Adam Lambert was not out of the closet when he auditioned for American Idol. In fact, he dodged questions about his sexuality and only came out after the season ended.
You're right. I guess he just set off my gaydar so strongly that it seemed unnecessary for him to have to come out (I felt similarly about Clay Aiken and, although he was young, I was pretty confident David Archuleta was a mini mo).
While he wasn't the first openly gay singer, Adam Lambert wasn't ashamed to put his sexuality into his music and felt very mainstream to me since he made it so far on
Idol. When "For Your Entertainment" was released, it felt so unabashedly about topping.
Flashing forward, Adam Lambert put out an album in early 2023 that was primarily covers, including a lot of queer anthems. One of the singles was a cover of Sylvester's "You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real)," which was put out for Pride Month. Sylvester was known as the "Queen of Disco."
Another track that was put out as a single was Lambert's cover of "Holding Out for a Hero" (made famous by Bonnie Tyler on the
Footloose soundtrack, getting a second life in
Shrek 2 through Jennifer Saunders as the Fairy Godmother). The music video is gay gay gay gay gay.
Another track is a cover of Culture Club's "Do You Really Want to Hurt Me." Lambert really put his own spin on this cover, which plays more like a remix.
Since there's a limit of 5 embeds per post, I'll wrap this up with Lambert's cover of "I'm a Man" by Jobriath, who nicknamed himself "Rock's Truest Fairy."
