Homosexuality and Hip-Hop : The Gay Rapper Thread

...and they rock...

The main stream of hip hop culture itself tends to be deeply homophobic, I think it's fair to say.

It's cool to see out folks making any kind of headway. I know there's an LA rapper that goes by Gay Mike or something like that, he's part of some crew. Unfortunately the LA Weekly ate the New Times LA online archive when the latter was slain, so I can't find the one article I remember on him.

What about Q-Tip?

We'll probably get a mainstream-accepted lesbian MC before we get a gay one, I'm guessing.

Oddly, rumors have been flying for many years that 2Pac himself was quite the bisexual.

(I am so dead.)

Well, there's always Peaches...

And not to turn this thread into "hip-hop rumors involving homosexuality" (although it kinda already is that) but, according to DMX, Ja Rule had an exchange one night with a guy after eating X.

Jan Geerinck
http://www.jahsonic.com/Gay.html

Lesbian rappers are less of a threat to the hyper-hetero masculinity of hip-hop.

Hmmm? But lesbian rappers are women that suceed in a male-dominated medium, and furthermore don't *need* men (as opposed to heterosexual female rappers, who almost always encourage fellow females to get a guy, even if only for $$$$$.) Surely that's a threat to your average thug's comfort, too?

Or so someone tried to explain, zonked on acid, staring intently at a Bone Thugs ad at a bus stop. I think this was at Berkeley some weeks after a seminar on bisexuality in lower-class communities with high rates of incarceration. This also doesn't help explain the lack of non-gangster gay hip-hop artists.

It's kind of a cheap irony, but I enjoy it nonetheless.

(I guess you could draw a similar/stronger line with first-wave hip hop's dico roots, as also per the house comments above...)

Lil' Kim's frequently rapping about how she quite likes lesbians - there's even a song where she tells Puff Daddy not to yell "dyke" at them - in some ways I think the lesbian is almost upheld within ho-rap as the ultimate in self-empowered independence - though that said, I get the impression that flirtation with lesbianism would still be a male-porn style prelude to the main event.

This isn't something I've even heard of before, but if it's true, it might explain why he bit a Bowie song.

I dunno about Dre = gay. Calling your former-friend "punk-ass faggot," etc., figures pretty prominently in the various Ruthless/Death Row/and so on feuds. Witness Cube's "No Vaseline," Dre or Ren "talking to that bitch O'Shea," as just a couple instances.

Re: James Brown I read an interview with someone who'd been on tour with him, 60s or 70s, about him bringing along an effeminate male companion for his pleasure. I don't have trouble buying this.

*(i didn't read it if he did, so this may not be fair)

I saw evidence to the contrary a couple months ago while watching a clip I saw of him performing on SNL in 1980. Unless he used a prosthesis.

http://www.villagevoice.com/issues/0005/trebay.php

Then again, would any drag queen use lip liner to that extent?

I think the gay scene rarely follows trends - and hip hop as a genre is just so outdated, it's too way back there for gays.... the fashions may seep into gay culture, the music - nah. Too violent, too ugly and impossible to dance to.

Spoke to Mykki for five minutes before her show tonight (a few folks I know were involved in setting it up and I showed up a bit early).

Cosmic Angel (the mixtape) is supposed to drop in October with production from Brenmar, Teengirl Fantasy and Physical Therapy, and some other folks I forget. She's recording in LA and SF in the next week or two to finish things up before her European tour.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IIhf8InaOr4

based on the screencap, I'll pass.

Be grateful you did.

should i go see BIG FREEDIA on thursday night at a small-ish club?!?

I cannot imagine why you (or anyone) wouldn't.

Absolutely. Ass is everywhere.

rev & i talked this out a bit behind the scenes but im not sure i see what the pitchfork article did that this article isn't also doing?
http://www.alternet.org/comments/medias-problem-gay-rappers

i mean, i think obv there needs to be a balance between defining rappers who are gay as a gay rapper movement & simply ignoring the phenomenon that there are now out gay rappers, (which is to say, there is SOMEthing happening, right?) but I fail to see what the pitchfork article did that made it any worse than what this article is doing.

Do Kpop girl group rappers count?

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q40UvNxLBDQ

They're being promoted in a major way.

