32 Queer Covers Of Songs by Straight Artists Because Everything’s Better When It’s Gayer
This post was originally published in September 2014 and has been updated and re-vamped with new artists and songs in February 2021.
My friends, I love a cover. I love covers so much I watched every season of Glee. But most of all I love queer covers, aka queer people covering songs. Give me a gay cover! Let us share in this love together? I attempted to only pick songs that had videos where things happened, like people singing for example, but some covers were too good to skip even though their video was audio-only. ALSO I was looking for songs usually by male artists about women so we could have some pronoun fun but also there are exceptions to that as well because of goodness and my personal desires. I also was looking for covers of songs by straight artists but I have indicated where that premise was slightly compromised. Lez begin!
Miya Folick, “I Will Follow You Into the Dark” (Death Cab for Cutie)
Tracy Chapman, “Stand By Me” (Ben E King)
Alex G, “Perfect” (Ed Sheehan)
Joy Oladokun, “My Girl” (The Temptations)
Marika Hackman, “Between the Bars” (Elliot Smith)
Be Steadwell, “Use Somebody” (Kings of Leon)
Brandi Carlile, “Wildflowers” (Tom Petty)
https://youtu.be/ZPRkpyHUpJU
Julia Nunes & dodie & Orla Garland, “God is a Woman” (Ariana Grande)
(as far as i know, orla is not queer, but the other two people in this are!)
Hayley Kiyoko, “Mr Brightside” (The Killers)
Rebecca Black, “Love Me Two Times” (The Doors)
Note: Jim Morrisson may have been bisexual.
Jessica Betts, “I Kissed a Girl” (Katy Perry)
Japanese Breakfast, “Head Over Heels” (Tears for Fears)
King Princess, “Happy Together” (The Turtles)
Joan Jett, “Crimson and Clover” (Tommy James)
https://youtu.be/mHZBBNRrano
Janelle Monae, “I Want You Back” (The Jackson 5)
Sara Ramirez, “Chasing Cars” (Snow Patrol)
Unfortunately she is not the only singer on this track but we have what we have
Demi Lovato, “Take Me To Church” (Hozier)
Kai Mata, “Riptide” (Vance Joy)
k.d. lang, “Crazy” (Patsy Cline)
Katie Melua, “Just Like Heaven” (The Cure)
Melissa Etheridge, “Brown Eyed Girl” (Van Morrison)
Indigo Girls, “Romeo and Juliet” (Dire Straits)
Holly Miranda, “Lover You Should’ve Come Over” (Jeff Buckley)
Me’Shell NdegéOcello, “Who Is He and What Is He To You” (Bill Withers)
St. Vincent, “Lithium” (Nirvana cover, performed with surviving members of Nirvana)
Note: Kurt Cobain was possibly bisexual but this has not been definitively declared. Also Pat Smear is bisexual.
Lily Brown, “Rude” (Magic)
This song is actually unbearable in its heterosexual version but delightful when it’s gay.
Mary Lambert, “Teenage Dirtbag” (Wheatus)
Tayla Parks, “What’s Going On” (Marvin Gaye)
Halsey “Sucker” (Jonas Brothers)
K’s Choice, “Yellow” (Coldplay)
Tegan & Sara, “Dancing in the Dark” (Bruce Springsteen)
Santana Lopez and Brittany S Pierce, “I Wanna Dance With Somebody” (Whitney Houston)
10 Super-Successful Lesbian, Bisexual & Queer Celebrities With Depression
feature image via The Pop Hub
Our gal pal true love Kristen Stewart’s recent comments to The Daily Beast about the validity of mental health diagnoses and treatment rubbed a lot of fans the wrong way — and her comments are especially unfortunate considering the disproportionate numbers of LGBT folks who have some kind of psychiatric diagnoses. Like uh, most of the people who work here! And the women on this list.
Ruby Rose, Actress / DJ / Model
photo by Rush
Ruby Rose, who has bipolar disorder and is a survivor of sexual abuse, attempted suicide at the age of 12 and, in 2013, announced on twitter that “it is with great sadness that despite everything I have tried in the short time I was given, I am still losing my battle with depression,” before canceling tour dates and taking time off to get healthy. “Being honest about being bullied in school and my bipolar was not so much of a ‘do I or don’t I?’,” she said, “it was waiting for the right time. Even before I knew what making a mark on the world meant, I knew I wanted to make a difference.” She’s an ambassador for digital health platform Headspace, which focuses on mindfulness and meditation, and copes by staying sober and taking medication, admitting “Sometimes you take it for so many years and then it doesn’t work and you’ve got to find a new one – and that period is a really crazy period.”
Mary Lambert, Musician
Mary Lambert, photo by Mike Ruiz
Lambert’s recent single “Secrets” starts out with the singer coming out as bipolar — a decision she made during one of her “funnest nights ever.” She told DAME magazine that being open about it felt freeing, noting that “we talk about bipolar disorders, or mental disorders in general, usually in a negative light, like Oh, she has bipolar disorder, she went to the mental hospital, or something. But we don’t often talk about functioning people who are successful that have bipolar disorder.” She’s also spoken openly about being a survivor of physical and sexual abuse, hoping her willingness to talk about trauma can be used for “a tool rather than sympathy.”
