Suranne Jones, 47
Tracy Chapman, 61
Cate Blanchett, 56
Jodie Foster, 63
Jenna Lyons, 57
Regina King, 55
Lena Headey, 52
Cynthia Nixon, 59; Carrie Coon, 45; Christine Baranski, 73
p.s. In case further apology is needed, please accept this with my most sincere age-appropriate feelings (just put your thumb over 38-year-old Karen Gillan’s face if necessary) as everyone else is 50+.
Today is last day of Pride in a year which has been unquestionably one of the most destructive for queer people’s rights in this county (thanks SCOTUS and Trump, and by thanks I mean the most sincere FUCK YOU). So let us instead send a little prayer out to the Big Gay Universe for better days in the not so distant future. Imagine that. Thanks for the reminder, Tracy Chapman. Happy Monday and last day of Pride, kittens.
Yes, another Tracy Chapman song. Yes, another reminder for these times. We can either rise up or continue to be ground down by the incessant demands of capitalism fueled by the endless greed of the 1%. Or we can start with a whisper that builds to a fucking scream. Do not comply in advance. Do not normalize these carnival barkers. Anyway, per usual, fuck the patriarchy, fuck white supremacy and fuck late stage capitalism. Happy Monday, kittens!
Just a reminder – for those of us who have forgotten or perhaps were never taught – the wealth-hoarding elites of this world have always pitted those at the margins against each other. Human innovation (not to mention obscene wealth) has almost always come with the cost of human exploitation. And history has shown us accept that price over and over and over again – often for the possibility of even a fraction of said wealth. Anyway, just something you think about when the literal richest man in the world is now also suddenly one of the most powerful men in politics. Funny how that works. Tracy knew 36 years ago. How little things truly change. How badly they still need to.
Well, my divorce became official over the weekend. So, that’s that. It’s a good thing, but still feel...strange. Anyway, here’s a song for us all. Happy Monday, kittens.
I’m not much in the mood to celebrate America’s birthday this week. Democracy isn’t doing so great right now, not that it was ever great. Each SCOTUS ruling is equal parts infuriating and frightening. Guess we’ll see in November how much longer this American experiment can hold on.
The one, the only. Ms. Chapman. While we all know her classics. But “New Beginnings” remains one of her very best albums for me. It came at a time of my life with exploding love, endless hope and emerging heartbreak. Many of its songs mirrored the longing, the overflowing chest full of first true love, I felt. For a while it still hurt to hear those songs. But not anymore. Now they just make me smile. Queer joy is celebrating our own histories as well. Happy Monday, kittens.
If you hadn’t noticed, Tracy Chapman is having a bit of a moment. Since her Grammy performance with Luke Combs on “Fast Car,” so many think pieces have been thunked onto the internet about what it all means. It’s healing America’s racial/political divide! It’s about hope! It’s about despair! It’s about cars! It’s about the impossibility of reaching escape velocity in a capitalist society intent on exploiting its most vulnerable populations for the further enrichment of the already obscenely rich! (You know that last one is true.)
Through all of this I just want to marvel at the fact that a queer activist folk singer, which is what Tracy has always been, is being celebrated by basically everyone some 35 years after her first appearance in our cultural conscience. And despite leading an overwhelmingly private life, especially in the last 15 years, she remains such a powerful force that everyone was again overwhelmed by her talent and grateful that she chose to share it with us again. Also, to be deeply superficial, holy shit she looked so beautiful. Revolutions are hot, pass it on. Happy Monday, kittens.
Look, I never watch the Grammys. I never watch because the Grammy are usually pretty terrible. Like I watched the year Steely Dan won everything, I know what can happen. But this year’s Grammys were….good. They were just really, really good. Entertaining. Moving. Surprising. MOVING SOME MORE. I mean Tracy and Annie and Joni alone made the evening iconic and a queer Gen X lady’s widest dreams. But there was also Oprah and Beyonce and Taylor and Celine, and Mariah and Mylie and Meryl. MERLY Freaking STREEP.
And do you know why this Grammy telecast was so very good for so very long this time? For the first hour and a half it featured literally all female performers or female winners (yes, Luke, but I already said I’m not cranky with him anymore). Maybe I’m just excited I knew (and liked) most of this year’s artists instead of just squinting at my screen and saying who? And I love that Taylor winning Album of the Year will make the crazy MAGAs even crazier. Don’t worry, she’ll still be able to skydive into the Super Bowl to endorse Biden and then fly off on a unicorn to turn all children gay, fellas. Keep investing in all that red string to connect all your amazing theories!
Speaking of things that make the MAGAs crazy, the gays did so well. Boygenius won three Grammys. Victoria Monet won Best New Artist. Mylie won Solo Pop Performance and Record of the Year. Billie Eilish won Song of the Year. Gaylors are still hyperventilating because, hello, a whole album about tortured poets?
And then Joni Mitchell making her Grammy stage DEBUT at age 80 and spellbinding an audience filled with people a quarter of her age? With Brandi, of course. Masterful.
