Hey listeners, Outward is going on a little summer break.

Brian and Jules and I are taking some time to touch grass, so we're pressing pause on the podcast for the rest of the season,

but we're dropping something very special in your feed, a queer pop deep dive from Hit Parade with Chris Melanphy,

Slate's show about the music and moments that climbed the charts and shaped the culture.

So stay gay, stay hydrated, and we'll see you in the fall. Welcome back to Hit Parade, a podcast of Pop Chart History from Slate Magazine about the hits from coast to coast.

I'm Chris Malanfi, chart analyst, pop critic, and writer of Slate's Why Is This Song Number

One series?

On our last episode, we walked through the varied history of LGBTQ hitmakers on the charts, from Little Richard to Leslie

Gore, Dusty Springfield to Sylvester. We focused on Rock and Souls early years, from the

birth of rock and roll to the peak of disco, when gay hitmakers were defining the culture.

We're now going to take a twirl through a selection of chart-toppers

who managed to reach number one both in and out of Pop's closet.

Thus far, the LGBTQ performers we've covered from Rock's first few decades were rarely out of the closet.

The majority came out years after the peak of their fame, or not at all.

For example, to reiterate, both Leslie Gore and Billy Preston did score number one hits, but neither

was out at the time.

Conversely, the artists who were out didn't actually top the Hot 100 or the pop album chart, from Gibriath to Sylvester.

Also, complicating matters is that bisexual artists were, to quote, one Janice Joplin historian, often heterosexualized.

That was certainly the case with Joplin during her lifetime. She was regarded as a straight,

free-love hippie. Her lesbian relationships largely kept secret, except to her friends. Even if

Janice had been out, her only chart topper, me and Bobby McGee, topped the Hot 100 in

1971 after she was gone.

...