Next weekend, the west end of Golden Gate Park plays host to the eleventh edition of Outside Lands, our city's annual festival of music, food, comedy and dramatic temperature shifts (Do yourself a favor and slip some sweats into your backpack if you're planning on sticking it out through the evening acts). While Sunday night closer Janet Jackson is an obvious draw for queer audiences, we went panning for pink and came up with a handful of other nuggets for LGBTQ festival-goers to seek out.
No Shape, the most recent album by Seattle-based Mike Hadreas, better known as Perfume Genius adds dense layers of studio gimcrackery to the spare keyboard-centric sound that is still at the heart of his raw, emotionally open music.
Openly gay from the beginning of his career, Hadreas is also outspoken about his harrowing past experiences as a gay-bashing victim and drug abuser. While his intimate oeuvre -think Rufus Wainwright meets Jeff Buckley- seems an odd match for open fields and broad daylight, he's pulled off oddball juxtapositions before, whipping out a throbbing David Lynchian version of Elvis Presley's "Can't Help Falling In Love" for a Prada campaign. (The video features sexy full-grown fetus Dane DeHaan).
http://perfumegenius.org/
Friday, 3:40. Also Aug 11 at Bimbo's 365 Club.
Despite selling over 20 million copies of her first hit single, "Call Me Maybe," worldwide and making a major gay-supportive statement with that song's delicious boycrazy video, Carly Rae Jepsen has yet to build the mass pop audience she deserves. Listen to her latest albums, E�MO�TION, E�MO�TION Side B, and 2017 single "Cut To The Feeling" this week for an irrefutable sonic sugar rush. Then head to her set so you can beg her to help you clean off your head. It'll be completely crawling with earworms.
Friday, 5:15.
Former Top Chef-testant Tiffani Faison, who owns Boston barbecue restaurant Sweet Cheeks Q, will bring a capital Q sous chef to the GastroMagic stage this year as she welcomes fellow reality TV runner-up -from RuPaul's Drag Race- for a session of cookery and bitchery. Born D.J. Pierce in Paris, Texas, Shangela Laquifa Wadley, will be dishing up the double-entendres as she and Faison cook up a supper of -wait for it- fish and tea.
Saturday, 6:10.
Jonathan Van Ness, the luxurious locked grooming guy from the Queer Eye reboot, was actually building a cable-adjacent career long before Netflix came knocking. Since 2013, he's been offering barbed pink commentary on the world of Westeros on his Funny or Die video serial Gay of Thrones. At the Barbary comedy tent, Van Ness will be doing a live version of his quirky podcast, Getting Curious, and later appearing in a stand-up showcase hosted by one of the funniest young comics currently working, Phoebe Robinson, of Two Dope Queens.
http://www.funnyordie.com/gayofthrones
Saturday, 2:40 and 4:10.
It's no surprise at all that a band called Rainbow Kitten Surprise is fronted by a gay dude. What is a bit unexpected though, is that Sam Melo and his North Carolina quintet make rootsy, tuneful music a far cry from the anime electronic bloopery implied by their moniker. The band's recordings offer a mix of southern Americana, jam band and hypno-acoustic freak folk. It's rumored to work like a charm live and outdoors. Inhale deeply. You may leave with a new favorite act. Pre-game by checking out RKS' touching dragcumentary video for "Hide"
https://rksband.com
Sunday, 2:00.
Eight years ago, Janelle Mon�e was playing the All Shook Down music festival in North Beach. Not chopped liver, but not Outside Lands by a long shot. Three acclaimed albums, two Oscar-celebrated films (Moonlight, Hidden Figures) and much public attention to her sexuality later, Mon�e -who has at various times declared herself "queer," "bisexual," "pansexual," and "a free-ass motherfucker"- has earned a prestigious late afternoon slot to showcase tunes from Dirty Computer, along with hits from her prior two albums. Mon�e's June gig at the Masonic had some of Pride Month's most elaborately choreographed showmanship, so expect a set to rival that of the night's big closer, Miss Jackson, on the same stage just a few hours later.
Sunday, 4:40.
SF Outside Lands, August 10-12. $150-$795. Includes dozens of concerts, comedy and food demos, with drinks, more food, bicycle parking, shuttles to and from Civic Center ($48). Golden Gate Park (Polo Field, Hellman Hollow, Marx & Lindley Meadows). https://www.sfoutsidelands.com/