And just Tracy Chapman. TRACY CHAPMAN.
And to think I almost didn’t watch.
Tracy Chapman and Luke Combs - Fast Car#GRAMMYs pic.twitter.com/WWztcov2tJ
— Craig R. Brittain (@RealBrittain) February 5, 2024
Just, please, enjoy. Life gives us so few perfect moments. I’m not even cranky with Luke Combs anymore because his cover gave us this. Here is Tracy Chapman returning to the Grammy stage where she won Best New Artist 35 years ago to receive the undying adulation she so richly deserved but has always been so reluctant to seek. Not only is her voice still just as stunning, she looks…like there aren’t enough slow whistles in the world. That dimple. That silver streak. Like I said, perfect. Honestly, almost the entire Grammy show was excellent. But today isn’t about that. That’s for tomorrow. Today is to just, please, enjoy. Happy Monday, kittens.
[Backup embed because everyone needs to catch this performance. Everyone.]
Earlier this month Tracy Chapman made history as the first Black artist to win Song of the Year at the CMAs for Luke Combs’s cover of her 1988 hit. And while “Fast Car” is no doubt an iconic song for the ages, her whole catalogue is like that. Heck her whole first album is filled with them. “Talkin' 'bout a Revolution,” “Baby Can I Hold You,” “If Not Now.” But I think one of the under looked bangers from her 1988 debut is “Mountains O’ Things.” The more you listen to Tracy, the more she feels like a prophet. But, really, what she was was clear-eyed about our human condition, and particularly the conditions we’re all forced to live under late stage capitalism. Consume more than you need. This is the dream. She knew more than 30 years ago, yet here we are with even more billionaires and things than ever. After Black Friday weekend, her music remains an apt reminder for these times. Guess we’ll all just deep dreaming, dreaming, dreaming. Happy Monday, kittens.
Yes, yes — I know, posting again about the Indigo Girls and Tracy Chapman in the same week? I’m not a lesbian cliche. I am just very On Brand. Anyway, as I was saying, you might have heard recently that Tracy Chapman has become the first Black woman to land a No. 1 on the Country Airplay charts thanks to Luke Combs’ cover of her 1988 classic “Fast Car.”
I am decidedly not a fan of Luke’s version, faithful as it may be, because something about having a straight cis het white dude sing those words just hits different. And it also annoys the grumpy old lesbian inside of me that kids today may think a guy named Luke actually wrote this iconic 35-year-old song. Because, goodness, he did not.
But, I am happy that as the primary holder of its writing and publishing credits, Tracy is raking in beaucoup royalties and chart accolades on a song that first charted for her when Ronald Reagan was president. According to Billboard, that’s somewhere to the tune of $500,000 which is no Kate Bush “Running Up that Hill” money, but still clearly will help toward that goal of buying a bigger house and moving to the suburbs. Or, alternately, buy a person a very, very, very fast car.
Happy Pride month, where we will always stan for our lesbian music icons. And they don’t get much more powerful or enigmatic or iconic than Tracy Chapman. This clip of her singing “For My Lover” in 1986 — two years before “Fast Car” skyrocketed her to international fame — is as disarming as it is devastatingly good. Could you imagine being in the theater settling down for some unknown singer to start and then this happens? And those dimples? Holy fucking shit, those dimples. I sometimes wish Tracy Chapman hadn’t been so adverse to the trappings of fame. But then I totally get it, too. Just because you’re a once-in-a-generation talent, doesn’t mean you have to give yourself away to be devoured by the world’s endless appetite. Our tendency to eat people up and spit them out is one I understand wanting to avoid entirely. At least we have the songs we have, and the knowledge that a performer of this caliber walks amongst us somewhere. I do wish she’d let us see those dimples a little more often. But I’ll take what I can get. Happy Pride Monday, all. (Yes, every day this month is Pride something because suck it Nazi, TERFs and garden variety bigots. Happy Pride!)
This month marks the 35 anniversary of Tracy Chapman’s landmark self-titled debut. “Fast Car,” “Baby Can I Hold You,” “Talkin’ Bout a Revolution.” These songs feel like the bedrock of a generation, at least my generation. I grew up after the era of protest songs, but something about Tracy’s music always felt like an intimate, personal protest. “Fast Car” transports you instantly to that car. To that moment. To that weightless feeling of possibility and then the crushing weight of real life. Damn, what a song. What a singer. It’s been 15 years since she has released new music. Who knows if we’ll get any more. But the gift she already gave us will continue to resonate when we’ve all shuttled off this mortal coil, and the sun swallows all of our known existence. Thanks for making us feel like we belonged, Tracy. Happy weekend, all.
One more music post for good measure this week. And then, I promise, I’ll write actual words. But I also believe Tracy Chapman’s “Talkin’ Bout a Revolution” just fits this moment. And Chapman, despite or precisely because of her reluctance to bask in the limelight, remains one of my favorite singer-songwriters of all time. The elegance of this sparse song. How she can draw a picture so simply, yet so powerfully. It rings through time with an eternal message. Well, seems I found some words after all.
