A Queer Pop Retrospective: The Drag Race Diaries Vol. 4

Fourth time's the charm? Well, a lot of Drag Race enthusiasts point of Season 4 as the beginning of peak RPDR, with its unique blend of high key drama, wild cast of queens and some of the most fun challenges in the series' history. I call bullshit on this because Season 2 and Season 3 are way better and because this is one of the series' most unbalanced casts, with the core five queens (Sharon Needles, Latrice Royale, Chad Michaels, Willam and Phi Phi O'Hara) being so dominant that the other eight contestants barely make any impact. Still though, even a middling season of RPDR is great TV and those five queens are some of the most memorable competitors in series' history and it gave us two of the show's most iconic rivalries, Phi Phi vs. Willam and Phi Phi vs. Sharon. While this season is somewhat tainted for crowning the groundbreaking alt-queen Sharon Needles, who while an incredible artist is perhaps the franchise's most controversial and problematic character due to her post-show antics including virulent racism and alleged grooming, it remains an important turning point in the history of the show, for the first time really allowing the werider, less traditional queens to flourish.

Now I've got twelve heaping helps of queer pop for us to digest and dig into, so let's get into it!

Toxic - Britney Spears (2003)

It's Britney bitch! There aren't many better ways to kick off a season of celebratory queer TV than with the reigning pop diva of the early aughts, not only that but with what is inarguably her greatest contribution to the pop music pantheon. "Toxic" isn't just a great pop song, it is THE great pop song of its era. Many critics hail this track as one of the defining and most enjoyable pop songs of the entire decade, and those critics would be right, because this track is a flawless production. The track itself feels like an action movie, with the thrilling string accompaniment giving the song a sense of real drama and heft, with the spy movie themed video working in tandem to create Britney's newfound femme fatale image. The song is hook upon hook upon hook, once you hear it, the song is in your head for the next month. Lyrically, Britney tackles her own addiction to a particularly dangerous partner, who she can't bear to tear herself away from cause his love is just so infectious. In terms of performance, the showdown between the iconically busted (on this season) Jiggly Caliente and the franchise's most forgettable Porkchop, Alisa Summers is very much one-sided, with Jiggly throwing down with a full-throated ferocity. Jiggly quite literally lip syncs for her life, cause she has a fire within her, fighting to not go home first. Her performance is made all the more dramatic due to her absolutely absymal apolcalyptic design challenge look, which has tin foil panels and prosthetic limbs falling off of her with every split and dip. Maybe this song deserved a less messy performance, but just like Britney herself, Jiggly left it all on the table, and then some.

Bad Girls - Donna Summer (1979)

Donna Summer is a truly complicated gay icon, the prime disco diva who pumped out classic song after classic song, ripe for the dance floor and perfect for a high drama lip sync, but who in her day, spurned her queer fanbase due to her own deep-seated religious beliefs. It's hard to celebrate someone who has such disdain for their own fanbase, but at the same time you can't ignore her artistry and importance to the gay fantasia of the Studio 54 disco scene. This track, perhaps Donna's most iconic number, is a sultry, soulful disco strutter with that nasty four on the floor dance beat and punchy horn lines where Summer herself sings about the bad girls of the world (or more accurately the hookers), singing their praises for their sheer fabulousity while also giving them a bit of sympathy for their chosen life path. The song is camp as hell, with its mini-refrains of "Toot Toot Beep Beep", but there is also some real pathos in this song, like many of Donna's best, wailing her heart out about the plight of the "bad girl". Now for the lip sync, the showdown between two of the season's look queens, LaShauwn Beyond and The Princess, is solid if not spectacular, leading The Princess to a strong win after LaShauwn takes off her shoes in the song's first 10 seconds (a cardinal Drag Race sin). This is far from Drag Race's only dip into the pool of Donna Summer disco classics (or my favorite), but they sure picked a great song for their first time. Now can I get a "toot toot beep beep"?

This Will Be (An Everlasting Love) - Natalie Cole (1975)

As I wrote last time about Mimi Imfurst and her infamous performance of "Don't Leave Me This Way", sometimes a performance can fully overshadow a song, but not always for a bad reason. In this case, it is due to the fact that DiDa Ritz, the season's most underrated queen, turns in what may be a Top 5 performance in the show's history to this song, delivering as Latrice Royale states, "high class drag at its finest", fully embodying Natalie Cole's immense joy as she lip syncs the song as if she herself wrote it. The expressiveness and her word perfect rendition of the song is hard to not be bowled over by, it is just so incredibly enrapturing. Occasionally I'll feel bad for The Princess, who herself delivering a strong performance of the track, but there's something magical about the way DiDa turns the party, with no tricks, no gimmicks, just a good old fashioned lip sync. It's so good even Santino is waving his handkerchief like a church lady. Now about the song, this track is some primo soul from Natalie Cole, the daughter of my favorite jazz performer Nat King Cole, who delivers an ebullient, soulful love song about her manifesting the love of her life. The blend of jazzy instrumentation, soul songwriting and gospel vocals really makes this a standout song among this group, especially with the rapid-fire delivery on the bridge where Cole serves some gospel realness with her gorgeous vocals. But even with a song this good, all I can think about is DiDa Ritz absolutely lip syncing the house down. A performance for the ages to a truly lovely song.

