The Bright Side of the Rainbow (Mid-Week Mini Post!)

Being gay is hard. It is an awfully, dreadfully, terrifyingly hard thing. I've read of even atheists trying to pray the gay away, because who wants to live in the ire of so many people? It isn't always rainbows and unicorns.

But sometimes it is.

One of the best things, I think, about being gay is the music. And, no, I don't mean Born This Way, necessarily, nor that ever-popular classic Dancing Queen, nor my new favorite Andrew in Drag (which also supports last weeks post). I mean every single popular song since the dawn of time can be read (heard?) as gay. 

Y'see, if being gay is so scary, so lonely, it follows that any song about/addressed to any angsty teenager applies perfectly to the rainbow demographic. Firework is a recent addition to the list of gay anthems on Wikipedia (I love that site). It works, because of course we've all felt 'like a plastic bag drifting through the wind'.  Everyone has, but being gay (or bi or trans or whatever you happen to be) gives us all something we can always be deliciously sad about to be able to be reminded that we are a firework. 

I realize that my example, being on the gay anthem list, isn't the best, so  let's look at something else. From pop to punk, we go to 21 Guns. Any GLBTWhatever person knows exactly what is 'worth fighting for but not worth dying for'. Or maybe it is worth dying for. Your choice. However, it exactly catches what we all feel sometimes.

Of course, with American Idiot now on Broadway, Green Day is now an officially gay band, right? Let's try again with the World Cup Anthem, Waka Waka (the real version, not the English). It's really a battle song, right? But it, like everything, matches our problems. Being reminded that we need to start from zero to touch the sky gives a ring of hope to us all. What if we lose something because of whom we love? We'll start from there and touch that cielo, no?

Of course, South Africa is the most gay-friendly African state, so maybe its world cup's song shouldn't count. So, continuing in the theme of the odd (as far as the American readers are concerned), what about the winner of the 2011 Eurovision Song Contest, Running Scared? This poorly lip-synched song from Azerbaijan juxtaposes love and fear. Isn't that the heart of all gay angst (gayngst, maybe)? Even in East Europe, the music is pretty darn gay.

So even though life is hard, even with all the pointless fighting, there's always something that will apply directly to you on the radio, even in Azerbaijan.

Oh, and this.