The Music Videos That Made Me Gay
In place of one measly gay movie, may guest writer Phoenix Casino offer you several tiny, exclusively homosexual cinematic experiences?
Sung to the tune of “Empty Chairs at Empty Tables": My friends, my friends, don’t ask me questions of what this newsletter is for. It’s gay subtext and gay main text, where the straights will go no more. (Unless you’re my kind but befuddled straight friend reading this and doing your best to follow along. To you I say soldier on, my good man. It can only go gay from here.)
We’ve waded into film and television, and this month, to my great honor, we boldly go to that great bastion of coded and blatant and baiting queerness, where only a formerly closeted teen imprinting on pop stars could take us: music videos. Guiding us through that journey is top-tier appreciator of gay media Phoenix Casino, who agreed to guest-write this installment only after we spent an evening yell-sing-lusting to the visual discography of ‘90s icons, and they subsequently could not get Shania Twain’s big dyke energy-fomenting “let’s go girls” out of their head. It only proved what we both already knew to be true: the music video is a perfect vessel for queer joy at any age.
Without further ado, please enjoy this trip down memory lane to arrive at a music video present gayer than your angsty younger self could have imagined.
x.O.X.o.
Shayna
This year I passed the milestone of having been out for over half my life. I started to creep out in 2006 when I was 16, and I didn’t have any connections to queer people. I wouldn’t even start using the word for another 6 or so years, much less use it to describe myself. And yet, on late nights and early mornings I took part in the right of passage that was watching The L Word to catch a glance of gay adults. I’d sneak into the living room or stay behind my locked bedroom door and under my blankets for the fear of being discovered or disrupted while I stared hungrily at the absurd spectacle, which felt like a rare and precious thing. Once I learned to look a little harder, I found that The L Word wasn’t the end-all, be-all of queer media: there was always music.
There are two types of teenagers: the Music Is Life kind, and the kind that isn’t prematurely depressed. Of course, I was the former. I burned CD after CD to listen to in my car while I took a roundabout way home. In my high school halls I was jeered at by other students (why do bullies love the world lesbo?), but once I put on my dorky little headphones I could at least drown everyone and everything out. When I wasn’t clandestinely watching overtly gay content or making gay friends on the internet, I watched a lot of TV, and in particular, a lot of music videos. It turns out that there’s tons of gay stuff in music videos, whether or not the artists themselves are queer (though it’s always better if they are). I found myself searching for a concept whose name I wouldn’t learn for years: queer coding.
Since then I’ve become even more avid in reading queerness into media, music videos included. In that spirit, here’s a modest selection of my favorite Gay and gay-adjacent music videos from over the years.
t.A.T.u, “All the Things She Said,” and “They’re Not Gonna Get Us” (2003)
If queerbaiting was a term at this impressionable point in my life, I didn’t know about it, and I can’t say I would have cared; I was desperate. It was pretty impossible to search online for women kissing when my family, like most at the time, shared a single desktop computer. By their own admission, t.A.T.u members Lena Katina and Julia Volkova were not lesbians, though they did end up having a falling out that reached dyke levels of drama, which is a story for another time.
It didn’t really make a difference to me, because they were kissing anyway, a stunt that peaked at the 2003 MTV Video Music Awards. The above clip captures the zeitgeist of the moment. The duo is introduced by Hilary Duff and Amanda Bynes, who single out the Hot Guys in the audience (Ashton Kutcher, Colin Ferrel, Hugh Jackman et al) before Bynes exclaims, “You know what’s great about these next two performers? They’re not interested in any of them!” Cue electronic echoes of “All the Things She Said” as t.A.T.u walk down aisles in the audience in their signature uniforms: schoolgirl skirts and white tank tops. Upon reaching the stage, they almost kiss – BUT DON’T – instead awkwardly pulling each other in, followed by an attempt at coyly walking away. You know when you go to high-five someone and they think you’re going for a fist bump? That’s how it feels.
The music transitions into their second single, “They’re Not Gonna Get Us,” which objectively is a really bad song that Volkova makes almost no effort towards lip syncing. But as we all know, the song is not what’s most important. Here’s what’s important: strobe lights flash, and the aisles flood with women in full schoolgirl uniforms. But not just any schoolgirl uniforms. In a masterful display of the power of costuming, the women reveal their real outfits: white tank tops and boyshorts. And at the end of the song, they kiss. All of them, they all kiss, except for the members of t.A.T.u who remain on the stage grinning and lording over the school girl minions.
YouTube wouldn’t be created for another two years, so this MTV performance would burn in my memory for years to come. To this day, t.A.T.u. remains the most successful Russian music export of all time. I like to think I did my part in contributing to that.
Lady Gaga, “Just Dance,” and “Poker Face” (2008)
The year 2008 was an extremely gay time to start college. I had befriended a fairly large gaggle of gay boys, as well as a bunch of straight women allies who would slowly come out over the course of the next two years. Every Friday the multi-floor gay club had an 18+ night, and we’d sloppily roll up to the club to the year’s greatest hits – “I Kissed A Girl,” “Love in this Club,” and “Single Ladies.” Something important happened that year, something that would change pop music forever.
