Playlipsync. A playlist by Gad Yola
By Gad Yola.This playlist comprises 30 songs ranging from the 1950s to the present day. In it, you will find different eras, musical genres and origins.
For me, they are key songs to understand the drag culture that we have drawn from and the one that we continue to reproduce in discos, bars, artistic spaces, contests and queer homes.
They take me to the prevailing past of the great divas, sometimes forgotten, who spread the CAMP, EXAGERATION and BEAUTY to which we aspire as artists: Yma Sumac, the only diva coming from Peru, and her “drag fire” that Frau Diamanda talks about; La Lupe and the “lupism” of the “Yiyiyi”. The actress who performs, the actress who messes her hair up while singing, the expelled from the island, the grand master of playback contests.
From a more recent past, I bring you artists who continue to welcome imitations and who come to life in seedy bars where they would never perform. From Mexico to Argentina or Peru, names like Selena, Whitney Houston, Juan Gabriel, Isabel Pantoja, Susana Estrada, resonate in our fag collective imaginary. Perfectly synchronized drama and passion.
With the echo of their ancient art came the new generations of drag singers and performers. Artists with a more determined focus and who, in fact, belong to the LGBTQ + community such as Rupaul, Pabllo Vittar, La Prohibida, Samantha Hudson or the songs of the Mexican reality show La Más Draga, which contrast with the old and exclusive cisheterosexual referents that we had in the community.
We do not make as much money as straight pop divas, nor do we have the same views, but now we are the icons and musical referents.On the list are smash disco hits like Last Dance by Dianna Ross, another of the gay divas imitated a thousand times. You’ll also find wild and cult songs like the 1975 film “The Rocky Horror Picture Show” theme Sweet Transvestite Tim Curry, or Whitney’s It’s Not Right But it’s Okay now iconic after the lip sync battle between Sasha Velor and Shea Couleé at the Drag Race 2017 Season Finale.
The most Diversity Drag Show will take place next Saturday July 23rd with the performance of the international Todrick Hall at the Diversity València Festival.
This is a playlist that leaves out the A quién le importa, the I will survive and other songs rehashed by mainstream culture because, although they are part of the history of transvestism, they are now out of date and out of place.
But it is a playlist that includes La India, Willie Colón or Pandora to state that drag is not only produced in the West and the global north, drag also comes from the south. It is brown and anti-racist.
