Get Lucky - Number Seven!

I don’t want to admit how many hours I lost to researching tunes and bands for this article. There’s a lot of stuff out there to sort through, even if you restrict yourself to artists you know and ones that have some element of queerness attached to them. But it was fun going back and listening to all this amazing stuff and realizing a lot of these back catalogues, side-projects, or even new albums I had no idea existed! I felt lucky revisiting parts of my childhood, teenage years, twenty-somethings, adulthood, and post-adulthood where I realize that it will never be possible for me to be what the past generation thought an adult should be.

So I thought how luck factored into all of this: the chances that I discovered these bands, the opportunities I’ve had in my life to see some of them in concert, the amazing effect this music has had on different queer communities! And, to keep myself from burning out by listing every song ever, I figured lucky number 7 would be a great place to set as my goalpost.

- Pride takes place on the seventh month. (Okay, sixth but it’s close!)

- The rainbow has seven colours in it and is the symbol for a number of queer flags! (Well, they took out indigo at some point, so six I guess? And the rainbow flag used to have eight stripes but then went down to seven!... and then down to six… damn, this is not the best metaphor so far…)

- I got it! Pride week has seven days! (Well, that was before it was extended into a month in many locations.)

Whatever! Here are songs for seven different moods by seven different artists to make your playlist a colourful and lucky one!

The celebration is called PRIDE so let’s talk about those tracks that make you feel proud to be whoever the hell you are!

Gossip, lead by the incomparable vocals of Beth Ditto, was the first band that I listened to specifically for their queerness. It was impossible not to fall in love with the band’s modern club-disco-synth feel. And then hear their grungy punk, riot grrl roots with their first three albums. A friend of mine gave me a copied version of Standing in the Way of Control with the risqué Love magazine cover with the lead singer bearing a lot of skin, style, and undeniable self-confidence, regardless of her fatness.

While the band’s songs cover an array of topics (most often dealing with break-up or realizing that you’re too good for someone), my first taste was the poppy Men in Love off of their 2009 track, Music for Men. This song just starts a dance party and is just a celebration of everything, including the titular love for men by men. A few discordant breakdowns remind you of the unique sound coming your way and the ‘even queer for a dance song’ feeling of it all.

Mostly, the song is damn fun. Everyone gets happiness in the song with moving your body being the only perquisite!

“Dance like there's nobody looking

Slide, like you're coming my way

Shake, like you know what you're doing

We're out all night and sleep all day”

I’m sure there are many people out there that can resonate with those kind of Pride celebrations and nights. Spare me from the Mold, from the same album, cries out a different kind of a celebration; this time the counterculture aspects of queer lifestyles (Who care if it hurts/cause I’ve been through worse/I make the right mistakes) are touted above the heteronormative expectations of society, and the band returns to their punk-garage roots with a dirty and driven chord progressions underneath Ditto’s juxtaposition of smooth yet grungy vocals.

However, why resistance and ‘we are who we are’ are parts of pride, playlists are supposed to be fun! That’s why the short, soft, utopic but epic Perfect World off of 2012’s A Joyful Noise puts pride in the future of being free. Much like Men in Love, the tune has points that trap you with an inescapable need to move. A trio of sounds from subtle piano chords, funky basslines, and the hopeful melodies of the songstress’ voice all culminate into something that elevates the entire effort. You’re left with something that puts the ‘joyful’ in A Joyful Noise and also power behind dreaming big for the days of tomorrow.

“From the beginning

My head was spinning

The perfect star

Oh a church

A place to fit in

A new religion

I found your heart”

Dogma and Pride culture are not always two things that mix well. While the month and parades and events are about being unabashedly who you are, there’s also the aspect of not hiding who you’re into, romantically and sexually. And of course, the opposite is also celebratory of knowing where your desires do not lie with those that are aromantic and asexual.

