Rainbow Boy: The Soundtrack to PRIDE
For anyone who thought they couldn’t be themselves and be the hero too, your time is now.
-Keiynan Lonsdale, Gay Street Fighter
When I was a teenager, it always difficult for me to reconcile my Blackness with my queerness. A lot of the representation I saw was always white. I used to lock myself in my room and binge watch movies like My Own Private Idaho, Mysterious Skins, Speedway Junkie and Johns. Each film starred a white, queer (or a white queer-acting) man who sold himself for money or ended up dying by the end of the film. To me, at that age, being queer was synonymous with being white and being miserable. But today, we have pop stars and movies and books that proudly explore the intersections of race, gender and sexual orientation. This Pride Month, I wanted to dedicate my pride to all aspects of my identity. And there is no better way to do that than listening to Keiynan Lonsdale’s album Rainbow Boy. Rainbow Boy, is a celebration of the Black Queer identity.
Lonsdale came to understand his sexuality after working on the film Love, Simon, where he played the love interest to Simon Spier. Rainbow Boy is an exploration and a celebration of Lonsdale identity.
Existing within a heteronormative, Eurocentric society can be difficult. It can be even more difficult if the whole of your identities fly in the face of societal norms. And being both Black and Queer disrupts the dichotomies of western gender and race. Black men are expected to be strong and masculine. Gay men are expected to be feminine and weak. Human beings are expected to do what they can to fit themselves within limited categories. Even when something is out of the norm, it is still expected to act as a cautionary tale. For example, if someone comes out as gay, they’re expected to align themselves with heteronormativity as much as possible, or be seen as an even greater outcast. If someone is Black, than this person must align themselves with Eurocentrism as much as possible in order to gain acceptance. Black people must “speak properly,” Queer men must “act like men,” and dichotomies must be maintained.
But Rainbow Boy, much like Lonsdale, refuses to be subjugated to the labels of others. Lonsdale refuses to have his sexuality labeled, and Rainbow Boy album refuses to have its identity separated. And even more, Rainbow Boy does not steep itself within somber messaging, and instead chooses to embody pride, both the idea and the emotion.
The song Gay Street Fighter is an anthem about queerness and the ability of Queers to exist unapologetically. The song uses Funk sounds, retro arcade soundbites that bring energy and strength. Gay Street Fighter does the impossible by taking all the identities that society has pushed to the margins and recast them as the “hero”. Taking what was seen as a liability (Blackness, queerness, otherness) and turning it into a superpower.
And when it comes to Pride, what better message can there be?