Today is a holiday here in the states to celebrate the life and accomplishments of Martin Luther King Jr. So in honor of the man and in thanks of his extraordinary vision, here is some beautiful music. Also, you know, thanks for the day off. Back again with more tomorrow, kittens.
And now, for your moment of Zen. I’ve been a fan of Tracy Chapman forever. And she was among the ladies I featured in the first year of doing My Weekend Crushes. So here she paying (inadvertent) tribute to the late Ben E. King (who passed away after this appearance) and the beautiful “Stand By Me.” Lovely doesn’t even cover it. Now that’s how you start off your week right.
What does a lesbian look like, exactly? It’s a good question without a good answer. Because anyone who tells you he or she knows exactly what a lesbian looks like is wrong. Sure, we can generalize. I, myself, have a propensity for plaid shirts and Doc Martens. But that doesn’t mean al ladies who love ladies wear plaid and Docs or have alternative lifestyle haircuts or prefer cargo shorts and love blazers or own a closet full of clothing covered in cat hair.
So then, it’s particularly galling when people in positions of power who certainly should know better say incredibly stupid things about what lesbians look like. Like Florida Lieutenant Governor Jennifer Carroll who is currently embroiled in a lesbian sex scandal of her own. A fired former employee claims she caught the Republican Lt. Gov. and her travel aide in vag-rante* delicto (*because she was under her skirt at her, oh you know) in her office. The Lt. Gov has denied this claim, in possibly the stupidest way possible to deny this claim. Of, just watch for yourself.
In case you missed it: “Usually black women that look like me don’t engage in relationships like that.” Oh, really? What do black women who do engage in relationships like that look like? Wanda Sykes? Tracy Chapman? Jasika Nicole? Meshell Ndegeocello? Alice Walker? Sheryl Swoopes? Please, I am dying to know. Sigh. The Huffington Post has made a nice response slideshow to this general idiotry thank to the Twitter hashtag #ThisIsWhatALesbianLooksLike. It’s well worth a look (and I even recognize some of your lovely face in there – hey girl!) Guess it’s time for a reminder. Lesbians look like a lot of things Women who love women come in all colors and shapes and sizes and clothing choices. Believe me, it would be a lot easier to find a date if we all looked the same and could identify each other more readily in a crowd. But as is we need to rely on shaky gaydar and that fool-proof strategy of steadfastly refusing to make eye contact while passively hoping that cute girl at the bar will come over and say hi. Because I sure can’t find the common visual trait between all these lesbian and bisexual women. Except they’re all beautiful women and think other women are beautiful.
So last week during the TCAs one of the big “reveals” was that Sara Gilbert is gay. Of course, it wasn’t really a reveal. She’s been quietly out for years. She has a partner, they have kids, the whole nine. So it’s kind of a duh. But in another way, it’s also a reminder. Sara is one of those stars I always blank on the fact that they’re gay. She’s a stealth gay. Not that she is being stealthy about it, not in the least. But for whatever reason I always forget, at first, that she is family. There are actually quite a few celebrities that fall into that category for me. And that means I don’t write about them that often. Well, no more. I’ve taken my Ginkgo Biloba, so let’s celebrate at the stealth celesbians among us.
I’m not sure if I’ll watch her new all-mom talk show, but I do think she is one cool mom.
I’m actually kind of mad at Kristen because she is going to be on both Criminal Minds and the new Criminal Minds:Suspect Behavior. Which means, because I love little punky Penelope Garcia so much, I’ll have to add yet another show to my overflowing schedule.
Her character is so cute with Walter. Seriously, they could do a whole sitcom together.
Some think of her as the Merkin, but she’ll always be Weinerdog to me. But either way, she sure looks good with her fiancée (or is it wife now, anyone know?)
I hear she’s been stealth dating Guinevere Turner, too. Sneaky, sneaky.
Speaking of stealthy, I don’t know if she is still with Fiona Shaw, but I certainly hope so.
As I was researching the new Oz remake “Tin Man,” Tracy Chapman’s beautifully sparse “Remember the Tin Man” kept going through my head. Off her “New Beginning” album, the song is a simple yet perfect metaphor for a guarded heart. In fact, the entire record was my soundtrack one summer, what seems like a lifetime ago. I was on an internship states away from the first person I ever truly loved (and dearest, if you’re reading, kisses). Tracy’s earnest, heartfelt songs both touched my loneliness and cradled my hope. Every time I hear “The Promise,” it brings back a sweet ache and warm rush of emotions, like staring at a faded snapshot from a precious moment in time. Tracy’s music has an honesty and power that needs no further embellishment. Just a guitar and that voice. Of course those amazing dreads, sly dimples and killer arms don’t hurt either. Fuck, she’s sexy. Oh, and she’s gay. And, apparently, she has a thing for writers. Lord, I’d love to tell her a story or two. Happy weekend, all.