Angel Haze, Musician
“Mental health problems are like a stain, once they happen in your life you’re scarred by it forever,” pansexual rapper Angel Haze wrote in their Vice magazine column. “You have to wake up every single day and make the decision to be better, and that’s not easy.” Haze was raised in a cult-like religion and is a survivor of sexual abuse and an eating disorder. Haze is open about suffering from depression and the loneliness of not feeling like they have a family, but says they’re doing much better these days. Haze doesn’t hold back from addressing depression and suicide in their music.
Kristy McNichol, Actress
McNichol was a wildly famous young actress just getting started in her career when she walked off the set of a movie under mysterious circumstances. It turns out that the stress of fame and the industry was too much for her to handle on top of her recently diagnosed bipolar disorder, especially during a time when not much was known about the condition. Eventually, McNichol decided that acting just wasn’t her passion anymore and has led a relatively private life ever since, aside from a brief return to the spotlight when she came out in 2012.
Heather Matarazzo, Actress
Actress Heather Matarazzo has worked with the advocacy project Half of Us and The Mental Health on Campus conference, sharing the story of her personal struggles with low self-image and depression.
Me’shell Ndegocello, Musician
Meshell Ndegeocello. Photo credit: Charlie Gross. Via dukeperformances.duke.edu.
The crippling lack of self-esteem and sadness that haunted her childhood resurfaced after the release of her first album, when she fell into a depression — further complicated by the daily oppressions she experienced as a black bisexual woman. The pressure she was under while recording her album in 1993 drove her to a drug addiction, and she credits her son with giving her the strength to get past it. Despite her desire to leave the industry in the ’90s, she is still going strong, recording and touring today.
Rosie O’Donnell, Actress / Comedian
Rosie has been very open about her lifelong struggle with major depressive disorder as well as the profound grief she suffered after her mother’s death when Rosie was only 11. Depression runs in Rosie’s family and her Aunt once attempted suicide before recovering with lithium. She first sought treatment for depression in 1999, and in doing so has employed methods including yoga, giving up alcohol, medication (including Prozac and Effexor), therapy, and, apparently, “inversion therapy” — hanging upside down for 15 to 30 minutes a day.
Alice Walker, Author
Walker on set of Beauty In Truth
During her senior year of college, Walker learned she was pregnant, and considered suicide before eventually getting an abortion — an experience that led her to another depressive episode. She published her first short story, “To Hell With Dying,” while recovering. She discovered meditation as a coping mechanism after her emotionally exhausting divorce.
Laura Jane Grace, Musician
Laura Jane Grace spent much of her life struggling with depression and feeling isolated, and those themes are abundant in her punk band Against Me!’s album “Transgender Dysphoria Blues.” Grace told Grantland, “Dealing with depression is really what a lot of that’s about. On the surface level, the album may be transgender-themed, but underneath it, there are those universal themes — alienation, depression, not being happy — that I think that everybody can really identify with.” Although coming out as transgender had a radical impact on Grace’s mental well-being, she’s open about the fact that it wasn’t a “cure-all.” (However, she’s also found getting tattoos to be therapeutic for her.)
Margaret Cho, Actress/Comedian
photo by robin roemer
The outspoken comedian and actress has been through a whole lot — including depression, alcoholism, anorexia, and drug addiction. In 2001, she appeared on the cover of Rosie magazine for a story entitled “The Faces of Depression.” Cho has also recently come out as a survivor of sexual abuse — an issue she’s addressing head-on in her new song “I Want To Kill My Rapist.” Music, humor and advocacy have been transformative coping mechanisms for Cho, who considers no topic off-limits.
Resources:
15 Lesbian Couples Time Forgot
Sure, everybody knows about Portia and Ellen. But there are likely many other fantastic pairings you never knew about or totally forgot about or vaguely remember but not really anymore! THIS IS IMPORTANT HERSTORY.
15 Lesbian Couples Time Forgot
*indicates that one member of the couple has refused to confirm the relationship
1. Tracy Chapman & Alice Walker
Alice Walker (© Roger Ressmeyer/CORBIS) & Tracy Chapman (© Lynn Goldsmith/Corbis)
The brilliant shy musician Tracy Chapman, who drove a fast car into all of our souls forever, and the legendary Alice Walker, author of The Color Purple, dated in the mid-1990s. Walker spoke to The Guardian about the relationship in 2006:
“Why was it kept so quiet at the time? “It was quiet to you maybe but that’s because you didn’t live in our area,” she answers with a throaty laugh. She has written about the relationship in her journals, which she plans to publish one day.
So why did they decide against using their relationship to make a big social impact like other celebrity lesbian couples, such as Ellen DeGeneres and Anne Heche, have in the past? The idea seems to amuse her. “I would never do that. My life is not to be somebody else’s impact – you know what I mean? And it was delicious and lovely and wonderful and I totally enjoyed it and I was completely in love with her but it was not anybody’s business but ours.”
In 1967, Alice Walker married Melvyn Roseman Leventhal, becoming the first legally married interracial couple in Mississippi, but the two divorced in 1976. Walker told The Globe and Mail in May that she is not heterosexual or gay, just “curious.”
