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Who are your favorite LGBT musicians/bands?
I'm in a bit of a personal musical renaissance at the moment and am actively seeking out new music after having listened to the same albums for years, effectively playing them out.
One of the areas I'm interested in exploring is LGBT artists out there making good music, especially because it seems like so many have entered the scene in recent years. Let me know if you have any recommendations! I'm open to any genre.
SOPHIE
Vektroid (Macintosh plus)
Will Weisenfeld (BATHS)
serpentwithfeet
FIRE-TOOLZ
Laura les (of 100gecs)
I'll update this with more as I remember. Very generally, dance and electronic have lots of LGBT+ rep
I appreciate the list! I'm excited to make my way through these.
I started listening to SOPHIE's album, and wow does it turn quite the corner after that first track. That was NOT what I was expecting!
Rae spoon - beautiful voice - they /them pronouns
against me! - Laura Jane graced transitioned - a few albums have lgbtq and bdsm themes lately too
Soccer mom
I know of a few of them, but there aren't many that I normally listen to.
The most popular one that I am aware of - and one who I actually do occasionally like to listen to because he's very talented - is Adam Lambert. His albums are on the dance/electropop side of music, which isn't a terribly good match for his voice IMHO.
There's also Shamir, who got really popular a few years ago with "On the Regular". He's got a really unique style, but once again it's not quite what I would normally listen to. I say "He", but he's actually nonbinary. He also played AJ in Dear White People (the series) and had a few voices in Tuca and Bertie.
Agreed on Adam Lambert. He's an incredibly talented vocalist, and while his pop stuff is alright for what it is, I feel like it undersells him. I know he's the frontman for Queen right now, but I'd love to see him lead his own glam rock band.
Also, quite coincidentally, I actually just listened through Shamir's discography (or at least, what's available on Bandcamp). I really like his voice but his output is a bit too experimental for me to really get into. I will say that I do really like his collaboration with Rina Sawayama though.
If you want what was probably the most explicit reference to it in her work pre-coming out, The Ocean is it.
I can concur with this, I loved Against Me! in high school, and despite loving this song, I was caught by surprise when she came out like most everyone else I knew.
Long before I knew how Laura identified, one of the things I really liked about Against Me! was how they wrote songs about women's perspectives and experiences and eschewed a typical masculinity in their lyrics. "Thrash Unreal", for example, tackles femininity in a very thoughtful way, with the empathy it builds for song's main character as well as the attention given to mother/daughter relationships. I thought this was particularly noteworthy coming from what I believed at the time to be an all-male band.
"The Ocean", which you mentioned, is my absolute favorite track from them. I thought the second verse, where the singer reimagines their life as a woman, was pure, beautiful poetry (and I still think it is, just in a different light now). Of course, in hindsight, it's an incredibly obvious trans reference, but at the time it never even crossed my mind. In fact, I admired her for tackling femininity as a man in such a powerful way.
"Bamboo Bones" (NSFW artwork) is another favorite track of mine, and in hindsight it's completely obvious that it's about being trans, but at the time I just thought it spoke to the complex blend of insecurity and confidence that lives in all of us.
It's actually interesting to me that the final tracks of the three albums leading up to her transition are all direct trans references ("Searching for a Former Clarity", "The Ocean", "Bamboo Bones"). In fact, I see "Bamboo Bones" as almost a final sendoff, as the last track on the last album put out to the world before she transitioned. I think it's an incredibly powerful personal statement, and it's hard for me to listen to it now and not be overwhelmed with emotion knowing that it's basically her "see you on the other side of transition" song.
Spencer Brown is def my fav artist, period, and he's gay.
Octo Octa and Eris Drew are both fucking amazing DJs in person (both trans girls). The kind of sounds they can make on vinyl is mindblowing. I'm not super into the music they produce, but they put on a hell of a show.
Some of my favorites that haven't been mentioned so far:
Orville Peck
John Grant (will also say that he's probably the best notable person to come out of my specific hometown)
Perfume Genius
Passion Pit (Michael Angelakos is bi)
Kim Petras (amazing trans pop singer)
GriZ
Placebo
I'm sure there's more I'm forgetting right now as well.
I already know (and like) Placebo and Perfume Genius, and I've never really given Passion Pit the time of day outside that one song from some old commercial that I liked. I'm excited to dive into them and the others you've listed. Thanks for these!
Woah! Never knew GriZ was gay, he's been one of my favourite producers for the past decade. Absolutely fantastic to learn.
Dunno the orientation of many of the artists I listen to, but one unapologetically gay artist I know and love (that has also already been mentioned) is Baths. Obsidian is my favorite album of his. Very dark, and very gay.
left at london, in love with a ghost, the crane wives and the scary jokes
Ooh, all of these are new to me. Thanks for sharing!
Also, welcome to Tildes!
Jason Mraz is bisexual, his music doesn't really reflect it, but he's got some good vibes.
Huh. I had no idea! I used to love Mr. A-Z back in the day.
I'm always amazed at the quantity, quality, and variety of music that Patricia Taxxon is able to put out. Lots of great experimental and poppy electronic stuff.
The only one I'm really aware of is Janelle Monae, who came out as pansexual in 2018. Her most recent album (and videos) had more or less made it explicit but keen observers would have picked up the odd hint here and there before that... her full debut The ArchAndroid is the first in a series of concept sci-fi records about an android who falls in love with a human in a future where inter-species love is forbidden, and draws partial inspiration from Fritz Lang's Metropolis. I bought it on release day solely on the strength of stumbling across her being interviewed on NPR, and it's up there as one of my favorite albums of all time.
Not sure if they are classed as an LGBT band but years & years have some great songs and they have a love all theme about them.
Hayley Kiyoko
I just came across Tami T's "Princess" (slightly NSFW album name and artwork), which is a super cute super catchy queer electropop bop.
I can't say the artist is one of my favorites yet given that I only know this one song and haven't fully dove into
theirHer Majesty's album, but I liked "Princess" enough on first listen that I felt compelled to share it here.I'm glad this came back up, because there's another band that fits this bill that I thought of!
Adult Jazz
I believe the singer is gay and the lyrics reflect his experiences as such.
Hum is a fuckin' great song. A slow burn that has one of my favorite jam-y sections near the end that I wish lasted some 16 bars longer (though I believe they in fact do just that live). Gist Is is a damn good album, altogether! The rhythm section is so fuckin' cool...
Brockhampton is self-described as the "best boy band since One Direction" even though they're more rap than pop. Not all of the members are gay but the main mind behind the group is, and they talk about being black and gay in a lot of their songs. Plus the line I coulda got a job at McDonalds, but I like curly fries / that's a metaphor for my life, and I like taller guys is so clever I can only laugh.
Car Seat Headrest is much more subtle in how singer-songwriter Will Toledo expresses his sexuality, but lines like It's been a year since we first met, I don't know if we're boyfriends yet remove any ambiguity.
Those are the first two off the top of my head, I'll see if I can think of any others that haven't been mentioned yet.