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Podcast: What Next | Daily News and Analysis
Episode: Mighty Real Edition
Description: As What Next celebrates Juneteenth, please enjoy this episode from our colleagues at Hit Parade. What Next will be back in your feed on Monday.
Little Richard was rock ‘n’ roll’s flamboyant architect. Lesley Gore sang that no one owned her. Sylvester was a gender-fluid icon who helped define disco. Freddie Mercury made rock operatic, and George Michael demanded freedom.
What all of these LGBTQ artists had in common was bold hitmaking—and fear of being fully out of the closet. For decades, queer acts topped the charts while cloaking their true identities and paving the w...