2. Ellen Degeneres & Alexandra Hedison
Before she began engaging in knife-play with Helena Peabody, Alexandra Hedison engaged in loveplay with Ellen DeGeneres, who she met via mutual friends in 2000 after Ellen and Anne Heche broke up. Although she was a cast member of The L Word and played bit parts in Lois & Clark, Melrose Place, Nash Bridges and L.A. Firefighters; Hedison’s primary occupation is photography. She’s also directed an animated film, In the Dog House, and a documentary, The Making of Suit Yourself. They lived together in Ellen’s Hollywood Hills home until December 2004, when the two split up, Heddison moved out, and a “source close to the couple” told The New York Daily News that “it’s difficult for both of them and very sad. They were a private couple, and they hope they can separate privately.” Recently rumors began swirling that Hedison has hooked up with another major lesbian power player – Jodie Foster.
3. Ione Skye & Jenny Shimizu
Bisexual actress Ione Skye (best known for her role in Say Anything) fell for legendary model/actress Jenny Shimizu when they met on the set of Quentin Tarantino’s movie Four Rooms, around the time that Skye’s seven-year marriage with Beastie Boy Adam Horowitz was crumbling into a million little pieces. Skye reportedly admitted, “I guess I was just looking for love. I was reeling, I didn’t know what I wanted. When Adam and I split up, I was making Four Rooms with Madonna. She had this gay entourage. She introduced me to them. And I have to admit, I dallied.” She described Shimizu as “kind of boylike, kind of dykey” with “a great figure.” Clearly, Jenny Shimizu has mad game. I mean she also dated Angelina Jolie. So.
4. Amy Ray & Jennifer Baumgardener
Jennifer Baumgardner, esteemed third-wave feminist activist, former editor of Ms., prolific journalist and author of Manifesta: Young Women, Feminism and the Future, Grassroots: A Field Guide for Feminist Activism and Look Both Ways: Bisexual Politics, dated The Indigo Girls‘ Amy Ray from 1997 to 2002! Now Baumgardner lives in New York with her husband Michael and their two sons, and Amy Ray has been dating a lady in Seattle for the last ten years.
5. Patricia Velásquez & Sandra Bernhard*
Venezuelan model and actress Patricia Velásquez is best known for her print and runway work (she’s also been in several Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Editions) and her role as Anck-Su-Namun in The Mummy and The Mummy Returns. You may recognize her from Arrested Development (she was the second actress to play Colombian soap opera star Marta Estrella) and The L Word (she played Begoña, the actress playing Marina/Karina in Lez Girls). But did you know that she dated outspoken lesbian comedienne Sandra Bernhard in 1992? The two met at a fashion show in Paris. In her memoir Straight Walk, Velásquez confirmed that relationship and her lesbian identity, revealing that Sandra Bernhard was actually the first girl she kissed. “I was deeply in love with Sandra,” she wrote in her book, “in a way I’d never experienced before.”
6. Meshell Ndegeocello & Rebecca Walker
photo of Rebecca Walker via © Brian Velenchenko/Corbis
Alice Walker’s oft-estranged daughter, the writer and activist Rebecca Walker (Black, White and Jewish, Baby Love: Choosing Motherhood After a Lifetime of Ambivalence, BLACK COOL), was in a long term relationship with crush-worthy bisexual singer Meshell Ndegeocello once upon a time, a pairing which AfterEllen says was “for years… the most out couple in the black lesbian community.”
Ndegeocello and Walker co-parented Ndgeocello’s son, Soloman, born in 1989. Ndegeocello now lives in upstate New York with her partner of eight years, Alison, who had a baby in 2009. Ndegeocello spoke openly about her family to OUT Magazine in 2010, noting that “it’s kind of important to get it out into society about people who are gay or different, that they can have a family.”
Walker now lives in Maui with her partner, Buddhist teacher Choyin Rangdrol (or “Glen,” as Walker calls him) and her 11-year-old son, Tenzin. In 2012, she wrote about her first girlfriend and discovering her attraction to women for Marie Claire Magazine.
7. Portia De Rossi & Francesca Gregorini
If you’re anything like me, you’ve been asking yourself “What happened before Ellen?” pretty much constantly for at least ten years. Well, now we all know. It was Francesca Gregorini, an Italian writer and directer and the daughter or Bond Girl Barbara Bach and businessman Augusto Gregorini and the stepdaughter of Ringo Starr. Gregorini has also been rumored to have dated director Kimberly Pierce and actress Amber Heard.
8. Rosie O’Donnell & Sophie B Hawkins*
I’ve been hearing about this one for what feels like a decade, but although Rosie’s open about it, Sophie isn’t. Damn, I wish I could hear about her being her lover.
9. Leisha Hailey & KD Lang
These two are like the ultimate “omg remember when ____” couple. Crooner k.d. Lang and actress/musician Leisha Hailey, then a singer in The Murmurs, met at a friend’s birthday party in 1996 and broke up in 2000. Hailey has never talked much about their relationship, telling The Advocate, “It’s a very private matter for me. I learned a tremendous amount from that relationship, and I’m very sentimental about it and look back on it with beautiful memories.” She says their lifestyle “was about being at home and being with our dog.”
10. Camilla Grey & Clea Duvall
If you’re following along at home on your Chart then you will see that Leisha Hailey connects the prior couple to this couple! The exact timeline of this relationship is unclear, but it was definitely in full bloom circa Uh Huh Her‘s 2007 debut, during which time Clea was doing photography for the band. After their split, Grey hooked up with bandmate Leisha Hailey and Duvall kissed a girl in the park and also got all of our hopes up about Ellen Page.