Trouble - P!nk (2003)

This one is an interesting case because unlike last season where we got soundalike songs of less famous artists trying to sound like their more famous counterparts (the many almost-Janet songs of S3), here we have a famous artist but one of their least recognizable hits off of their least popular album. Now P!nk herself is not queer, she is one of the most fervent allies in mainstream pop, especially at the time, when she courted the audience of kids who didn't fit in, particularly the queer community, as P!nk herself was non-conforming when it came to typical gender norms for an early aughts pop star due to her embrace of more traditionally butch styles and music genres. In fact, Morgan McMichaels played a version of P!nk in the first Snatch Game in S2. The song is a very high energy rock piece, which is a genre I would love to see more on the show, as it gives the queens a different range of emotions to play with. The track is fiery and defiant, with P!nk railing against societal norms, declaring that she herself is trouble and will tear up whatever is in her way. The lip sync between Madame LaQueer and Milan is fierce, with Milan in particular embodying the ferociousness of the song, delivering a staggering performance culminating in the iconic "taint-swiffer" (coined by Willam) while Madame is more of a "pointer sister" (coined by Jiggly Caliente). This song brings some real diversity to the musical mix of the Season 4, and I thank the show for reintroducing me to the magic of P!nk, whose discography I fully explored on account of Drag Race (and I found many other hidden gems like this along the way).

Vogue - Madonna (1990)

"Vogue" itself is a very interesting case with the song finding itself to be simultaneously a piece of queer culture and also an unceremonious rip-off of queer culture. Madonna herself isn't queer, but she started out in the gay bars of New York, honing her style, so she from the beginning has been endebted to queer artistry, but never has that debt been more apparent than on this song, which is a wholehearted mainstream-ification of the New York queer ballroom scene and their invention of voguing. Without "Paris Is Burning" there would be no "Vogue", but does that invalidate the importance of the song and what it did for helping to popularize and de-stigmatize the world of drag, queerness and transgender people? Maybe or maybe not. Personally, I think that while Madonna may have copped her style, she did an amazing job of uplifting queer artists while doing so, especially in her music video which featured many of the ballroom scene's most dazzling talents, and keeping them paid as her choreographers for her next few tours. The song is a sparkling house track, one of the first to truly hit it big on pop radio before the sound came to dominate the rest of the decade with sharp synths, blasts of horns and a groovy base of keyboards over which Madonna delivers her sultry, spoken word raps about fashion icons of yesteryear and posing the house down mama. The lip sync between Puerto Rican powerhouse Kenya Michaels and Milan is jaw-droppingly good, and dare I say the season's most underrated moment, with both divas hitting unbelievable moves (Milan balancing on her head, Kenya basically doing the backstroke across the runway, the double death drop) while encapsulating the queer joy of the song. This track distills everything fabulous about late 80s queer culture into a dazzling (perhaps whitewashed) package and proves to be a damn great song to vogue the house down to.

Born This Way - Lady Gaga (2011)

Do I even have to really explain this one? It's Lady Gaga, patron saint of the queer Milennials and Gen Zers, singing her most outwardly, proudly queer song all about belonging and embracing your own unique self regardless of your gender, race or sexuality. It's THE queer anthem of my generation, so much so, that honestly it's a little bit played out, but fuck that, you can't overplay the National Anthem of queer-dos everywhere. This track is uplifting, it's maximalist, it's got some of Gaga's best (and occasionally corniest) lyrics, what more do you want. In terms of performance, we have the fall of Milan, who removes her wig and strips way down one too many times, with Ru firmly over her schtick and setting the unspoken "don't take your wig off unless you're doing something special" rule for seasons to come while Jiggly turns in her second powerhouse lip sync of the season, embodying the queer joy and fighting spirit of the song, full of energy hopping around in her tie dye bodysuit. Sometimes a song is so overwhelmingly influential and important that there's really nothing else to say about it, and that's the case here. Can Gaga get an amen?

