February 11, 2022

We've Got Ourselves a Zine!

We did it, y'all!!! Thank you so much!

There are still 5 days remaining if you would like to snag any of the subscriber swag and/or donate to get your name in the thank-you page of Rainbow Rodeo #2!

This is a shorter update! Now that the fundraiser is over, we'll be returning to our regular bi-monthly schedule.

Or would you rather have a short weekly update? Tell me what you think!

##Sweetheart of the Rodeo

We may have hit our minimum funding goal, but subscriptions will keep the zine going and eliminate the need for fundraising campaigns! So to entice you a little bit, here is an excerpt of drag king Tex Miller's essay about outlaw country and gender.

It wasn’t until college that I realized “The Road Goes on Forever” wasn’t a classic American folksong. Robert Earl Keen’s slant rhyme-filled Bonnie and Clyde esque ballad, which was later covered by supergroup The Highwaymen, about a drug-smuggling couple who tragically run afoul of the law, brings a modern twist to the traditional American desperado tale. Hearing it at dance halls, amphitheaters, and restaurants across South Texas at a formative period in my youth (during the early 2000s) started my life-long love affair with 80s and 90s outlaw country and permanently shaped my view of masculinity. While I recognized the outlaw aspects of the saga weren’t exactly to be emulated, I was enamored with Keen’s condemnation of slut shaming and portrayal of self-sacrifice as essential to masculinity. Although promoters of toxic masculinity, of which there were many in the great state of Texas, would have me believe these traits are feminine, the men after whom I modeled myself taught me feminism and selflessness transcend the gender binary. As I slowly emerged from the closet as a trans man through the help of my cowboy drag persona, I continually returned to Keen’s vision of manhood.

Similarly, the whimsical lyrics and wistfulness of Lyle Lovett’s repertoire conjured up a mythopoetic Texas where a closeted queer, trans man could find refuge, even when the real Texas struggled to live up. Instead of crooning about guns, trucks, and violent escapades, Lovett, one of the most respected Texas country music artists, pens songs about poetry, riding his pony on his boat, and bears.

Want to read more? Subscribe!

##Rainbow Roundup

The Country Queers podcast interviewed queergrass artists Sam Gleaves

• The Bootstrap Boys are fundraising for their new album

• Bible Belt Queers has a zine about well...you guessed it! Help them pay for printing!

##Rainbow Rodeo Playlist

This week's playlist celebrates the QTPOC artists that Terry Blade and I discussed in the Juneteenth Pride episode of Adobe & Teardrops -- plus a few others!

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/7HYDPcZuT9eG70LID0EoJe?si=60268d01c3d24e3e

##Artist Resources

• Submit your music and events to The Q LGBTQ Creative Network
• Submit your profile to the Country Everywhere which seeks to unite BIPOC, LGBTQ+, and disabled artists and professionals
• Mercy Bell is looking for a queer Filipinx tenor to record with her in Nashville in late April. Is that you? Message her!

And a moment of zen