The top fifty gayest songs EVER!

Australian website samesame.com.au asked their readers to vote for what songs out of the vast catalogue of musical history you think deserve to be called camp classics to help them celebrate the 30th Anniversary of Sydney’s Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras and this is their top fifty (in reverse order):

50. Elton John and George Michael “Don’t Let The Sun Go Down On Me”
49. Dead or Alive “You Spin Me (Like A Record)”
48. Pet Shop Boys “New York City Boy”
47. Diana Ross “Chain Reaction”
46. Deborah Harry “I Want That Man”
45. Cher “Strong Enough”
44. RuPaul “Supermodel (You Better Work)”
43. KD Lang “Constant Craving”
42. Culture Club “Do You Really Want To Hurt Me”
41. Chaka Kham “I’m Every Woman”
40. Wham “Wake Me Up Before You Go-Go”
39. Paul Lekakis “Boom Boom (Let’s Go Back To My Room)
38. Kym Mazelle “Young Hearts Run Free”
37. George Michael “Outside”
36. Donna Summer “I Feel Love”
35. Dannii Minogue “This Is It”
34. Belinda Carlisle “Summer Rain”
33. Peter Allen “I Go To Rio”
32. Sylvester “You Make Me Feel Mighty Real”
31. Heather Small “Proud”
30. CeCe Peniston “Finally”
29. Madonna “Express Yourself”
28. Cyndi Lauper “Girls Just Wanna Have Fun”
27. Charlene “I’ve Never Been To Me”
26. Tim Curry “Sweet Transvestite”
25. Barry Manilow “Copacabana”
24. Barbara Streisand and Donna Summer “No More Tears”
23. Whitney Houston “I Wanna Dance With Somebody (Who Loves Me)”
22. Sister Sledge “We Are Family”
21. Queen “I Want To Break Free”
20. Dolly Parton “9 to 5”
19. Coming Out Crew “Free, Gay and Happy”
18. Village People “In the Navy”
17. Frankie Goes To Hollywood “Relax”
16. Village People “Macho Man”
15. Judy Garland “Over The Rainbow”
14. Bronski Beat “Smalltown Boy”
13. Diana Ross “I’m Coming Out”
12. Cher “Believe”
11. Gloria Gaynor “I Am What I Am”
10. Alicia Bridges "I Love The Nightlife"
9. Madonna "Vogue"
8. Olivia Netwon-John "Xanadu"
7. Kylie Minogue "Better The Devil You Know"
6. Pet Shop Boys "Go West"
5. Kylie Minogue "Your Disco Needs You"
4. The Weathergirls "It's Raining Men"
3. Gloria Gaynor "I Will Survive"
2. Village People "YMCA"
1. ABBA "Dancing Queen"

Looking down that list, that sounds like a typical Saturday night in the Kitsch Bitch Lounge at Poptastic here in Manchester. In fact, although I haven't counted, I reckon I bought most of those older songs on 7" vinyl during my innocent childhood years. And my family said they didn't have a clue!

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Forbes.com presents the twenty highest grossing female musicians of 2007

Forbes.com has actually bothered to look at the earnings of female singers for the first time. Taking into account their estimated earnings from June 2006 to June 2007, they've compiled the following list of the twenty highest grossing female musicians. By the way, I've left in their own blurb, I was going to delete their commentary but then I realised that if I did, I'd have to actually make an effort and write something myself. Yeah, like that's gonna happen:

1. Madonna
$72 million
The ever-morphing singer still outsells artists half her age. She tops the Cash Queens list thanks largely to her record-breaking Confessions tour, plus income from album sales, an apparel line with retailer H&M and a deal with NBC to air concert footage

2. Barbra Streisand
$60 million
The 65-year-old legend, with 145 million albums sold worldwide to her credit, drew legions of die-hard fans to her short (and rare) concert series that wrapped in Europe last summer. Some tickets sold for upward of $1,000 apiece.


3. Celine Dion
$45 million
The Canadian diva's landmark Las Vegas concert drew some 3 million fans and grossed upward of $450 million during its five-year run, which ended in December.

4. Shakira
$38 million
The Colombian chanteuse shook her trademark hips from Mexico to India on a tireless tour that saw her perform 111 concerts before it was over.

5. Beyoncé
$27 million
The former Destiny's Child front woman is an endorsement darling, boasting deals with blue-chip brands like American Express, L'Oreal and Samsung.

6. Gwen Stefani
$26 million
Her last album, The Sweet Escape, peaked at No. 3 on the Billboard charts, her best performance as a solo artist. The 38-year-old platinum blonde also has an endorsement deal with HP, her own fashion label and a recently launched fragrance.

7. Christina Aguilera
$20 million
Critics adored the retro stylings of Back to Basics, her third studio album, which also proved popular with fans. Aguilera also inked deals with Pepsi and Orange, a European cellphone operator. In January, the 27-year-old welcomed her first child, Max.