But for those looking to consensually dance with others, grind with others, get it on with others, I’ve got some lusty picks for you. Halestorm posits what if hard rock/metal met a Joan Jett-esque lead with no shame of her rock and roll lifestyle, intense and sometimes kinky sexual desires, a rough feminist edge, and an understated queerness that doesn’t define the bad. Lzzy Hale leads the charge with her all male bandmates with songs that put the multitalented singer into the spotlight.

There are plenty of bangers about the benefits of a no-shits-given attitude and taking the crown whenever you feel like it along with a number of contemplative ballads about the pain of loss, paving the way for the new generation of female presenting rockers. But, in my eyes, Halestorm is a dirrrrrrrty band. Sometimes it’s slumming it with dirty licks and more than suggestive beats. Lzzy doesn’t fuck around; she is direct with her appetites and puts that on full display to be celebrated, and it is one hell of a ride.

I can’t take the lust out of the band (and not just because of the crushable nature of the lead singer) but because of the way I was introduced to a particular song. I Get Off is about the thrill of being watched, voyeuristic teasing, and being in control of someone’s horndog stares. It was apt that I first heard of it during a burlesque number performed by a gorgeous, fiery redhead who knew how to work that stage and pull at my heartstrings. Her attitude and smoky voice left me in a puddle and her curves in the places I’m usually drawn to was the icing on the cake. But, my mind has a way of assuming a lot of people who I crush on are out of my league. The fact that this sensual performer had eyes for me as well, well, the song is memorable for many reasons.

“I get off on you

Getting off on me

I give you what you want

But nothing is for free”

With some excellent guitar work and Lzzy’s vocals pulsating pure sex and pushing past that point of unrestrained rock vibrato, I Get Off is a song title you can accompany, if you so desire. While the contents of this track, originally off of Halestorm from 2009, hit some not so uncommon voyeuristic notes, a more interesting and darker twist on the things we seek out comes with I Miss the Misery from 2012’s The Strange Case of…

“I miss the rough sex

Leaves me a mess

I miss the feeling of pains in my chest

Miss the phone calls

When it's your fault”

The line of romanticizing and understanding the powerful aroma of a toxic relationship is thin here. But I remember those kind of relationships where the constant tension and disagreements with the other just made the sweet releases that much more… decadent. Lzzy doesn’t mince words here; she knows what she misses and craves but also understands that she doesn’t miss the person behind those angry yet pleasurable memories. The simple snare work acts as a staccato to the bare truth in the different stanzas. The choruses are chopped up with chunky chords and a steady trudge along. The middle slows down into an quiet admission of the deviant desires but explodes into Lzzy’s bold acceptance and declaration of missing that misery. The power of taboo thoughts and someone unrepentant in their honesty can light many fires

There are a lot of other twisted and sexy ballads I can point to, like a sweet hard rock cover of Gaga’s Bad Romance or the forbidden juices oozing from The Familiar Taste of Poison but the real choice for this playlist is a song I hadn’t heard until researching for this article. Halestorm released Vicious in 2018, a while after I stopped listening to them regularly. But there is one song that I’m glad disturbed my listening research sessions and made me feel strong things in certain areas.

“I think we should make out”

Why song, don’t you think you should buy me a drink first?! Do Not Disturb makes the sleazy guitar riffs and thirst-filled lyrics just work in an intoxicating mixture. Lzzy likes to being dirty and direct here with commentary like ‘I wonder what it'll sound like when you cum’ because of your accent and ‘There's a king size bed but we can do it on the floor’. There’s even a part that makes math fun!

“And if I were you I'll bring your girlfriend too

Two is better than one, three is better than two

Leave a sign on the door, the whole night through

That says "Do not disturb", "Do not disturb"”

And there is the very rare lyric showing Lzzy Hales bisexuality. Like I said earlier, it doesn’t define her or the band, but adds more levels to her refreshing take on, I am who I am and I want what I want and I want who I want. That openness is just so enviable and hot!

I shouldn’t speak of envy! This is a Pride playlist! It’s all about the celebration and the magic and the aesthetics of the queer experience! Because we’re all like that all the time, right?!

