Natalie wears it with pride

Natalie wears it with pride

By Drew Sheldrick

Performer Natalie Bassingthwaighte has joined forces with the Wear It With Pride campaign to raise awareness about federal Government law reforms for same-sex couples.

Her new single, Love Like This, and its video will be the centre of the campaign when it launches on February 2, with all profits from sales being donated to the gay and lesbian community.

“I’ve always had friends in the LGBT community, but I wasn’t familiar with these new laws,” Bassingthwaighte told Southern Star.

“The more I heard about them, the more passionate I became and angry that they hadn’t been in place prior.”

Love Like This was written, recorded and produced by the Grammy Award-winning team at Metrophonic, who have worked on tracks for Enrique Iglesias, Celine Dion, Britney Spears and Cher.

Up-and-coming director Jan Reichle helmed the video clip and invited gay and lesbian community members and their families to appear alongside fellow celebrity ambassadors such as The Morning Show’s Kylie Gillies, The Today Show’s Richard Reid and Courtney Act.

Reichle said working in support of the Wear It With Pride campaign was extremely rewarding and that his aim was to create symbolic celebratory imagery to act as a catalyst for people to find out more about the reforms.

“To experience how much this means to a large and integral part of our community was very special” he said.

Despite sweltering temperatures on filming day, Bassingthwaighte said she had a great time putting the clip together.
“It was boiling in that warehouse but we all had an absolute ball. We had volunteers flying in from Newcastle, Melbourne and as far away as Darwin, so it was a wonderful process,” she said.

Along with Bassingthwaighte and the host of other celebrity ambassadors, the campaign run by the National LGBT Health Alliance will produce 85 T-shirts custom-designed by Australian artists and fashion designers. Each T-shirt commemorates a different piece of reform and will also seek to promote the changes to the community.

National LGBT Health Alliance executive director Gabi Rosenstreich said the changes represent one of the largest single steps forward on the road to equality.

“The changes provide, for the first time, recognition of many same-sex couples and their families in areas like your tax return, your workplace leave entitlements, immigration visas, superannuation entitlements, to just name a few,” she said.

Bassingthwaighte’s involvement in the campaign is the latest in a list of engagements with the gay and lesbian community since the launch of her solo music career including performances at Mardi Gras and lesbian shower scenes in movies.

As well as her solo music career, the former Rogue Trader will return to hosting duties for the forthcoming season of Ten’s So You Think You Can Dance and will appear in this year’s third season of Underbelly: The Golden Mile.

info: Love Like This is available digitally on iTunes and all digital retailers from January 29. For more on the Wear It With Pride campaign visit www.wearitwithpride.com.au

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