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Smalltown Boy

Openly gay pop arrived in the UK in the 80s thanks to The Pet Shop Boys and Bronski Beat and illustrated how far British society had moved towards being more open-minded.

Whilst British pop has had a long and colourful history of powerful and visionary movers and shakers who just happened to be gay, for a long time it was a story that was kept under wraps. Partly because it would have been distasteful to a huge chunk of the mainstream record buying public, but mostly because it was also illegal until 1967. But consider these gay trailblazers: Brian Epstein and Simon Napier Bell were incredibly successful managers, the former with, of course, The Beatles, the latter with Marc Bolan and later Wham. Joe Meek was a maverick music-making trail-blazer and Kenny Everett the most influential DJ of his era.

57 minutes

Broadcast

  • Sun 28 Jun 2020 21:00

Song Profiles

Read the stories behind featured songs, listen to & watch related clips & cover versions!