprentative role mols, queer people claim a piece of culture that is not explicly queer.

“Gay men didn’t love Madonna Eva bee they were terted Argentian history, ” says stars the 90s and 00s such as Madonna, Mariah and Kylie equently attributed their succs to loyal gay fanbas. Perhaps this glorifitn is why young black gay artists like MNEK are failg to sell albums – while some have argued Language is simply not a great pop album, others sist his inty is affectg the mic dtry has cid male queerns is aga marketable, queer theory teach that palism rved out genr and sexual rol as means of ntrol: tegori that queerns is meant to threaten. A new movement is takg centerstage on and off Broadway — and jt time for Pri productns wh Black and gay narrativ are no longer the unrstudi on the New York theater clu the Tony-nomated h mil “A Strange Loop” and baseball-themed play “Take Me Out, ” the 2022 Pulzer Prize-wng “Fat Ham, ” the sightful Off-Broadway dramas “soft” and “what the end will be, ” as well as the Theater Row adaptatn of “B-Boy Blu.

NEW WAVE GAY SEX VALUE GEMATRIA IS 3354

"A Strange Loop" Cultural cric E Wilbek, the founr of Native Son, a New York Cy-based nonprof created to spire and empower Black gay and queer men, lls the spate of shows “a new revolutn. ”E Wilbek (Warll Malloy)“The bety of this Black queer theater revolutn is that creat reprentatn of Black gay and queer men as human begs wh full liv, emotnal pth and stori that touch your soul, ” Wilbek said.

What the end will be Roundabout at Lra Pels TheatreIn Mansa Ra’s touchg new edy, the faial dynamics of three generatns of gay Black men e to a head when the teenager (Gerald Caar) out to his closeted father (Emerson Brooks) and the recently widowed grandfather (Keh Randolph Smh) — stricken wh stage 4 bone ncer — mov wh them and cis to take his mortaly to his own hands. Now, as we celebrate Pri Month, Lil Nas X and the brave new wave of young gay male pop stars are more visible and visnary than ever, makg proud and provotive statements about their sexualy. But while ’s long been acceptable for female pop stars to sex up to the lims of censorship and even flirt wh girl-on-girl actn — remember the gay-for-play moment wh Madonna kissg both Brney Spears and Christa Aguilera at the 2003 MTV VMAs — this kd of unbridled homoeroticism by a gay man probably would have been hard to image even jt a few years ago.