11. Susan Powter & Jessica Kirson
Susan Powter, ’90s fitness icon (author of Stop the Insanity!) and current fitness/lifestyle/yoga guru, dated lesbian comedian Jessica Kirson circa 2008-2009-ish. Prior to dating Jessica, Powter had dated Animal of the band Bitch & Animal. Powter had divorced twice and had two sons by the time she came out in Curve magazine in 2004, describing herself a a “radical feminist lesbian woman.” She adopted a third son and presently lives in a self-described “earth ship” in New Mexico. Kirson, the stepsister of Zach Braff, has appeared on Last Comic Standing, Last Call With Carson Daily, The Tonight Show With Jay Leno and Comedy Central’s Premium Blend. The internet offers no recent updates regarding her relationship status.
12 & 13. Rita Mae Brown & Fannie Flagg // Rita Mae Brown & Martina Navratilova
Rita Mae Brown was quite the romancer back in the day. She lived with Martina Navratilova from 1979-1981, a relationship which likely inspired her novel Sudden Death, about a lesbian tennis player. Martina went on to famously and publicly date beauty queen and mother-of-two Judy Nelson, starting in 1983, and when the couple suffered a messy breakup in 1991, it was Rita Mae who mediated their palimony dispute — and who then moved in with Judy. Rita Mae wrote the intro to Judy’s book Love Match, which was about her affair with Martina. Much later, Rita would meet Fannie Flagg at a party thrown by Marlo Thomas, but Rita has said that her relationship with Fannie ended up not working out because of generational differences: “It doesn’t mean we don’t love each other, [it just means] we will never see the world quite the same because of our tremendous losses and disillusionment and then the realization that ‘Oh my god, we gotta fight back.'”
14. Amanda Moore & Kate Young
Model Amanda Moore and ex-Vogue writer Kate Young were featured in New York Magazine’s Sexiest Couples of 2003 with the following tidbit: “Now, that’s lesbian chic. Kate’s an ex–Vogue-ette with Marilyn-blonde hair and a pixie face. Amanda’s a tall, dark runway regular. They recently posed, making out, for iD magazine. And why not?”
15. Lindsay Lohan & Courtenay Semel
On the cover of Curve magazine in 2009, Courtenay Semel, daughter of former Yahoo! CEO Terry Semel, described herself as the “lesbian Don Juan,” having been linked romantically to Lindsay Lohan, Tila Tequlia and the now-deceased heiress Casey Johnson. Lohan and Semel were linked shortly prior to Lohan’s relationship with Samantha Ronson. Semel also appeared in Curve magazine again this month because she painted a large colorful mural in her garage.
It was difficult to determine exactly the proper level of forgotteness for these couples and thus the following couples almost made the list, but then did not: Rose Troche & Guinevere Turner, Corin Tucker & Carrie Brownstein, Linda Perry & Clementine Ford, Romi Klinger & Dani Campbell, Cherry Jones & Sarah Paulson. But perhaps you remember all these fine feathered felines like it was just yesterday! Keep the memory alive, friends!
The ALTERNATIVE Autostraddle Hot 105: Hotties You Will Like Who Also Like Girls
Once upon a time, The 2013 Autostraddle Hot 100 happened — a haphazard assemblage of kickass queers voted on by approximately 1,000 readers who mostly had really strong feelings about Tegan and/or Sara. Despite the voters’ near-unanimous interest in gazing dreamily into Rachel Maddow’s eyeballs and fantasizing about Brittney Griner’s wingspan, it’s abundantly clear that those 100 queer mostly female-identified humans are not the only 100 queer female-identified humans worthy of the subjective-to-the-point-of-meaninglessness adjective “hot.”
See: almost all of the votes in the Hot 100 went towards the Top 30 girls on the list and Autostraddle staff. This means that people who are super hot, but not super-famous (or employed here) didn’t really have a fighting chance, which is unfortunate because those are the people you really should know more about!
There were heaps of humans who got between one and five votes — not enough to rank, but “ranking” is so ridiculous and ultimately arbitrary anyhow. A reader suggested that perhaps another Hot 100 was in order — featuring those who only got a few votes. The reader also noted that assembling that information might be an logistical nightmare, which was 100% true! It took forever but we learned about so many amazing new people.
This list features 105 human beings who are in the public eye in some fashion that we could find good pictures of, and who 1-5 of you voted for. This list is honestly possibly the coolest list of all time. The order is random, with a few of the folks who have come out in the past two months hanging out in the top spots because yay newly-out gays!
We didn’t know very much about a lot of the women on this list so in many cases we took your word for it w/r/t whether or not the person is gay. If somebody’s on here who shouldn’t be, or if we got any facts at all wrong about a person, let us know — email bren at autostraddle dot com.
If you’re on this list, you should consider coming to A-Camp because you’re really awesome.
The Autostraddle Alt-Hot-105
105. Alexis Hornbuckle, WNBA Basketball Player
Basketball player Alexis Kay’ree Hornbuckle was named a WBCA All-American in high school and awarded Most Valuable Player for the 2004 WBCA High School All-America Game. (Fun fact: she also played soccer in high school!) She went on to graduate from the University of Tennessee, where she had played for two NCAA Championship teams, to be drafted by the Detroit Shock in 2008. She set a WNBA franchise record with seven steals in 19 minutes in her first game, and helped bring the Shock to the 2008 WNBA championships. She’s since played for The Tulsa Shock and the Minnesota Lynx and currently plays for the Phoenix Mercury.