In my friend’s dorm room one night, we were trading music suggestions and she asked, “Have you heard of Lady Gaga?” I hadn’t. We got really high and listened blissfully to The Fame from beginning to end, and then watched the videos for “Just Dance” and “Poker Face” again and again as our friends trickled into the room. We were enamored by her persona and the lifestyle that seemed to come with it. The Bowie lightning bolt! Leather by the pool (with live Dalmatians)! The POP CULTURE glasses! She’s had a little bit too much! So have we! When Gaga came on in the club, we felt like it was just for us, even though that’s a ridiculous thing to think about a pop star. But for us, it was true.
Ciara, “Ride” (2010)
“Ride” by Ciara is one of the best music videos to ever grace TV and laptop screens. At the time, I was living in what one might refer to as a lesbian frat house, which was exactly like whatever you’re imagining. We appreciated looking at hot women in various media forms. My girlfriend at the time introduced us to the video, and it’s been living in my mind rent-free ever since. Ciara is an incredibly talented dancer, and this video was so hypnotizing that I watched the video a couple of times before realizing that I didn’t even know what the song sounded like.
The concept is deliciously simple: Ciara in an Atlanta Braves hat, a tight crop top, and leggings dancing in front of a plain white background. Every movement is smooth but precise, and Ciara executes impeccable control of her body thanks to her unbelievably toned physique. Another shot: Ciara in red lipstick and a floor-length fur coat, of course worn open, creating a deep V of skin. Ludacris (who I believe is generally under-appreciated) makes an appearance sitting in front of a car next to Ciara’s legs. Their chemistry is hot, and Luda, like all of us, understands who this video is about. It also turns out that the song is pretty good once the Ciara tunnel vision releases you from its grip.
Janelle Monáe, “Make Me Feel” (2018)
Of course we’d been picking up gay vibes from Janelle Monáe from the start. Sure it was all a bit superficial – she wears suits with bowties! Her hair is in a pompadour! She’s a robot! She’s an angel! I never dwelled the idea for too long because it felt silly to speculate on her sexuality when so much of her public image was based on personas, characters, and allegory. But in the video for “Make Me Feel,” one gets the sense that we’re really seeing her for the first time.
The video is so hot and so fun, but what I like most are the moments where it feels almost awkward or overwrought. In the opening shot, Monáe and then-real life girlfriend Tessa Thompson approach the bisexual lighting of the retro arcade/club. A smoking hot Thompson wears a confident smirk while Monáe’s eyes widen, a mix between awe and nerves, entering a new world both in the video and in real life. Toward the end we see Monae running between Thompson and an unknown man, eventually dancing between the both of them at once, which one can assume is a visual metaphor for bisexuality.
Monae and Thompson have since split, which makes the video a relic, a time capsule. It’s also relatable – who among us hasn’t excitedly made work featuring a sexy new girlfriend, only for the work to far outlast the relationship? Regardless (or because) of any awkwardness, the video is heaven. Monae crawling among and between womens’ legs; Monae donning a gold veil while playing jangly riffs unmistakably influenced by her mentor, Prince; Thompson feeding Monae a popsicle that appears out of nowhere. I don’t think it’s an exaggeration to say that the three minute and 50 seconds of this video approach a glorious utopianism in that glowing retro bar. I want to watch the video over and over again. I want to go to this club, and I want Tessa Thompson to be my date.
Lil Nas X, “Montero” (2021)
I’m not ashamed to say that Lil Nas X made me cry. Hours before dropping the Satanic lap-dancing, conservative rage-inducing, and instantly legendary video for “Montero (Call Me By Your Name),” he posted a letter to his younger self on Twitter. It’s worth quoting in its entirety:
dear 14 year old montero,
i wrote a song with our name in it. it's about a guy i met last summer. i know we promised never to come out publicly, i know we promised to never be "that" type of gay person, i know we promised to die with the secret, but this will open doors for many other queer people to simply exist. you see this is very scary for me, people will be angry, they will say i'm pushing an agenda. but the truth is, i am. the agenda to make people stay the fuck out of other people's lives and stop dictating who they would be. sending you love from the future.
-Inx
Six months after releasing the surprise country/hip-hop hit “Old Town Road,” Lil Nas X came out as gay on Twitter. That time seems like a relic looking back. I forgot that Lil Nas X hadn’t always been out; it felt like he was out since the first time the sun rose on the earth’s horizon. But the reality has been even better. Lil Nas X has since become the king of cowboy thirst traps, a neon-clad fashion icon, and a beacon for young queers (and older ones too) to forcefully shirk the pressures of respectability and just have some fucking fun.
The video follows Lil Nas X’s journey from a warped Garden of Eden to demonic temptation to a Spongebob-inspired court scene where he’s chained up, surrounded by his captors who are also also played by him, but in different Hunger Games-style wigs. Nas is freed from his chains, and begins his descent into hell in the silliest, campiest, and sexiest way: by sliding down a dance pole for almost thirty full seconds before he gives a lap dance to Satan himself before claiming the throne as his own. There’s not much else to say about the video that it doesn’t say for itself, so go watch it right now.
Phoenix Casino is a voracious consumer of pop culture and a lover of low art. They’re also a hair stylist-in-training. Check out their words here and their work here. Follow them on Twitter (@kcdanger) to read every thought they’ve ever had.