No.

Let’s talk about sins.

Common sayings in the last few years online have been ‘Pride started out as a Riot’, or ‘This year, let’s celebrate Wrath’ in reaction to the massive protests happening in the US and around the world based on the other pandemic of violence, subjugation, erasure, and other crimes against black communities. Injustices and awful things do not stop when you put on a glittery outfit. There are definitely times to celebrate but there are also times to resist, reflect, resolve, and reignite passions to protect all people and wipe away the stains of white supremacy, patriarchy, homophobia, transphobia, ableism, terrorism against so many non-white people. Pride just isn’t about rainbow cups from your favourite coffee chain or exploitative and fatphobic ads from a bank.

Let’s talk about sins.

It’s not a coincidence that Pride is one of the seven deadly sins. After having identities literally forged by the association and taxonomy of different immoral desires, those sins became intertwined within so many that are queer. The history of Christianity is literally riddled with this stuff. However, these lucky seven (see what I did there) actions are displayed as resistance and a confirmation of all that Pride exists for. Where being ‘loud and proud’ and ‘sexy and, uh, texty’ are often projected onto the month of June, so many more layers exist. All deadly sins are felt, dissected, celebrated, mourned, hated, dispelled, embraced during an intense and tumultuous time.

Luckily there’s music to reflect those often ignored or invisibilized moments or ‘big moods’ during June. So yes, let’s add Envy to the list!

Green Day was the first band I got into. Dookie was the first album I bought for myself. I remember feeling proud about this and listening to all the cool songs and lyrics that weren’t for snotty-nosed kids! And everyone was going to be envious of me and my discovery of punk and the greatest band on the Earth. And bonus points for me for finding out that frontman, Billie Joe Armstrong identifies as bisexual years later, adding even more things to admire about the band.

Of course none of that happened. My musical tastes (d)evolved into a metal slant and liking anything heavy in the 90s/00s was not a good choice for popularity points. Still, Green Day was part of my formative years and I still listen to them this day, even though there’s so many new albums to listen to. But like most bands that have lasted 30+ years, their tunes and words are still relevant decades later.

I got back into Green Day when American Idiot came out. I’m not sure if it was because it was everywhere or just because it was just that damn good and spoke to my developing theatrical side at that period, but it instantly became one of my favourite albums. It’s still up there. The political messages and punk imagery stuffed into this concept album about a lazy prophet named ‘Jesus of Suburbia’ was just incredible. There were two amazing ballads, Boulevard of Broken Dreams and Wake Me Up When September Ends, stuffed into the 57-minute runtime that became staples for years after.

The spectre of the radical activist and self-assured ‘Whatshername’ in American Idiot’s tale is an often overlooked part of the album. In both She’s a Rebel and the last track, Whatshername, shows the suburban Jesus falling for the woman. But in the lyrics, you can sense more of a longing and an envy of her singular focus on her passion for justice.

“I made a point to burn all of the photographs

She went away, and then I took a different path

I remember the face, but I can't recall the name

Now I wonder how whatshername has been”

The punk-pop drive of She’s a Rebel and the monotone yet still melancholic Whatshername both are great fits for any playlist that deals with complex feelings of admiration but also isolation due to jealousy. But I found Nice Guys Finish Last to be the best Green Day song to rep Envy. And because of the warping of the concept of ‘nice guys’ and toxic masculinity and entitlement for women’s affections, the song takes on so many new dimensions. As the titular Nice Guy struggles and worms and schmoozes his way through life, you can feel the derision of the narrator through the upbeat tempo.

“Oh nice guys finish last

When you are the outcast

Don't pat yourself on the back

You might break your spine”

There’s an unearned sympathy placed on our poor, misguided man-child. I feel this unsaid envy that Mr. Nice Guy to the narrator and the others judging him. I have seen myself in that situation, trying so desperately to be liked and fit in but also sheltered and awkward, unsure how to just communicate honestly with people. My superpower of withdrawing within myself a judging others from afar also mirrors the narrator’s smug declarations. I see this spiteful, envious behaviour during Pride as well.

