Who are the openly gay/ LGBT singers and musicians we should be listening to and supporting?

An earlier work of his. I wish he would've made this into a single.

Tyler, The Creator

I have to listen to singers because they're gay?

Javiera Mena, openly lesbian electropop goddess from Chile

You don't have to, r3 but if they're artists who are good, then why not let others know about them? Some of them struggle to break through because they're out.

R2 Thanks so much for posting that. He is a great talent and his band is amazing.

Will Young (85% Proof 2015)

Jimmy Somerville (Homage 2015)

[quote]Who are the openly gay/ LGBT singers and musicians we should be listening to and supporting?

I'd rather support and listen to a good singer or musician than a gay one.

Your question ought to be who are the openly gay singers and musicians who are worth listening to and supporting?

Elton John. but we should be boycotting him.

Tug, tug.

Jason Mraz Brendon Urie/Panic At the Disco! Harry Styles implicitly Perhaps Mike Posner Frank Ocean Troye Sivan Sam Smith

Jake Shears - new album (August 2018)

Years & Years

Perfume Genius.

Rufus Wainwright

Baths

How sad. 17 replies and no one mentions Steve Grand.

Idles

Olly Alexander in years & Years.

Laura Pergolizzi (LP).

WHET Ari Gold?

Hello?

Steve Grand isn’t mainstream. He hasn’t even had one single that has charted on the Billboard Hot 100.

Lady Gaga, Demi Lovato, Halsey

Shura, Steve Grand

OP didn't make any sort of stipulation about choices, R24. Go back to your Janet Jackson threads, you withered old hag.

Thank you OP for starting this thread and thank you DLers for your suggestions so far.

The XX

Rostam (of Vampire Weekend)

Is Kele still going?

Grizzly Bear

R25 Gaga and Halsey, srsly?

Elton John

R2 he is not out

Tom Goss! Cute as a button, and he's into bears (which I'm not, so too bad)

Matt Alber! Hot cub with a great voice (Rufus W. without the marble-mouth).

If this video doesn't make you cry, you have no soul.

R21 Cheers for Laura.

Some oldies and some newer latino and/or spanish singing ones. The older ones that aren't dead still release music occasionally.

Ricky Martin (duh). Vuelve, Volveras, La Bomba, La Mordidita, Vente Pa Ca, Adios, Pegate, Tu Recuerdo, MTV Unplugged/Vuelve/A Medio Vivir/A Quien Quiera Escuchar albums in general, etc. His english stuff is weak as fuck compared to his spanish stuff, especially his ballads.

Juan Gabriel (RIP). Mexican icon and one of the greatest songwriters ever.

Miguel Bose. Spanish icon and was pretty much a gay icon back in the 80s. Was in Almódovar's Tacones Lejanos (High Heels) too, good movie, you should watch it.

Pablo Alboran... hasn't said he's gay, but the dude is more queer than a three dollar bill. Is consistently a top seller in Spain, less famous in latin america, dated Ricky and then Ricky's album got the grammy over his album.

Christian Chavez

Arca. Producer and songwriter, has three albums under his belt.

Pabllo Vittar

Tiziano Ferro, italian but sings in spanish, is decently popular in latin america.

Chavela Vargas (rip)

The brilliant Villagers, his album Darling Darling Arithmetic is about his coming out.

Kevin Abstract/Brockhampton.

R39 Thanks for those!

Frank Ocean.

Tyler The Creator.

Is Tyler the Creator gay? His Wiki entry leaves that open.

Erasure

Perfume Genius and Asbjorn.

R46 Definitely, he’s never had a public girlfriend his entire career and came out on his latest album. All his recent music is explicitly about men

St. Vincent/Annie Clark

R46 Pretty gay.

[quote]“Next line, I'll have ’em like whoa / I've been kissing white boys since 2004”

[quote]“Shout-out to the girls that I lead on / For occasional head and always keeping my bed warm / And trying they hardest to keep my head on straight”

[quote]”And I pedal through the city with the wide frame steer / With that tall pale boy that I met last year / Grape, that's what I call him, love, that's what I fall in / Fell in, I ain't like sports growing up, but now I'm ballin' / I guess I'm a late bloomer”

[quote]”And he do what I says like Simon / No violence / And my guy mixed like jambalaya”

[quote]”Niggas mad at T, where the tall freckled white boys at? / Cause I don't fuck with niggas”

[quote]"New nigga from New York, I'ma give him sticky hands"

[quote]"Pro black but this twink white"

R40 - that was lovely. I kept thinking I was hearing a bit of a Grizzly Bear influence and, sure enough, the Villagers toured with Grizzly Bear.

Sam Sparro is still awesome in my book. Passion Pit, Grizzly Bear, Tyler The Creator.

Rostam is not nor has been in vampire weekend for like 4 years. He is great, however.

Perfume Genius!