8. Faith Hill
$19 million
Country's beauty-queen crooner joined husband Tim McGraw on the road for the Soul2Soul II tour, one of the year's fastest-selling, top-grossing American concert series, beating out even the U.S. leg of Madonna's Confessions tour. Hill also belts out NBC's Sunday Night Football theme song.

9. Dixie Chicks
$18 million
Despite vehement criticism from country fans of their anti-war, anti-Bush politics, the Dixie Chicks proved their resilience with their seventh studio album, the Grammy-winning Taking the Long Way Home. Though it immediately topped country and pop charts, the tour to promote the album was hit-or-miss. The Chicks canceled dates in Texas and Oklahoma following refusals from several radio stations to advertise the event.

10. Mariah Carey
$13 million
The 37-year-old pop and R&B diva makes good money off of her extensive catalog. (Her 10 studio albums have sold over 100 million copies worldwide.) The musical director for her last tour, dubbed The Adventures of Mimi, was longtime collaborator Randy Jackson, judge of American Idol.

11. Hilary Duff
$12 million
The 20-year-old former child star of Disney's Lizzie McGuire has quickly established herself as a credible pop star thanks to Dignity, her modestly selling recent studio album. Though acting and music may be her passions, retail is her biggest moneymaking asset. Stuff by Hilary Duff, merchandise targeting her tween fans, is available at Kohl's and JCPenney.

12. Avril Lavigne
$12 million
Marriage hasn't slowed this 23-year-old rocker down. Her third studio album, The Best Damn Thing, topped the pop charts last year and spawned an international mega-hit from its first single "Girlfriend." The video for that song is the second most-watched clip on YouTube, with over 69 million views. Lavigne recorded the chorus to the song in seven other languages, including Mandarin and German.

13. Martina McBride
$12 million
The 41-year-old country crooner's ninth studio album, Waking Up Laughing, was an unlikely crossover hit last year, earning top 10 spots on the country, adult contemporary and Hot 100 charts. (She's still on the road promoting the album on tour.) She and her husband own and operate Nashville's Blackbird Studio, where A-list music acts like John Bon Jovi and Keith Urban have recorded.


14. Britney Spears
$8 million
The former pop-superstar-turned-tabloid-staple eeks out a sizable income from her catalog of hits--the 26-year-old has sold over 80 million records worldwide over the course of her career--and royalties from sales of her fragrance lines. Critics be damned, her latest album, Blackout, has been a modest hit.

15. Carrie Underwood
$7 million
American Idol's fourth-season champ saw her debut album, Some Hearts, sell 8 million copies worldwide and spawn a mega-hit of its third single, "Before He Cheats." (Over 2 million downloads and counting.) Her sophomore effort, Carnival Ride, has sold over 2 million copies. Word is she'll hit the road this year with Keith Urban to promote their respective albums.

16. Nelly Furtado
$7 million
The one-time folk-indie-songstress-turned-pop-star partnered with uber-producer Timbaland for her third album, Loose, said to have sold more than 7 million copies worldwide. The album launched eight hit singles, including "Promiscuous." Furtado, 29, also appeared in Timbaland's "Give It To Me" single with Justin Timberlake

17. Fergie
$6 million
The Black Eyed Peas singer scored big with her debut solo album The Duchess, which landed five hit singles, including "Glamorous" and "Big Girls Don't Cry." Born Stacy Ann Ferguson, the 32-year-old also bagged endorsements with Kipling bags and Candie's shoes.

18. Jennifer Lopez
$6 million
Despite weak album sales of her first Spanish-language album Como Ama una Mujer and limited touring, J.Lo still rakes it in, mostly from her catalog, clothing sales and incredibly successful fragrances. (There are six fragrances so far.) Lopez also collected a paycheck for her credit in El Cantante, the biopic of salsa star Hector Lavoe co-starring hubby Marc Anthony. Lopez, 38, who also runs her own production company, is reportedly expecting twins.

19. Sheryl Crow
$6 million
The nine-time Grammy-winning pop-rock singer enjoyed income from her catalog and a smallish 2006 tour to promote her last album, Wildflowers. During that period, Crow overcame a breast cancer diagnosis and endured a very public breakup with Lance Armstrong. Last year she adopted a son, Wyatt Steven. In February, Crow, 45, will release Detours, her sixth studio album

20. Norah Jones
$5.5 million
The 28-year-old mellow rocker released her third album, Not Too Late, earlier this year and has reportedly sold 3 million copies worldwide to date. She also enjoyed income from a worldwide tour to promote the album. This year she'll make her big screen acting debut opposite Jude Law in My Blueberry Nights.

You can't begrudge Madonna being top of the list as you had to admit that our Madge does work damn hard for her money. Oh, and look at Ms Britney making the list. Her cut from selling paparazzi photographs of herself must be more lucrative than we thought!

Hunky Josh Brolin as George Dubya Bush? WTF!