Mi Vida Loca (My Crazy Life) - Pam Tillis (1994)

Now this is where the wheels fall off. There's nothing remotely queer about 90s glam-country. This isn't a camp diva like Dolly or a fierce icon like Shania, this is Pam Tillis (who?) and her flamenco inspired teen-country hit about taking corners on two wheels. It's not a good song, and even worse, it sucks ass as a lip sync song. You can't do anything with it. You can't dance, it's not an emotional park and bark, it's not funny, it's a whole lot of nothing. I expect they picked this one just cause Pam Tillis was the guest judge, but they didn't do a Tanya Tucker song when she was there on Season 2 and she's a hell of a lot more interesting and diva friendly than Pam Tillis. Willam's performance is servicable (mostly for her full butt reveal due to her not wearing panties) and Jiggly feels like she's performing to something else entirely (she wished in the confessionals for it to be Lil' Kim instead). Not much nice to say here, it just sucks.

It's Raining Men... The Sequel - Martha Walsh and RuPaul (1997)

And now we get back on track after out brief detour into country pop insanity with this, half an ultimate queer disco jam half a needless Ru plug. After last week, I'll take it. The original "It's Raining Men" is an absolute classic track, with Martha Walsh delivering a earth-shatteringly good vocal performance full of gospel fervor about mother nature opening up the skies and letting hot men rain down on the ladies, which is as camp as it gets and has from day one been a gay anthem in clubs around the world. The track is so camp it hurts, but that's why I love it so much, with the hilarious spoken word "weather report" intro to the best lyric in all music, "Mother nature's a single woman too", but this isn't the original track is it? It's a hastily put together remix of the song from fifteen years later featuring none other than Ru herself. Oddly enough, it's just the same song, the production is exactly the same, the only difference is Ru doing some goofy ad-libs in the back and Martha singing lead the whole way through instead of switching off with her former Weather Girl Izora Armstead. This one is more or less a copy paste of the original, but with Ru vibing with one of her musical heroes. I like it, but the original is in another tier of greateness. The performance, a showdown between the season's two main characters, the arch rivals of Sharon Needles and Phi Phi O'Hara, the alt spooky drag monster versus the petty pageant queen is one of if not the series' most dramatic lip syncs. It is an all out brawl, with the two showcasing their vastly different styles, Phi Phi's performance is hungry and raw, but also desperate, throwing off her wig and delivering crunchy death drops and splits, while Sharon is locked in, delivering a campy, spooky performance that really fits the song's comedic edge. The performance is a well deserved double save, even if I think Sharon wiped Phi Phi because in the season's gaggiest twist Willam is disqualified for breaking the rule of the queens being secluded from outside communication. The song and the performance is the highest of camp and for that let's all get absolutely soaking wet!

I've Got to Use My Imagination - Gladys Knight & The Pips (1973)

First thing's first, I absolutely adore Gladys Knight. She is probably my favorite classic soul singer of all time, just barely edging out Aretha and Marvin due to her grittiness mixed with how beautifully she can emote a song. As for a queer pop icon, I'm not so sure Gladys fits the bill. She's not campy, she's not as high glam and high drama as the grand divas like Aretha and Diana Ross, she's got an edge to her and a real downhome Southern charm that sets her apart from others in the Motown stable. This might be a curious choice for a lip sync song, but unlike Pam Tillis', this is a great lip sync track because of hos ferocious and emotional it gets, this song has all the emotion of a great ballad but wrapped up in a tense soulful rock exterior, allowing the season's two powerhouse lip syncers, DiDa Ritz and Latrice Royale, a chance to face off to a song which really suits both of their unique styles. DiDa's performance is killer, working the crowd like Tina Turner with her dance movies while Latrice gives Gladys down with her fantastic ability to feel a song with her facial expressions, also giving some ferocious choreo (for Latrice standards). On another season this could have been a double shantay, but it was DiDa's time to go, being the only queen to ever make Top 5 without a single placement above safe. The song itself has a beautiful kind of roughness to it, with the lyrics being all about how you need to imagine a better future to get through the darkness of the present day. In Gladys' own words, you gotta keep on keepin' on, and especially nowadays that message rings true for queer people everywhere. Don't stop fighting, keep on keepin' on and make yourself heard.

(You Make Me Feel Like) A Natural Woman - Aretha Franklin (1968)