104. Nicole Albino, Musician, Nina Sky (New York, NY)
“At the end of the day, we want to be successful and we want any young girl to look up to us and say, “If two girls from Queens who grew up with their brothers and sisters in a regular apartment and didn’t come from money can do it, then I can do it, too.” (via clayton-perry)
Twins Natalie and Nicole Albino grew up in a musical family with parents who were super-supportive of their daughters’ musical ambitions. The twins eventually started performing together, using the first two letters of each of their names to make “Nina.” Their first hit was “Move Ya Body” in 2004, which mixed Carribbean, R&B and pop styles. Nina Sky, their first album, debuted in 2004, and their second album, Nicole and Natalie, came out in 2012. Speaking of coming out, in 2010 Nicole Albino came out as a lesbian and married fashion designer Erin Magee, who she had been dating since 2009.
103. Sassy of “The Black Ink Crew,” (New York, NY)
Sassy of “The Black Ink Crew”
via vH1: “Sassy is sweet, sexy, and fun. She has a tattoo of an AK47 on her back, but the AK47 has no trigger. Sassy keeps the guys in line and keeps the shop from burning down. Whether it is taking appointments, being the peacemaker at the shop, or planning an event at the shop, Sassy keeps things running smoothly. She has a strange obsession with being clean and takes more than one bath a day. She is best friends with Puma, and believes in girl power all the way…and is about to take the Black Ink world by storm!”
102. Ivette, Creative Director at Marimacho (Brooklyn, NY)
photo via the peculiar kind
via marimacho: “Fashion has been Ivette González-Alé’s artistic outlet from a young age. Having grown up in Los Angeles’ rockabilly scene, she continues to draw inspiration from music subculture and throwback fashion. As creative director, Ivette’s love of vintage clothing bleeds through every piece. She has years of experience working in the apparel industry managing finance and operations, but designing is what she loves.”
101. Kirsten Vangsness, Actress (Los Angeles, CA)
“I am as queer as a purple unicorn singing Madonna.”
Kirsten crawled her lesbian way into our monstercrushing hearts via Criminal Minds, where she plays the computer wizard and flamboyant dresser Penelope Garcia. She’ll be marrying her fiancee, film editor Melanie Goldstein, this year.
100. Alixa + Naima of Climbing Poetree, Poets & Musicians & Activists (Brooklyn, NY)
“Creativity is the antidote for violence and destruction. Art is our most human expression, our voice to communicate our stories, to challenge injustice and the misrepresentations of the mainstream media, to expose harsh realities and engender even more powerful hope, a force to bring diverse peoples together, a tool to rebuild our communities, and a weapon to win this struggle for universal liberation.”
read their full bio at climbingpoetree.com: “With roots in Haiti and Colombia… Alixa and Naima’s acclaimed performance is composed dual-voice poems and multimedia theater that explores diverse themes, including: healing from state and personal violence, social / environmental / economic / racial / sexual justice,human rights, spirituality and women’s empowerment… for the last 10 years, Alixa and Naima have been guest artists and workshop facilitators at hundreds of universities, conferences, correctional facilities and high schools — from Cornell University to Rikers Island prison. They have toured to more than 75 cities… traveled over 11,000 miles with an all-women crew in a recycled vegetable oil-powered bus, delivering their largest theater production and national organizing strategy, Hurricane Season: The Hidden Messages in the Water, to thousands of people, and featuring 150 community based organizations.”
99. Kristen Stone, writer (Gainesville, FL)
website // tumblr // author of domestication handbook
98. Jenny Lee Lindberg, musician, Warpaint (Los Angeles, CA)
tag // warpaint website // music
“I think that sex should be in the actual music of the song, more than the costume or the act. Sex should be in the instrument.” (via the skinny uk)
Jenny plays bass in Warpaint, an indie rock band founded in 2004 with Emily Kokal (vocals, guitar), Theresa Wayman (guitar, vocals) and drummer Stella Mozgawa, who replaced actress and founding member Shannyn Sossamon — who just-so-happens to be Jenny’s sister. (Nice genes in this family, eh?) Their debut EP, Exquisite Corpse, was released in 2008, and their first full-length album, The Fool, came out in 2010.
97. Efva Attling, Jewlery Designer (Sweden)
Efva Katarina Attling has quite the resume: a stint in the band “X Models” in the early 1980’s, working as a designer with Levi’s and H&M, twelve years of professional modeling and getting famous for being one of Sweden’s best professional disco dancers. Now she’s Sweden’s leading jewelry designer. She married pop singer/writer Niklas Stromstedt and they had two children, but in 1996 she entered into a civil union with Swedish pop singer Eva Dahlgreen. When Sweden passed its gender neutral marriage law in 2009, the two got married.
96. AZMarie Livingston, Model (Los Angeles, CA)
Born in Louisiana, Ashley Marie Livingston grew up in Minneapolis with her mother and her gay father, who were divorced but “best friends.” Growing up, Livingston was teased for being a tomboy. On a trip to Los Angeles with her Dad at age nine, she got interested in modeling, and would eventually drop out after three semesters at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater to move to Los Angeles and pursue her dreams. From 2009 to 2011, she worked as a runway model in LA and New York, appearing on BET’s Rip the Runway and in London Fashion Week. She appeared in the film Precious and The Jacksons: A Family Dynasty. But it’s likely you know AZMarie from her 2012 stint on America’s Next Top Model: British Invasion, and her subsequent role on the homolicious teevee show DTLA.
