Against Me! - New Wave

it's like the amorphous sexuality of UK glam transferring over to America a decade late (see also Prince, MJ etc).

xp

yeah I'm not knocking the material on CBN. some of it is beyond silly but there are def hooks there.

Speaking as a guy who didn't have MTV until the late nineties, I heard Culture Club hits beside Men at Work, Matthew Wilder, and Lionel Richie and didn't notice anything amiss; they all played with "island" rhythms.

maybe disco's success had dislodged America's sexual mores enough to allow less traditionally gendered artists to come through via New Wave

xp

ahhh Matthew Wilder

maybe disco's success had dislodged America's sexual mores enough to allow less traditionally gendered artists to come through via New Wave

MTV.

suddenly English nancy boys in pirate makeup singing over glam chords and disco bass lines were acceptable

yeah, Haircut 100 was huge on MTV (speaking of vaguely tropical)

How's Ricky Martin these days?

― i love the large auns pictures! (Phil D.), Thursday, May 10, 2012 7:25 AM Bookmark

his album last year debuted at #3, so quite alright

― The Reverend, Thursday, May 10, 2012 2:26 PM (1 hour ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Ha, well I guess I got PWNED,

ha, i thought that was a genuine question

he is rich enough that he is playing CHE in EVITA on BROADWAY

lol

the role of Evita was taken

What a weird piece, that VV-thing. Because my god, how many gay artists have had huge singles in America, number one or otherwise? What kind of strange standard is the elusive number one album? And certainly there have been acts so flamboyant that I'd surmise their heterosexuality made no difference to homophobes. Like, were there homophobic Prince fans who were all, yeah, he sings high and dresses in black panties, teases with "am I straight or gay?" but he's totally not gay, so he's OK?

Did Judas Priest fans turn their back in the band when Rob Halford came out?

he is rich enough that he is playing CHE in EVITA on BROADWAY

― World Congress of Itch (Dr Morbius), Thursday, May 10, 2012 3:49 PM (23 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

lol

― BIG HOOS aka the steendriver, Thursday, May 10, 2012 4:00 PM (12 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

the role of Evita was taken

― Roger Barfing (Shakey Mo Collier), Thursday, May 10, 2012 4:04 PM (8 minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

o_O

Did Judas Priest fans turn their back in the band when Rob Halford came out?

Halford came out well past their commercial peak. And then left the band (I forget which came first, this was around the same time...?) He's an interesting case tho. Certainly now it's no problem, they're rightly revered as "metal gods".

I was about to make Shakey's joke tbh

What kind of strange standard is the elusive number one album?

I think CM is approaching it as a matter of trivia more than anything.

I dont think there's any way to link an artist's gayness with their chart success, especially using whatever strange science is at work in that piece. If anything it seems like a lot ("a lot") of artists, at least "rock" artists, come out when their career has already slowed or faltered, which definitely imparts the illusion of failure.

What about Bowie? He came out early in his career -- he go tit out of the way, so to speak. It certainly caused American critics to view him with suspicion for years.. Not only is he a chameleon, but he's queer.

Bowie's one of the only cases I can think of where a straight guy tried to pass himself off as gay AS A CAREER MOVE

Brandon Flowers, in his luckless way, has tried.

What about Pete Townshend? What about Brett "I'm gay but I've never had a gay experience" Anderson?

Certainly the Depeche Mode guys, hetero though they may be, didn't exactly make an effort to macho themselves up.

Cross-genre here, but Jean Claude van Damme was always open about courting gay fans.

didn't duran duran brag about letting guys suck them off because they got bored with women doing it? or is this a sixth-hand bit of rumor/mythmongering

It is now!

I heard that Duran Duran used to brag about letting guys suck them off.

I saw an EMP talk once about how back in the day Elton despised Bowie because the latter was this straight guy playing gay and critics were eating it up while Elton was stuck in the closet and not getting anywhere near the plaudits. Supposedly "Bennie and the Jets" was a lyrical dart aimed at Bowie.

would LOVE to read bitchy Elton attacking Bowie

Not sure critics ate it up in America. The tone of many of his reviews was suspcious.

Bowie's failure to break America early in his career is pretty legendary

altho don't think I've read much criticism of him from the time, apart from Bangs'

Diamond Dogs was his first top five album in the States, two years after the impact of his "coming out" had waned.

You may be aware of the fact that neither of them are Americans.

But ... but .... Young Americans ....

You may be aware of the fact that neither of them are Americans.

British = fruits?

Bowie's one of the only cases I can think of where a straight guy tried to pass himself off as gay AS A CAREER MOVE

Wasn't this Brett Anderson's thing? But I guess it's different in the UK, where Erasure had... what, FOUR consecutive #1 albums?

Suede were ignored here, alas.

Brett Anderson was also quite clearly using Bowie as a playbook. worked about as well in the US for Suede as it did for Bowie lol

xp

Anyway this is all kind of beside the point, she's a transwoman, not a gay man, and I think the super-positive reaction about her 'coming out' is more a reflection of the fact that being trans is (as I perceive) more difficult for the uninitiated to parse than "gay" or "lesbian"

yeah we got kinda off-topic a bit

I'm just happy to see a public entertainer with gender dysphoria speaking plainly and candidly about it in the media. It's not really _new_ that there are trans (or gender-queer) people working in entertainment, but I think this openness creates a more positive space and I hope it becomes the norm

Man, I was looking for country singer Rae Spoon's coming out article(s)-- Rae identified as transman in the early 00s but now they identify as gender-neutral-- sadly they've been whisked away off the internet.

learned how to play 'reinventing axl rose' today

Rae is fucking awesome. Point final.

Brett Anderson was also quite clearly using Bowie as a playbook. worked about as well in the US for Suede as it did for Bowie lol

worked less well because Bowie sold millions of records in American and got two #1 hits

British = fruits?

― Exile in lolville (Alfred, Lord Sotosyn), Thursday, May 10, 2012 3:41 PM Bookmark

Naw, just trying to point out the British press is probably much more relevant to that conversation than the American press you automatically jumped to.

well, I think I was clear about distinguishing between his coverage (and sales) here and the Yoo Kay.