There are the queer folk who understand their being and aesthetic so incredibly and then have the imagination to wear that through drag or costuming or body-painting or hairstyles and a host of other cool things. On the sidelines, I am secretly frustrated, impressed, and mean-spirited. Why can’t I become a literal Bisexual Superhero like some I know during the month of June? Is that the way I need to express my sexuality? Am I valid if I hide within my passing nature? Or if I prefer my unfashionable ways of jeans and pop-culture tees? The answer is always ‘everyone is valid in their queerness’ but I know too many people that fall into this envy pit.

Envy leads to fear. Fear leads to hate. Hate leads to wrath. Wrath leads to the jealous cishet side. I think that’s the Star Wards quote. But that anger is one of the cornerstones of Pride and of the resistance. The brick thrown by black, AMAB activist, Marsha P. Johnson during Stonewall has become an iconic anecdote for the 40 years of Pride since. The good fight still rages on even as certain aspects of homosexual life have become normalized, especially when they mirror that of monogamous, heterosexual relationships.

But wrath is what brought that about. It was the rage of a people connected through their ‘sinful’ life outside the norm that helped them organize and retaliate as they were fighting for their very livelihood. I exist in a safer world to explore my own demi-queerness (see my other article ‘Queer Life vs. Queer Lite’ on Vocal for more on that) because of the four decades that came before. Sometimes it’s easy for me to forget about the resistance that must be built up within when things seem ‘equal’ on the surface, especially for privileged people like myself.

But any glance at the news with horrible things like mass unmarked graves with Indigenous kids at shuttered residential schools or families being run over by radicalized white men because of their faith, makes that resistance and anger boil. I don’t own the rage of the groups these awful subjugations belong to, but I listen to those stories. I know who the enemy is, on the inside and outside, and I am ready to resist and fight when needed, and I was helped along by a specific genre of music.

“We are screaming, screaming for vengeance

The world is a manacled place

Screaming, screaming for vengeance

The world is defiled in disgrace”

The Metal God himself, Rob Halford, sang many-a resistance and antiauthority songs, sometimes when all decked out in leather. Screaming for Vengeance speaks of internal need to act against authoritarian powers that strip their citizen’s freedoms. In a falsetto that still ‘screams’ of metal and power, he soars up the musical scale during the titular yell. Vengeance is regulated to a thought that is almost cut off at the end, showing the importance of it all. Of course dual solos battle with shredding intensity, until the two guitarists come together for a united, slower, and menacing end to the section. It’s all very Judas Priest circa 1982 with the album of the same name as the song.

Of course, the wrath and anger don’t stop there, which is not surprising for a metal band. Breaking the Law off of the even earlier (1980) British Steel, comments that the only recourse is to fight against the police and oppressive laws when everything else has been taken away from you. The parallels to the gay rights movement is pretty clear, Also, the energy needed to keep up this wrath can be felt in the power-ballads such as Ram it Down from 1988 and Painkiller from 1990, both tracks of their respectively named albums.

Pride is not an easy time for a lot of people in the LGTBQ+ community. Some carry the scars of the past while others have fresh ones every year. Some have been beaten down by every community they ever belonged to including their family, friends, employers, and church. Even within what are supposed to be the open arms of the Queer umbrella, factions arise. Gatekeepers appear and certain people are cast out for not being gay enough. TERFS look to reject all trans people where bisexuals and asexual folks are shunned due to their ability to pass better. ‘Respectable’ queers look to make all of Pride family-friendly and embrace the oppressive idea of homonormativity, rallying against the kink and sex worker factions.