95. Adelina Anthony, multi-disciplinary artist (Santa Barbara, CA)
website // facebook for AdeRisa Productions
“I sometimes joke with my audiences about being on a “collective date” together, but it’s true. I know I’m my most honest, interesting and generous self on that stage. It’s the space I’ve learned to be the most courageous because you can’t lie in your art or let your ego lead you. If the art is all about ego, then the artist has failed in a deep, fundamental way.” (via xqsi magazine)
via adeliaanthony.com: “Adelina Anthony is a critically acclaimed and award winning two-spirited Xicana lesbian multi-genre artist, cultural activist, teaching artist, director and producer. The themes in her works address colonization, feminism, trauma, ancestral memory, gender, health, race & ethnicity, immigration, sexuality, land & environment, and issues generally affecting the queer/lesbian/gay/bisexual/transgender/two-spirited communities. She has nearly 20 years of stage experience and has garnered Best Actress nominations and awards.” (read more here)
94. Vicci Martinez, Musician (Tacoma, WA)
tag // website // autostraddle interview
via facebook: “Vicci Martinez is a singer/songwriter from Tacoma, Washington, who was one of the finalists on Season 1 of NBC’s The Voice. At only 28 years of age, she has already opened for or shared the stage with notables such as Sting, Annie Lennox, B.B. King, the Doobie Brothers, and Jonny Lang.”
93. Kim Ann Foxman, DJ & Dance Music Artist (New York, NY)
92. Jincey Lumpkin, Writer & Juicy Pink Box Chief Sexy Officer (New York, NY)
website: Juicy Pink Box // @juicyjincey
“I suffer from overthinking. I can be very shy. But let me tell you: Your inhibitions drop very quickly when you’re sitting on the floor naked, eating a macadamia-nut cookie while looking point-blank at nine women’s inner labia.” (via the huffington post)
Jincey Lumpkin, Esq. grew up in Carrolton, Georgia, and went on to graduate from the Darlington School, Vanderbilt University in Tennessee, and then the Florida Coastal School of Law in Florida. Jincey wanted to go into fashion law but in the meantime was super-bored with her law job, which inspired her to start an anonymous porn blog. It got mad hits, so she quit her job and in 2008 became “the founder and Chief Sexy Officer of Juicy Pink Box, a lesbian lifestyle brand that entices all women to explore their female fantasies.”
91. Zanele Muholi, Photographer (South Africa)
“I always say to people that I’m an activist before I’m an artist. To me, you take a particular photo in order for other people to take action. So you become an agent for change in a way. I say that I am a visual activist because it’s important to me to go beyond just being a photographer. Because you know, that sounds so sexy, and it’s a ‘profession.’ I think to myself – what’s the point of just taking a picture? What happens after that? I’m doing what I’m doing to make a statement and also to say to people: This is is possible.” (via nomorepotlucks)
via zanelemuholi.com: “Zanele Muholi was born in Umlazi, Durban, in 1972, and held her first solo exhibition in 2004, at the Johannesburg Art Gallery. She has worked as a community relations officer for the Forum for the Empowerment of Women (FEW), a black lesbian organisation based in Gauteng, and as a photographer and reporter for Behind the Mask, an online magazine on lesbian and gay issues in Africa. Her work represents the black female body in a frank yet intimate way that challenges the history of the portrayal of black women’s bodies in documentary photography. Her solo exhibition Only half the picture, which showed at Michael Stevenson in March 2006, travelled to the Market Photo Workshop in Johannesburg and the Afrovibes Festival in Amsterdam. In 2008 she had a solo show at Le Case d’Arte, Milan, and in 2009 she exhibited alongside Lucy Azubuike at the CCA Lagos, Nigeria. She was the recipient of the 2005 Tollman Award for the Visual Arts, the first BHP Billiton/Wits University Visual Arts Fellowship in 2006, and was the 2009 Ida Ely Rubin Artist-in-Residence at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).”
90. Hannah Gadsby, Comedian (Australia)
via token.com: “Hannah Gadsby is an award-winning Australian comedian who thinks quickly and moves slowly. She is sardonic, laconic and, after numerous bone crunching accidents, bionic. Her droll delivery, delightful wordplay and heart-breakingly funny, self-deprecating observations have delighted audiences all over the world. You can see her on ABC TV’s Adam Hills In Gordon Street Tonight, or live at a festival near you. Desperate to make use of her art history degree, Hannah has written and presented two specials for ABC TV’s Artscape and takes every opportunity to present her incredibly popular comedic art lectures at festivals around the world.”
89. Morgane Richardson, Blogger, Lecturer & Professional Feminist (Costa Rica)
“I was raised in an environment where I was able to witness the undying strength of black queer women, our resilience and ability to fight against injustices. I have begun to recognize that being a black queer woman is not just a shared identity, it is a form of activism, and it is a movement that I am honored to be a part of.” (via elixHER)
Morgane Richardson via elixher
26-year-old Morgane Richardson is a self-described “professional feminist, lecturer, professor and freelance blogger who addresses race, gender and sexuality in today’s society… without dwelling on theorists and terminology.” She worked fearlessly as a campus organizer while earning her BA in Sociology/Anthropology and The History of Art and Architecture at Middlebury College and later put that activist experience to work by founding Refuse the Silence: Women of Color in Academia Speak Out. Her writing has appeared in Bitch, Feministing, University of Venus and More Magazine and she’s the co-founder of social media film Mixtape Media. She tours the country working with college students and administrators to promote diverse campuses within elite academia’s existing hegemony and is presently pursuing a master’s degree in Gender and Peace Building at the University for Peace.