The Internet. Syd is a lesbian and Steve Lacy is gay/bi.

Steve's solo stuff is also really good, I always come back to this EP.

Tara Jane O'Neil .

Plugging Powderpaint, a Brighton-based electronica duo with the "same synth pop punches that you’d find from bands such as Pet Shop Boys, The Human League and New Order."

Lesbian singer Hayley Kiyoko.

MNEK, who just released his debut album, Language.

Villagers new album is out next Friday, it's much more melodic finely crafted indie pop.

Jason Mraz

Judas Priest

You would think the Butthole Surfers but apparently none are gay.

Lady Gaga

Was Freddie Mercury openly gay ?

Bisexual (but mostly lez) Alison Goldfrapp of Goldfrapp...

Madonna

King Princess

I like some of Troye Sivan’s music

You missed the best one R51

[quote]’He got them long lashes, couldn’t get the dirt in them, curls on his head look like waves Imma surf in them’ ’He kidnap my feelings I ain't paying any ransom, I keep em' like secrets’

Tyler is phenomenal live

Kele Okereke, who was in the band Bloc Party, is openly gay

I loved them in my teens, I’m glad he came out

Jake Shear

Jay Brannan

Okay Datalounge....This is a REALLY good thread!

I was expecting the usual jaded snark....but these are some gems...

Thanks for restoring my faith in gay culture...

Bright Light Bright Light

Steve Grand

I do enjoy Adam Lambert.

Also, LP has some great music.

Years & Years. Music video starring gay actor Ben Whishaw (Olly played his brother in Bright Star).

Great thread.

I "support" no artist just because they are gay. That's bullshit.

OP You listen to someone because of their sexuality, not because of the quality of their music?

He said Support!

Jay Brannan's most memorable performance

r84 r85

R86 That's worse. Entails either buying their music of paying to go see them.

R89 you know exactly what OP is saying, but it appears you want to banter and create difficulty. Meh.

R90 Bollix to "meh". I see no reason to support anybody for producing something, which I may not like or which my be an inferior product, simply because we share the same sexuality. I would of course defend a gay person from attack/assault, but that's different.

Denis Vega

The mighty John Grant

Calum Scott

D.H.

SOAK (Birdie Monds-Watson)

tyler the creator. I love this song

Almost 100 posts, and nobody has mentioned the best living openly gay voice of all:

kd lang

Saw her show a few months ago. She's still as great as ever!

R98, is that the tour in which she's performing all of the Ingenue album?

Sam Smith

Hamed Sinno lead singer of Lebanese indie band Mashrou' Leila is gay.

Former Christian music singer Ray Boltz

The new Anna Calvi album is phenomenal. She's a lez.

The gorgeous MIKA

Great thread op

The skinny boy with the big nose in Javiera Mena's video is sexy.

The Hidden Cameras, amazing music video for Carpe Jugular.

Kim Petras

R92 is pretty but that song is awful, if you're going to watch a porn guy do a music video like that try Allen King:

Glad someone else mentioned Matt Albers. His voice is beautiful and unique and his words and music are poetic.

End of the World is probably his best, but I also love this one: Field Trip Buddy

And my last, but do explore his website :)

Handsome Man

Tyler the Creator is not openly gay so stop placing him here, closet cases can fuck off

Freddy Mercury was also closeted so he does not deserve to be here

Walk the Moon - lead singer/songwriter Nicholas Petricca came out a couple years ago.

Also from Chile, Alex Anwandter has led a couple of bands and also works solo:

. . . .

Tanita Tikaram - Yodelling Song

My Life With The Thrill Kill Kult was the gay Nine Inch Nail back in the 1990s.

R113: It was Passion PItt singer the one who came out a couple of years ago. I didn't find anything about Walk the moon singer that suggest he is gay (apart of being very private and not talk about his private life)

So far Perfume Genius wins the thread.

Just enough indie/euro without overdoing it. He is on the level of Prince in my opinion, although in a different way. He could be huge but refuses to sell out completely.

Now, if only he could make some full-length singles.

Hayden McHugh

Sufjan Stevens

Sufjan isn't really open, unless I missed some announcement...

Sufjan Stevens seems obsessed with vulgar and sexually graphic hetero hip hop, doubt he is gay.

R118, Nicholas Patricca did mention exploring his sexuality after the death of his father in a EW. He didn’t elaborate on what that meant.

EW interview&

Fischerspooner

^^Let's give the very underrated Casey Spooner and Warren Fischer a spin, R126!

I second John Grant. He just released his first single off his new record.. “He’s Got His Mother’s Hips”

Jake Shears will be performing his new hit single Creep City on Live with Kelly and Ryan today! The song is very catchy!

Jake looked great, and he's almost 40 years old!

Kim Petras is awful. Paris Hilton wannnabe

Eli Loeb

Christine and the Queens

Miss Conchita

Soon Shawn Mendes will be allowed in this thread.