Sometimes I wonder if Ru likes to put a queen in the bottom just because she knows that the lip sync song is perfect for them, and this is my number one example of that phenomenon because Latrice Royale is able to perform this song as if she herself wrote every word. This song needs no introduction, it's Aretha's second most popular song (second only to "Respect", which we'll cover in Season 14) and is one of the greatest ballads of all time, wringing pure emotion from each line. It's a perfect song, written by Carole King and delivered immaculately by Aretha's powerful, yet simultaneously gentle vocals. Two and a half blissful minutes, and Latrice Royale is able to enchant you every second with her grounded, emotional, beautiful performance. The runway that week is "Pregnancy Realness", and Latrice makes the powerful decision to perform the song to her unborn child, rubbing her belly as she performs, and each time it brings me near tears on account of her palpable earnestness. Latrice herself looks a lot like Aretha Franklin (she played her for Snatch Game too) and this helps give the performance such a feeling of authenticity, but truly she embodies the song like few other performers could dream of. Now this isn't a solo lip sync, but it may as well be, because fellow bottom queen Kenya Michaels delivers one of the dumbest performances of the season, completely misreading the song's energy and giving a hyper-active performance, with ballet moves, a terrible wig removal and overall some of the most off-puttingly weird energy seen on the main stage. But honestly, I never bother watching Kenya buzz around Latrice like an annoying mosquito because Latrice has a singular power of capturing my attention so greatly that everything else falls away. There is so much poetry and meaning to them choosing this song to perform. It questions what "a natural woman" can be, because Latrice, a cisgender drag queen, seems to understand the song on an emotional level that one wouldn't expect from a male presenting individual. Perhaps it was chosen for camp or for a cheap joke about seeing drag queens sing about "natural womanhood", but I choose to think of it as an important commentary on what femininity even is, and how it can be embraced by every single one of us. A greater subtext is added once you know Kenya Michaels came out as transgender after the show aired, making her performance more powerful, taking off her wig to show her real hair, because inside she is a natural woman too. Aretha sings about feeling alive, and as if she was awakened to her full self when she fell in love, and I think that's a universal feeling. Whether you are a woman, a man, a non-binary person or anything else, the way love can make you feel more yourself is magical. A beautiful performance of a classic song, and if you couldn't tell by how much I had to say about it, my favorite from this season.

No One Else on Earth - Wynonna Judd (1992)

Back to country I guess. If I can praise this season's musical selections for anything, it's that they aren't afraid of genre diversity (a complaint I am happy to leverage at the more current seasons, who seem to think high energy pop is the only way to go), but a second country song is really testing my patience. Thankfully, this track is a lot better than. "Mi Vida Loca", and features an actual glam country diva in Wynonna Judd who gives a solid performance of this track, a belty mid-tempo country rock ballad. It's a pretty generic love song, similar in its theme to "Natural Woman" but without any of the magic of that particular track. The performances from the season's hyper-polished front-runner Chad Michaels and fan-favorite/lip sync assassin Latrice Royale are both decent, but neither really captures my imagination, mostly cause they're working with a middling song to begin with. Chad wins out over Latrice, mostly due to track record, but I did find Chad appealing in how earnest the performance was and her ability to connect with eye contact, while Latrice seemed a bit defeated, knowing she had a weaker track record than her fellow final four queens. Not a memorable song, but I'll always enjoy a Latrice lip sync, even one where she loses.

Glamazon - RuPaul (2011)

Now for everyone's favorite segment: let's see what Ru song gets plugged in the finale! Now unlike "Champion" and "Cover Girl", "Glamazon" is actually a real song and not just celebratory background music or a runway jam. Similar to "Jealous of My Boogie" we've got mediocre verses but a really excellent chorus, but this time the disco production is substituted for some techno-pop flourishes with the heavy hits of early 10s synth bass. The track is solidly hook, with lots of little fun vocal riffs to latch onto as well as the campy "she's so bloody tall" ad-lib, but again it doesn't feel grandiose enough for a final battle. The season's final three queens all give solid performances that are befitting of their respective drag styles: Chad Michaels' performance is very polished and precise albeit the slightest bit boring, Phi Phi O'Hara's take on the song is hyper-active and showy, delivering a preponderence of tricks and dance moves that overwhelm her actual lip sync quite a bit and finally Sharon Needles' lip sync is down right weird, crawling down the runway with her tentacle gloves looking a spooky mess, but there's something really gripping about it. All season long Sharon thrived because she was weird and different from everybody else, and in the final lip sync, I can't help but still be drawn to that off-kilter vibe over Phi Phi and Chad's more traditional styles In retrospect, it sucks to have been taken in by Sharon, because while her drag remains visionary and changed the show's tragectory for the better, Sharon Needles the individual has done some truly reprehensible things that shouldn't be overlooked. Season 4 is a truly challenging season to rewatch because it's so much about separating the art from the artist, I found Sharon's drag so compelling on my first watch and I was so joyful seeing the weirdo win, but with the added context of her many controversies I hold this season and its winner at a distance. In short, "Glamazon" is a good song (for Ru standards) and Sharon was an amazing, visionary winner but in hindsight, maybe they should have just gone with Chad and then let Raven (or Manila or Alexis or Jujubee or Shannel or Latrice or Pandora) win All Stars, but then again in that universe Sharon probably would be our first All Star Winner.

Now this was fun! Season 4 isn't high on my list of Drag Race favorites, but looking at it through this lense, musically it's a very strong year especially for diversity in genres. Thanks for coming along with me and stay tuned for All Stars 1 coming soon (featuring more Chad)!

And remember, if you can't love yourself how the hell are you gonna love any of these campy queer pop songs!

Can I get an amen?