Long story short, the most inclusive time of the year can be the most damaging and hurtful for some. With a month that’s supposed to be about celebration and positive vibes, not enough attention is given to ‘negative’ emotions. Grief, sadness, isolation all creep in to people’s lives. Maybe it’s the reminder of the horrifying impact of AIDS in the 80s and 90s or the inhuman rate of trans lives lost. Those questioning or on the fringes of queerness step back and feel even more alone.

From these dark places, sloth slowly rears it’s funnily shaped head. This is not just laziness, but an apathy of the soul. One of the older deadly sins was the concept of acedia, a listlessness of the soul. Here, we have those who become sullen and morose and are made to feel even worse with the capitalistic fun party times pushed on them. Grief, sorrow, despair all belong at Pride. Suffering does not equal queerness but the unfortunate truth is the two go hand-in-hand far too often.

Sloth deserves its own cathartic tracks; tearjerkers and laments are there to compliment the tearing at one’s heart and soul. Sometime the songs themselves are tragedies of their own.

Otep is a difficult band to pin down from a genre perspective. The lead singer, Otep Shamaya, mixes influences from a plethora of sources to cover many different topics. She is lesbian activist/poet/writer/singer/doom-growler that has created many anti-patriarchy, anti-establishment, anti-fascist songs. She would’ve been right at home with wrath with her complex and extreme call-to-arms against misogyny, Menocide.

However, it was during my university years when I was taking Sexual Diversity Studies, that I came across the true brilliance of Otep. In one of the greatest classes I’ve ever taken, Queer Music, we were asked to write about a band in our favourite genre and their connection to queerness, whether it was through identities and orientations of the actual band members or non-normative explorations through music and lyrics. You’ve never taken a deep dive into the bellows of the metal/hardcore genre until you look at Forced Gender Reassignment (with accompanying graphic music video) by Cattle Decapitation.

However, Otep does not go to such visceral ends to create haunting pieces. On the 2009 album Smash the Control Machine (which has one of the best covers of all time), Shamaya explores the continual and insidious oppression of women over time and cultural norms. UR A WMN NOW strays away from the hypermasculine death-metal approach to Menocide and aims at a softer, femme rumination on just as heavy topics.

“He shoves her to the ground

Her soul begins to drown

A sky full of eyes where the stars should be

A sky full of eyes watching silently

You're a woman now

You've become a women now

The weight of the cradle has broken the bough

You've become a woman now”

Shamaya serenades through difficult and blunt lyrics with lulling melody and violins as somber accompaniment. Light notes of a piano hide underneath the layered everything above. The song is hauntingly fatalistic but in a way that’s only full of weary acceptance. The struggles of a woman going through rape, forced marriage, separation, judgement, unemployment, child birth, supporting a child are not romanticized or politicized but just presented the way they are. This is the reality.

“Standing on the welfare line

My daughter clinging to my side”

Sloth has been pushed upon the subject of the song. Society has broken her and now the haves further dehumanize her as a have-not. She becomes a strain on the system that exists to push her down and leave her in an inescapable state. This is an apt metaphor for many people who celebrate Pride and have found their way to being queer. The weight of a world that is always against to (and only increases in intensity with each additional intersectional property of race, disability, neurodiversity, class, etc) is meant to pull everything out from you and leave you as a lifeless husk that will be judged as a slovenly layabout or a failed person or someone marked with depression for life.

Within this deadly sin, we can see how we’ve been marked and heavily encouraged to be as normal and productive as possible. It’s incredibly painful but reflective songs like this are needed on our playlist. The periods of light and fun are often followed by dark and misery.

That’s not all Pride is about, right? There’s still fun along with Pride and Lust! What do we still have? Gluttony? Are you a glutton for punishment? But I want to make things a bit lighter. No punishment this time, even if you would’ve liked it.

I’ll level with you, I can’t really find a queer way to fit this next song in through personal anecdote or through the extended deadly sins metaphor. But Weird Al is a supporter of LGTBQ+ rights, even taking the money he made off of his parody of Gaga’s Born this Way, Perform this Way and donating it to Human Rights Campaign charity, the largest queer advocacy group.