88. Harmony Boucher, Musician & Model (UK)
Harmony Boucher is a model/singer known for “her unconventional look in line with the East London scene: defiant attitude and fierce features make Harmony unique and her look — one of a kind.” She created her band Vuvuvultures in 2009, known for “promoting offbeat events and parties that bring together underground musicians, artists and creative people and mix rock and electronic music.”
87. Martina Navratilova, Tennis Player & Coach (Sarasota, FL)
“Being blunt with your feelings is very American. In this big country, I can be as brash as New York, as hedonistic as Los Angeles, as sensuous as San Francisco, as brainy as Boston, as proper as Philadelphia, as brawny as Chicago, as warm as Palm Springs, as friendly as my adopted home town of Dallas, Fort Worth, and as peaceful as the inland waterway that rubs up against my former home in Virginia Beach.”
86. Susan Allen, Politician, Minnesota House of Representatives (Minneapolis, MN)
“[Native Americans] are such a small minority and yet we have this history with the state. When I go there and sit in that room, on the house floor, and all that history is there and I’m sitting there, in some ways it’s just ironic… So it’s really important for me to be there. Because it’s like we are still here. We are still here. We still have a political existence. We have this place in the state and that needs to be recognized.” (via star-tribune)
Attorney Susan Allen became the first openly lesbian Native American elected to a state legislature in 2012 when she won a special election for a seat representing District 61B in the Minnesota State House. Allen told Minnesota Public Radio that district 61B, an area of south central Minneapolis which where almost half the children live in poverty, “reminds me a lot of the places I grew up.” Allen is also the first Native American woman to serve in the Minnesota Legislature. A member of the Rosebud Sioux Tribe, her law practice specializes in helping tribes draft tribal laws. After losing the election, Nathan Blumenshine, her opponent, said of Allen: “Her personal story is a powerful one, and I can’t think of a stronger leader to serve as the voice of this community.”
85. Ashley Reed, Writer, Producer & Cook (Los Angeles, CA)
When she’s not at her day job cooking shit up with Giada De Laurentiis, Ashley Reed is writing and producing, making music or sometimes starring in a little webseries you know as Unicorn Plan-It.
84. Kylie Kwong, TV Chef (Australia)
via 15 gay chefs: “Australian chef Kylie Kwong is an author, restauranteur and television presenter who began making a name for herself in the early ’90s as the head chef of Sydney’s Wockpool. With dreams of running her own restaurant, in 2000 Kylie opened the doors of Billy Kwong, which focuses on traditional Asian cuisine that is made from locally grown, organic and biodynamic produce. It also happens to be my favourite restaurant in Sydney.
Kylie went on to create two successful television shows, At Home With Kylie Kwong and My China: A Feast For All The Senses, the latter which takes Kylie on ‘an inspiring journey from the rural simplicity of her ancestral village in China’s southwest to the wilds of the Tibetan plateau and the stylish modernity of Hong Kong and Shanghai’ and is super interesting. Kylie also makes an occasional appearance as a guest chef on MasterChef Australia.
Most were unaware of Kwong’s sexual orientation until a few months ago, when she mentioned that her girlfriend of five years was pregnant.”
83. Mia Tu Mutch, Social Justice Advocate (San Francisco, CA)
via femme2012
via facebook: “Mia Tu Mutch is a queer and trans social justice advocate, organizer, and educator. As a former Equality Rider and featured speaker on the Vanguard Queer History Tour, Mia has facilitated community conversations on LGBTQ issues and identities at over 25 universities. Now she serves on the SF LGBTQ Speaker’s Bureau Advisory Board and facilitates various workshops for the schools and organizations. Commissioner Tu Mutch is currently Chair of the Housing LGBTQ and TAY Committee of the San Francisco Youth Commission and uses her passion to create, advocate and implement policies that create safer and more equitable communities for all.”
82. Joanna Lohman, Soccer Player & Motivational Speaker (Cambridge, MA)
Joanna Lohman, soccer player
Joanna Lohman, the first four-time First Team All-Big Ten selection in Penn State women’s soccer history, has played with the US Women’s National Team and The Philadelphia Independence. Currently, Joanna plays for The Boston Breakers, is the Vice President of commercial real estate firm Tenant Consulting and is the co-founder of JoLi Academy LLC, a global soccer initiative that aims to raise the social status of women.
81. Spectra Speaks, Writer & Activist (Nigeria, US, UK)
website // autostraddle essay: I Am Alike: A Nigerian Boys Reflection on Pariah
“Afrofeminism is how I move through the world; how I live, learn and evolve. Afrofeminism is my personal compass, a way for me to stay centered as I navigate life as an idealist using a constellation of frameworks–feminism, social justice, spirituality and others. Afrofeminism guides every step I take forward, as it is grounded in my multi-layered, trans-national identity and personal experiences.” (via spectra speaks)
It’s hard to know where to begin when talking about Spectra because she has done so much. She describes herself like this: “Queer Nigerian Afrofeminist Writer and Media Activist. Social Entrepreneur Nurturing Principled Diaspora and Women’s Philanthropy in Media and Tech. Self-Care and Self-Love Evangelist. Idealist Warrior Woman. Big Dreamer. Big Thinker. Big Doer, Too.” She’s also the founder & executive editor for media advocacy organization Queer Women of Color Media Wire and the Community Engagement Officer at Africans in the Diaspora. She’s appeared in mainstream and alternative media outlets all over the world including ABC, Huffington Post, Ms. Magazine, Curve Magazine, Racialicous and BET, hosts the monthly podcast Kitchen Table Conversations, and offers coaching and support services to women-led ventures in new media as a principal at her boutique consulting firm.
