I recently had the pleasure of performing at Melbourne’s Midsumma Carnival. And no, I don’t have mad juggling skillz and I can’t body roll like Beyonce — but I do occasionally thrash a guitar and swear a lot as my Mac pumps out techno beats.
I developed a musical alter ego in my early 20s, just after I came out. Inspired by Peaches, I wanted to celebrate this newfound sexual identity and scream about particular lesbian sex acts at the top of my lungs.
In fact I was so excited about this self-discovery, I entered a very straight battle of the bands competition and invited my mum and dad along to show them the new me. Considering they were still adjusting to the news I fancied chicks, my rhyming of the words “sister” and “fist her” came as a bit of a shock.
After a couple more songs about sex in public loos and the colour of my then-girlfriend’s pubic hair, I wasn’t surprised when Mum confessed my music wasn’t really her “cup of tea”.
My ever-encouraging dad, on the other hand, patted me on the back and said, “Well done Mon — very good”.
My girlfriend spent the night hiding from my folks in a dark corner.
Not surprisingly, I didn’t win the band comp.
Back to Midsumma. Considering it’s a big inner-city gay fest, I was totally blown away when my dad, my butch tradie uncle and my little cousin turned up out of the blue to watch me perform. Thank you Facebook — in the digital age there are no secrets.
Even though their daughter/ niece/ cousin was singing about stuff you never ever want to hear your daughter/ niece/ cousin sing about, they totally dug it.
My uncle nearly had his picture taken with a Muscle Mary as a memento of the occasion and Dad was chuffed to be told he looked young for his age by some loved-up attentive chap.
After the set we hung out and had a good old family catch-up underneath the rainbow flags. It’s rare that we get to spend time with each other these days with some of us living interstate, crazy work commitments and the usual family conflicts — so it was pretty funny and pretty damn awesome that a fabulous gay carnival brought us all together.
