No, not a music post, but one of cultural interest….. Yes, the matchbook above echos the “Fagots Stay Out” message of the sign in the West Hollywood bar of Barney Anthony in the early 1960s. It was still brewing controversy in the mid 1980s, as seen in the article below.

  The AIDS Bells — Sung by Ian Jones, Written by Arthur Jones. A haunting dirge about the the losses to AIDS. This is a scarce 7″ vinyl, that took me years to track down, so of course I’m sharing it. Google has not helped me track down a year, but I am guessing late…

The year 1975 yielded one of the earliest rock operas that touched gay topics, “Everyhead,” an ambitious project inspired by the medieval play “Everyman.” It tried to cover the ills of mankind (at least American) all over the map, perhaps a bit too symbolically as the cast wore elaborate masks. According to the show’s very…

Billy Newton-Davis I could go on several tangents when talking about the 2008 EP released by Billy Newton-Davis. First, Davis is the award-winning Canadian artist and long-time member of the hit group The Nylons. That group formed in 1978 and in 2014 did a reunion concert including every living member of the group (there have…

As the liner notes indicate, Habanita was a performer at the world famous female impersonation club Le Carrousel of Paris, and I’m dating this release (on a Belgian label) from the 1960s. I really do not know anymore about this performer, except to say that not too many of the performers also released recordings (among…

  Some of you may have heard of Ramblin’ Jack Elliott, shown above, who has been a prolific recording artist since the 1950’s, winning Grammy Awards in 1995 and 2009. I’ll let Wiki go into a lengthy bio, or those with interest can visit his own website. Well, This is a Different Jack Elliott, with…

   Homosexuality Pre-Stonewall Spoken-Word Documentary LPsQueer Theory, 1960s style “Homosexuality in the American Male”by Lawrence Schiller, 1967, narrated by George Kennedy and“Homosexualité Masculine au Canada Français”by Christian Delmas, 1968, in French Here are two “documentary” LPs on the subject of homosexuality in the 1960s, with definitely different viewpoints than we see fifty years later. In…

From the 1967 film “Teenage Rebellion” comes the now campy and humorous track “The Gay Teenager,” narrated by movie director and announcer Burt Topper. He did not direct this film though; that was Mike Curb, future Lieutenant Governor of California. I could not find this on Youtube, so thought that was overdue.  

I adore the Noel Coward song “Mad About the Boy,” and over the years have collected many, many versions of it. But I have one that’s a mystery to me, and I need help! Years ago I acquired a mp3 of a Very camp version, sung by a man, and it was identified as sung…

And here’s some history I learned only last year, of the transgender kind. It may remind you of the story of Billy Tipton, a jazz musician who only at his death it was found that he was a woman, passing as a man for decades (see my blog entry and website page). The same secret…