This Sounds Like Music to My Gay Ears

In the words of the iconic Diana Ross, "I'm coming out!"...with the GAYEST playlist, not just in the LGBTQIA+ sense, but also in the happy sense of the word. It is 10 songs that anyone can jam out to celebrate and embrace love, happiness, and fun the way these artists have. It's time to celebrate Pride and though it's symbolically the month of June, I'll be partying 12 months of the year from between my earbuds.

P!nk: Get The Party Started

Throughout her prolific career, P!nk has been the underdog of the limelight, but one of the G.O.A.T LGBTQIA+ allies to me. Her speech at an award show directed to her daughter spoke about being true to you, whatever anyone else says about being 'too masculine' or 'looking weird' was something that I can always look back on to this day. Throwing it back (both era-wise and literally), Get the Party Started should really be the top of everyone's Pride playlist because it, in fact, gets the party started.

Janelle Monáe: Make Me Feel

Nothing makes me feel quite like a bisexual, pansexual queen than the queen herself: Janelle Monáe.

It's like I'm powerful with a little bit of tender

An emotional, sexual bender

This is a sensual, confident main character song, as in if you're not strutting down the bustling metropolitan street with your hair down and your head held high like it's noone's business, you're not doing Janelle justice. It's for whoever wants to not just be who they are, but flaunt it, honey!

That's just the way you make me feel

So real, so good, so fuckin' real

Ruby Waters: Supernatural

This is the scene in the semi-divey, semi-clubby bar where you see that gorgeous person from across the room and they're communicating that unspoken, mutual attraction with their eyes. Ruby Waters singing about her out-of-this-world experience with another girl is how I imagine every human feels like when they start something new with that one special person.

I thought she was a snack and now she be the whole meal

Troye Sivan: Bloom

I know I wrote a whole mini illiad for every other song, but this song is just the quintessential Pride playlist, from the artist to the melody to the words. That's it. Just listen and bloom.

Billie Eilish: You Should See Me In A Crown

Janelle Monáe's Make Me Feel is the angel to what You Should See Me in a Crown does. Where Make Me Feel is the main character with the silky, flowing-in-the-wind hair and the smize, Billie Eilish took her song and made its' listener into the main character with the sceptre, iron throne, and cocked eyebrow.

Watch me make 'em bow

One by one by one

This song is one that exudes a dark, domineering confidence that gives anyone the ability to conquer through their ears.

Village People: I Am What I Am

Let's be honest, YMCA is the anthem of everyone over the age of 4. But the Village People are more than just a one-hit wonder. They are a multi-hit wonder with an emphasis on the 'wonder'. I mean, the song title speaks for itself, but LOOK at these guys!

Mika: Grace Kelly

Fuck fitting in! Fuck the mould! Everyone needs to be the Mika and sing their Grace Kelly. For Mika, this song was a middle finger to his record label for trying to get him to fit into the "popular" music sound, which is ironic because this is one of his biggest hits ever.

Do I attract you? Do I repulse you with my queasy smile?

Am I too dirty? Am I too flirty? Do I like what you like?

I could be wholesome, I could be loathsome, I guess I'm a little bit shy

Why don't you like me? Why don't you like me without making me try?

Pride is all about embracing and owning who you are and this song and Mika himself are the epitome of that sentiment.

Kylie Minogue: All The Lovers

This song is singing to the "love is love" and "love whoever you want" choirs. Kylie Minogue in her semi-crowd-surfing, semi-orgy, all-beautiful music video is speaking to her universal audience, bathing them in a touching, sensual, and sexy message of love and expressing your true self and true love.

Feel, can't you see there's so much here to feel?

Deep inside in your heart you know I'm real

There's a undertone of hesitancy that comes with one of the people in the pair who isn't as willing to feel and act on the love they share as openly as the other. But as the song goes on and the crowd of people lifting Minogue up (literally and spiritually), it seems like she comes out of a cocoon and you can feel that as the song progresses. Listening to this rings true for me back when I started figuring out myself in the LGBT community but it also is just a dancy-feely-electropop song that gets anyone to just move and groove.

Ian Isiah: N.U.T.S

Make some room for the people that want to love you

This song is one, a reminder of the world we live in, but two, a reminder of the world we live in. Above the homophobia that is sadly still pervasive in the world, there is also love and acceptance and pride for those people who face it. There is a way to be who you want to be and be appreciated because the world is a big place. This funky, feisty fight song is teeming with that message as Ian Isiah dances and sings in the streets of New York.

Børns: Electric Love

The amazing, talented, Bowie-esque Børns knew exactly how to make a song that would make anyone want to just spread their arms and twirl in the streets.

Electric Love has been debated to be about drugs, maybe because of the way it gives a feeling of ecstasy (and maybe because his album was called Dopamine), but it's really about the fantasy and adoration of someone you love. This rounds out the playlist perfectly as it sends me, the listener, out with smiles and euphoria (also sounding like drugs, but I promise, it's not).