80. Beth Clayton, Opera Singer (Santa Fe, NM)
Beth Clayton is a mezzo-soprano opera singer most recently seen in Opera Colorado’s production of Catán’s Florencia en el Amazonas, in which she played Paula. Clayton was raised in Arkansas by a Methodist minister and got her feet wet doing musicals at church camp and in high school.
Clayton has appeared as Carmen in the Arizona Opera, The New York City Opera and The Austin Lyric Opera, opened New York City Opera’s 2009/10 season as Vashti in Hugo Weisgall’s Esther, sung the world premiere of Howard Shore’s The Fly at the Théâtre du Châtelet in Paris (produced by film director David Cronenberg) and later for the Los Angeles Opera. She’s performed Beethoven’s Symphony No. 9 with the San Diego Symphony, and Verdi’s Requiem with the Winston-Salem Symphony… I could go on. I mean she’s been in a lot of things all over the world. She’s a big deal.
Clayton met her partner, opera soprano Patricia Racette, in 1997, at a party shortly before the two were set to go into production for Santa Fe Opera’s La traviata. Clayton was initially weary to reveal her sexual orientation, but in 2002, when Patricia Racette was featured on the cover of Opera News, they used that opportunity to come out in the pages of the magazine. In 2005, they got married!
Crush Of The Week: Meshell Ndegeocello
Meshell Ndegeocello. Photo credit: Charlie Gross. Via dukeperformances.duke.edu.
It’s Pride Month, and I want to kick it off by feting a queer Black woman who’s a truly underappreciated musical genius: Meshell Ndegeocello.
Where can I even start? I’ve loved Ndegeocello, who self-identifies as bisexual, since her Grammy-nominated debut album Plantation Lullabyes back in 1993, when Madonna signed the multi-instrumentalist and singer to her Maverick record label. Between her bass playing (she tried out for the band Living Colour back in 1992 but didn’t get the gig, though she was a part of the Black Rock Coalition co-founded by the band’s guitarist, Vernon Reid), her come-to-me smoky voice, her gender-bending outfits, and (at the time) bald head, I swoonily followed her through her musical universe as she had some shooting-star hits, like her cut “Wild Night” with John Cougar Mellencamp and “If That Was Your Boyfriend (He Wasn’t Last Night),”
but more interestingly, the constellation of collaborations and genres she traversed as she tries to navigate the nexus of love and spirituality and sexuality, like this gorgeous same-gender loving song, “Mary Magdalene,” from her second album Peace Beyond Passion,
and “Aquarium” (featuring The Brazilian Girls’ Sabina Sciubba and Didi Gutman and jazz musician Ron Blake from The Spirit Music Jamia: The Dance Of The Infidel)
as love, sexuality, and spirituality collide with systemic oppression, as in “Leviticus: F****t” from Peace Beyond Passion (TRIGGER WARNING: Homophobic violence):
Her own beyond-definition music — people have called her the female version of Prince and she herself has stated that he’s one of her greatest influences — has led her to appearing on albums as diverse as the Rolling Stones, Alanis Morrissette, Chaka Khan (for which she and Khan received a Grammy nod in 1997), Zap Mama, and The Blind Boys of Alabama. She has also played at the all-women musical tour Lillith Fair and the H.O.R.D.E. tour. She’s also contributed music to the Red Hot series, the albums to help raise funds and awareness to help end HIV/AIDS (specifically Red Hot + Riot and Stolen Moments: Red Hot + Cool), and to Downtown Records’ now-unavailable Raise Hope For Congo, a compilation record to help raise funds for “protecting and empowering Congolese women in light of the war-related mass sexual violence in the nation. And her genre-mixing is cited as creating the afro-boho universe called the neo-soul movement.
And, whatever else I feel about sex columnist Dan Savage (which involves a lot of direct laser side-eye about his racial and gender politics), this musical goddess lent her writing to his anthology It Gets Better: Coming Out, Overcoming Bullying, And Creating A Life Worth Living.
I can wax on about the Berlin, Germany-born, Howard University-educated artist and mother. But I’m going to end with my all-time favorite cut: Lalah Hathaway’s and her can’t-touch-it perfect rendition of “When Did You Leave Heaven?
Andrea Plaid is the associate editor of the award-winning race-and-pop-culture blog Racialicious. She is also part of The Feminist Wire’s editorial collective and an associate producer of renowned web series Black Folk Don’t. Her work on race, gender, sex, and sexuality has appeared at On The Issues, Bitch, AlterNet, and RH Reality Check. Her work has been reprinted at, among other online sites, Penthouse, and New American Media. Her writing also appears in the anthology Feminism for Real: Deconstructing the Academic Industrial Complex of Feminism, edited by Jessica (Yee) Danforth and Corset Magazine.
This post originally appeared on Racialicious.com! Republished WITH PERMISSION, MOTHERF*CKERS!