Christeene

Is Shawn Mendes doing the slow roll coming out thing?

Jeffery Straker and his uncut Canadian meat.

Anohni (formerly Anthony from Anthony and the Johnsons).

bump

TORRES

Baby Alpaca

The Irrepressibles

Arrow - The Irrepressibles

This.

Owen Pallett

Erasure

Pet Shop Boys

SOPHIE

Ben McGarvey, who performs as Minute Taker is superb. Openly gay, cute as fuck as has really good social media interactions with his fans. You can also get three free tracks from his website - well worth seeking out. He's also remixed Yazoo's Winter Kills for their new box set.

The B-52's Three gay men Fred Schneider, Keith Strickland the late Ricky Wilson, one bisexual woman (now married to her female partner) Kate Pierson and straight Cindy Wilson.

I get a serious Marc Almond vibe from r150's clip. Which is a good thing in my case. Love the song. Thank you for sharing r150.

Gavin Creel

BAATHHAUS

Hirsute Pursuit. Lots of gay sex music - Tighten That Muscle Ring, Daddy Dear, That Hole Belongs To Me etc. This isn't their best track by any means, and is a cover, but it seems like the only one with an actual video.

Owen Pallett and Ed Droste (of Grizzly Bear) interview in Butt Magazine from way back in 2006. Which probably doesn't seem like that long ago, but there was still a certain bravery back in 2006 in not just being an openly gay public figure, but in unabashedly celebrating your gayness. That was twelve years ago. When the Bush administration was still in office, when even the dem candidates for President in 2008 weren't actively vocally supporting marriage equality (or were against it), when social media activism and think pieces on gender, sexual orientation and social justice weren't so commonplace. I remember that time. Even though I was in my early 20s and open and proud, I was still more cautious about WHO I was out to and when.

Also? Owen has(had?) a cute butt...

Owen doing an awesome cover of Tori Amos' Pretty Good Year.

Sarah Dougher

The great Thalia Zedek.

Sorry, but a lot of the songs listed here are derivative shit.

Blas Cantó was a member of the most successful spanish boyband, Auryn (if the rumours are true, four of the five members are gay or bi)

Belle and Sebastian

Sia - Thunderclouds

Courtney Barnett

Ezra Furman

Another vote for John Grant! The accompanying film for his song "Glacier" is an astounding montage of LGBT cinematic depiction through history!

And Courtney Barnett's partner, Jen Cloher.

Gold Class (lead singer, Adam Curley).

George Michael is no longer with us but his music is timeless.

Yass @ r165

Car Seat Headrest (Will Toledo)

Serpent With Feet.

Kevin Barnes from Of Montreal.

I watched an interview where Will Toledo came off so humorless and was so nauseatingly sycophantic about the "genius" of Kanye West, I could never listen to any of his work after it.

Luis Lauro from Mexico

Julien Baker

The Aluminum Group. Not quite sure if the Navin Bros. are still making music, but very talented and they have a unique retro sound.

Darren Hayes, formerly of Aussie pop giants Savage Garden.

Personally I don’t care if you are gay, bi or straight. If you are talented I’m in if not I’m not interested.

I don't think I've seen mention of The Magnetic Fields /Stephin Merritt

Magnetic Fields

Jussie Smollett

Shamir

Troye Sivan

The still in the OP makes me not what to support whoever that guy is.

Charlie Daniels Band?

Scott Matthew

The Ballet

The Sound of Arrows

The always underappreciated and overlooked Brandi Carlile.

It's as if she had my brother in mind when she wrote this song. It breaks my heart.

These threads always turn into Who Can Name The Most Obscure artist. Half these people aren't even really gay just gay to attract the lgbt community to buy my shit.

The Residents' Hardy Fox just died at age 72. Definitely an acquired taste and obscure, but quite influential, R191.

R190 Why so misanthropic? Many are gay, bi, not quite in-your-face-out, but not closeted, (i.e. Sufjan Stevens, et al) or gay adjacent, that's enough for me. Even though I fancy myself still hip to the music scene at fifty, I'm grateful for the suggestions and recommendations here. I've enjoyed this thread thoroughly, and have checked out the unknown artists out on spotify or YouTube. Cheers to all the posters on this thread offering bands and solo artists up! A special shout and thanks to the younger peeps & millenios posting here, as you take so much needless flack & vitriol here on DL.

^ sorry, meant for R191

Furthermore R191, if I may suggest, some of the best music is [italic] obscure [/italic]. My empirical evidence proves the more one expands his breadth in taste and genres, the better he can avoid the painfully mainstream.

Etienne Daho: stalwart French pop trooper since the mid 80s

Special thanks to R59 for introducing me to Tara Jane... I'm in love with her sound.

^ sorry again R58! These damned old eyes!

LP, don’t know if she was already mentioned.