With the 'Wavvy' premiere and the increased media coverage, I figured it was time for Mykki to get her own thread - Mykki Blanco - 'Wavvy' and the forthcoming Cosmic Angel mixtape

http://soundcloud.com/zebrakatz/ima-read-ft-gangsta-boo-x

GANGSTA FUCKING BOO

and tricky O_O

Gangsta Boo is great on that but Tricky doesn't work at all. Then again, I've never liked him.

haha i thought tricky had come out of the closet

That's how I interpreted that as well. LOL

i think they both sound really awkward on that track, she's no better than him imo

love this. DDm is the best.

http://soundcloud.com/goddm/bmore-fierce-remix

man y'all are sleeping on ^^^^that one

he raps over an az. banks beat and violently riffs on "Ima Read"

desert eag, desert eag, desert eag
make it bleeed, make it bleeed, make it bleeed
ima read, ima read, ima read
your obituary

are there any gay rappers in the UK?

http://blogs.villagevoice.com/music/2012/11/fan-landers-gay-rapper-aging-hardcore.php

I'm a 31 year old, balding bearded guy who doesn't drink but I do possess a love for post-hardcore or whatever

CAKES!

http://soundcloud.com/bloglin/cakes-da-killa-goodies/

i forget if we're still using this or if we've moved onto another thread, but there's a zebra katz mixtape out today called DRKLNG: https://soundcloud.com/zebrakatz/drklng

Not that surprising, alas:

Big Freedia Twerking Postal Service Fans The Wrong Way As Band’s Unlikely Opening Act

"twerking fans the wrong way" -_-

Could you imagine wanting to hear the electronic beats of the Postal Service more than the electronic beats of Big Freedia?

Gib Bardia, the hardest twerking artist around, is a gender-queer/gender-fluid musician famous for being the face of New Orleans Bounce music — a small sub-genre of hip-hop that uses hyper-sexual call-and-response lyrics over sampled beats and sounds (most ubiquitous is the Triggerman beat).

lol both of you

was the current mister cee situation covered in another thread?
http://america.aljazeera.com/watch/shows/the-stream/the-stream-officialblog/2013/9/13/mister-cee-and-hiphop.html

http://colorlines.com/archives/2013/09/laverne_cox_and_janet_mock_talk_mister_cee.html

^^This is really good.

Laverne Cox:

There's consistently an erasure of trans identity when we have these discussions. The reason I'm here is because whenever we have these discussions, trans people's voices -- trans women's voices, specifically -- are not included in these discussions. And the stigmatizing -- I've been single most of the time I've been in New York, most of the time since I started transitioning fifteen years ago, and I date men. The extent to which men who date us or are attracted to us are stigmatized is so intense. Most of these men feel like they can never tell anyone, can never be out about it.

Janet wrote in her piece today so brilliantly today is that men are attracted to women, and so so often, when a man is found to be in a relationship or attracted to a trans women, it's the misgendering and the denial of our womanhood that we see happening there. And that kind of stigma leads to violence against trans women. That kind of stigma leads to us not being able to get a job. That stigma leads to us not being able to get health care, housing. And it really is a state of emergency for trans women.

For me it's important that we use this opportunity to talk about how men who date us are stigmatized, and how that really reflects on how our bodies and our existence and our lives are stigmatized.

Today in my African American lit seminar we discussed Mykki Blanco and Le1f. I love school.

!

It is worth mentioning that I only brought up the latter, and even then, only after one of my classmates brought up the former. When I saw my prof scribble down Le1f's name in his notebook, I told him to download the Fly Zone tape.

lol, my friend that teaches classes on gender in media studies gets into those kinda conversations all the time. i think she has a matrix lecture.

http://www.hiphopdx.com/index/interviews/id.2181/title.f-virtue-discusses-homosexuality-in-hip-hop-coming-out-in-single-anita-bryant-

Unfortunately that guy's a pretty bad rapper though.

Definitely important to mention Lord Jamar in the second sentence of that. Def important to validate the opinions of a bigot who hasn't made an important record in 20 years

-________-

http://labrujamorgan.tumblr.com/post/79881448946/some-reflections-on-gaybigaygay

Cakes played it down a bit -

I’m sorry the event took a turn for the worst for you boo but I did not end my set out of frustration but because of a time restraint. Also, no one during my set annoyed me with how they were acting to me it seemed all out of fun.

Again, I’m sorry the event didn’t pan out the way you wanted it to but I def had fun at my first Gaybi and I don’t think Mykki was fazed either.

They have been told their whole lives that everything is theirs. They’ve been told that whatever they do is fine and cute and great

don't think this is really accurate about LGBT people of any colour tbh (this is not to minimise how terrible white gays can be) (the way she described it sounded terrible but if cakes is telling a different story...?)

fans climbing on stage during a concert isn't really a matter of disrespect or entitlement is it?

if uninvited i'd tend to call it an asshole move regardless but if the performers were fine with it, or it was expected...

That was an

urgh, sorry: wasn't there and have limited perspective but cakes and mykki have distinctly punk sensibilities, i have a hard time believing this kind of behavior would've traumatized them. and having been to dozens of sets where the words "these goddamn white people" have easily come to mind, saying that the white fans were "spasmodically wriggling" to the set sorta plays out your hand; with the artist shrugging in the comments this reads more like an opportunity to grind an axe in bloggytown than highlight a great injustice

alright, I hadn't seen Cakes' response. moving along

gaybigaygay is a terrible show name btw

truuuu

passed my way today, dunno if i exactly care for it or not
http://vimeo.com/84941601

surprised that this hasn't been discussed yet (for the fact of its existence much more so than its quality)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x4iBBfEHNaE