Music Takes a Stand on a Difficult Topic

The connection between music and non-traditional gender identities, aka LGBT, goes back decades, if not centuries.

The arts in general have been havens for a much broader spectrum of self-identification, but music has long taken a lead in mainstreaming what was once viewed (at best) as unconventional. “Music is just a little ahead of everyone else in some ways,” Billboard senior editor Alex Gale told USA Today earlier this year.

A lot of people take this personally, and that’s where it’s been largely left, with a spectrum of opinion and emotions that rarely crossed into transactional territory. At least, until very recently, when a spate of legislative actions in a growing number of states has made gender identification a blatantly economic issue. And that puts it squarely in the nexus occupied by MI retail, at the crossroads of music and commerce. 

Music has been good to the LGBT cohort, providing a community offering safety and acceptance. But the LGBT world has more than reciprocated, offering the music industry an avid and often lucrative marketplace, as well as a conduit to broader lifestyle revenues. Starting with the disco revolution of the late 1970s, an LGBT demi-monde evolved into a legitimate sales & marketing silo. When record producers and A&R lizards want to gauge the market possibilities of an upcoming single, they’ll send mixes out into the clubs, including specifically gay clubs, relying on that audience as an esthetic barometer. Katy Perry, Britney Spears, Jennifer Lopez, Mariah Carey, Janet Jackson, the Backstreet Boys, Lady Gaga, Nicki Minaj, and Kylie Minogue are among the pop acts who’ve appeared or performed at gay clubs in the United States in recent years, underscoring the mainstream influence of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender community to “Gay & R,” as it’s been called.

But that infrastructure is being challenged, by a series of recently passed laws that are clearly a pushback against the legislative headway that LGBT has made in areas such as same-sex marriage. There are more than 100 active bills, across 22 states, which seek to limit the rights of the LGBT community. For instance, a new law in Mississippi lets any person or business deny services to same-sex couples because of religious objections. In North Carolina, the governor signed a law banning cities from passing LGBT anti-discrimination ordinances and barring transgender people from using bathrooms that match their gender identity. Tennessee also has a “bathroom bill,” plus a bill that allows mental health professionals to refuse to treat LGBT patients. A pair of bills in Nevada would allow individuals and businesses to use religion to challenge or opt out of certain laws, including laws that protect LGBT people from discrimination in employment, housing and public accommodations. Similar legislation was also recently introduced in Montana and is still pending in Arkansas, Georgia, Missouri, Texas, and elsewhere.

But the North Carolina legislative action is the one with the most economic heft, and perhaps not coincidently the one with the most significant music pushback. Bruce Springsteen and Ringo Starr both cancelled shows in the state over the new ordinances there, while Cyndi Lauper, Brandy Carlile, Jimmy Buffett, and other artists said their shows would go on, but revenues would be contributed to LGBT causes. MoogFest, which took place in May in Durham, North Carolina joined in, saying in a prepared statement ahead of the show that they would be, “standing our ground in North Carolina, and will use every opportunity to protest this law – on the stage, in the streets, and on social media.”

Music artists were joined by a growing number of large corporate entities, including Disney, the NBA, the NCAA, Apple, and Google, which have all weighed in and opposed the new law. But it was the music artists who drew the most notice. It’s a reminder that whether you see the controversy through lenses tinted by philosophy or economics, MI retail has a role to play in this particular act of American history. And June – Gay Pride Month – is the perfect time to consider yours.