Anyway, he has a lot of songs that spoof food and the concept of eating and enjoying eating. Some, er, haven’t aged as well as others (looking at your Fat) but others are still super fun to listen to.

“Just eat it, eat it, eat it, eat it

Open up your mouth and feed it

Have some more yogurt, have some more Spam

It doesn't matter if it's fresh or canned”

Eat It is a Michael Jackson parody off of the 1984 album, ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic in 3-D. While Al’s vocals and musical stylings are on point for copying the King of Pop. But the song is just an appetizer with the music video being the main course. Amazing physical awaits those who watch it, as our limber satirist dances his way through the entire tune. The costuming is amazing and sharp eyed viewers will see so many Easter eggs referencing the original video and other pop-culture items. You’ll see the iconic yellow smiley face on the back of a jean jacket or silly hats during a pan of one of the gangs. Pride can be about silliness and humour and excess and you’ll find all of that with Weird Al and his take on gluttony.

We finally arrive at Greed. Was my attempt to shoehorn in my fave musician greedy? Perhaps. But it’s funny how greed and the want for more and more has changed from the 1980s to now. Trolls and con-artists and influencers vie for clicks and information and cryptocurrency and whatever the next internet trend is. Fifteen minutes of fame has shortened to fifteen seconds thanks to YouTube and other social media platforms. And within this ‘achievable celebrity’ we’ve seen queer voices rise to podiums where they can make their voices heard. But we also have seen the rise of radicalized, computer savvy neo-nazis and the insane webs of conspiracy theorists. The new greed is looking for the ones that get famous super quickly fall, or get ‘cancelled’, as problematic as that is.

My last singer and song for the sin of want and wont will be a surprise, especially given how I’m writing this on a Tuesday.

There’s a lot of greed in this artist’s history, with rich parentage, vanity projects, a sudden worldwide fame, and a severely mocked infamy. One does not get to star in a music video without money and vanity.

However, I chose this star borne via Friday to note how people who are torn apart online and become a cultural joke do not just stop existing once that ends. I wanted to reflect on the sometimes temporary and volatile nature of the limelight and how it can crush people down. Smaller celebrities and internet stars can be outed, doxxed, find themselves as the Twitter villain of the day, and then horrendously bullied online. And that can extend to people’s real lives with death threats, stalking, and unwelcomed invasions into people’s personal lives. Most of the time this happens to those who have many intersections of vulnerable communities including queer identities. Sometimes that greedy feeling of wanting the ‘high and mighty’ to fall can target people within your own ‘side’. Sometimes it’s for petty reasons and disagreements because the need to be right is so intoxicating. I’ve had a few experiences recently where I had to reel myself in and remind myself that righteousness can be a much worse sin than the 7 ones with notoriety.

All people deserve compassion and a chance for redemption and the current culture of trying to hold everyone to an unreachable, flawless standard is so harmful.

I'm getting back with my girlfriend

Ready to dive in the deep end

This time it's gonna be different

I'm getting back with my girlfriend

I'm gonna call her, drive on over

Wanna see her, wanna hold her

The greediness and narcissism here is very identifiable. The need for something that you abused and threw aside. The sense of ownership and entitlement. And, while yes, this is Girlfriend by the infamous Rebecca Black. I urge you to give it a listen and try to divorce those associations in your head. Think of it as an exercise in not simplifying someone into one thing that they did or identified as or love. Maybe it’s repentance from your deadly sins.

However, there was a theory of ‘revalorization’ of the Seven in modern times. The novelist, Sir William Robert Ferdinand Mount, 3rd Baronet, who, as you might have guessed, is British, has this to say:

"covetousness has been rebranded as retail therapy, sloth is downtime, lust is exploring your sexuality, anger is opening up your feelings, vanity is looking good because you're worth it and gluttony is the religion of foodies".

So wear and celebrate and own your sinful lives this Pride. And don’t forget to put on the appropriate music.