Uh huh, that's right. Oliver Stone wants to cast hot actor Josh Brolin as George Dubya Bush. WTF is he thinking? Ollie explains:

"I want a fair, true portrait of the man. How did Bush go from an alcoholic bum to the most powerful figure in the world? It's like Frank Capra territory on one hand, but I'll also cover the demons in his private life, his bouts with his dad and his conversion to Christianity, which explains a lot of where he is coming from. It includes his belief that God personally chose him to be president of the United States, and his coming into his own with the stunning, preemptive attack on Iraq. It will contain surprises for Bush supporters and his detractors."

Ollie goes on to explain his casting: "Josh is actually better looking than Bush but has the same drive and charisma that Americans identify with Bush, who has some of that old-time movie-star swagger."

Eh, Bush has old-time movie-star swagger now? I dunno what Ollie's been smoking lately, but last time I looked, Dubya was definitely no hunk and he wasn't doing any swaggering either. Josh, on the other hand, is dreamy. I've liked him ever since he played that bisexual armpit-licking sheriff in Flirting With Disaster. Ooh, I wonder what Josh's mom-in-law Barbra Streisand has to say about the film, she freaking loathes Dubya.






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Some classic barbs from Mr Blackwell

It was a quiet day at work so to relieve my boredom I went a-browsing on this here interweb doo-dah to dig out some more bon mots from the delightfully caustic Mr Blackwell. Even if you don't agree with his choices of worst dressed ladies, you have to admit that he's got a funny turn of phrase. The bitter old queen has been dishing it out since 1960 and here are some of the bitchy remarks that stood out:

1963 Jayne Meadows - "Looks like all the stores in town had a sale - and she bought it all; what's worse, she wore it."

1964 Jayne Meadows -"May I have an aspirin?"

1964 Debbie Reynolds - "A caricature of Zsa Zsa Gabor who is a caricature of...well, I really don't know. Plug her in and there's your Christmas tree."

1965 Elizabeth Taylor - "In tight sweaters and skirts she looks like a chain of link sausages."

1965 Barbra Streisand - "Ringo Starr in drag."

1966 Ann-Margret - "Marlon Brando in a g-string."

1966 Elizabeth Taylor - "A boutique toothpaste tube, squeezed from the middle."

1966 Carol Channing - "Finger paints, chicken feathers, and glue thrown into an electric fan."

1967 Elizabeth Taylor - "Looks like two small boys fighting under a mink blanket."

1969 Doris Day - "Doing your own thing in blushing pink...but for thirty years?"

1990 Barbra Streisand- "What can I say? Yentl 's gone mental!"

1998 Kate Winslet - "From gaudy gowns to creepy combat boots, Kate's a fashion panic - in fact, her whole wardrobe should have gone down with the Titanic."

2003 Melanie Griffith - "Melanie defines "fatal fashion folly", a botox'd cockatoo in a painting by Dali!"

2003 Celine Dion - "Half sequined scarecrow, half gaudy acrobat. Is it Abe Lincoln in drag? I'll leave it at that!"

2005 Jessica Simpson - "It's time to sack the stylist and divorce the 'designer,' she resembles a cut-rate Rapunzel slingin' hash in a Vegas diner!"

2005 Mary-Kate Olsen "In bag lady rags that look depressingly decayed – forget the 'accessories' and buy some Raid."

I also love his catty cameo in the Streetcar Named Marge episode of The Simpsons: "Memo to Goldie Hawn: Cheerleading tryouts were 30 years ago. Let’s grow up, shall we?" Aw, I love Goldie. That's just mean.

Meow, saucer of milk for Mr Blackwell!

Barbra Streisand touring Europe this summer

Barbra Streisand is touring Europe this summer, so far a whole five dates, though more are to be added.

"Barbra Streisand, will perform live in Continental Europe this June and July for the very first time in her celebrated career. She will also perform her first concert in London since 1994. The European tour, which her many fans have been eagerly anticipating for years, visits Austria, France, Ireland and the UK and follows her record-breaking US tour last autumn. More tour dates in additional countries will be announced shortly. This rare opportunity to see Barbra Streisand makes these concerts the most eagerly anticipated of the year.

"What a joy it will be to perform in so many wonderful countries for the first time,” said Streisand. “I can't wait to experience these different audiences and different cultures.” A 58 piece orchestra will accompany Ms Streisand as she performs many of the classic songs from her unique repertoire such as “Evergreen”, “People”, “The Way We Were”, “Don’t Rain on My Parade” and many more.. Designated proceeds from the tour will support her various philanthropic initiatives and will be distributed through The Streisand Foundation."

That's all very well, but have you seen how much the tickets cost? Tickets will be available to book from 9am on Friday 4 May 2007 and I was very tempted to get one but looking at the prices, I'm not so sure. I know she's a legend and we all love her and everything, but with tickets starting at £150 (that's around $300) it's not going to be practical for this fan who's saving up for a deposit on a house. The last time Streisand came to England, she did this hilarious thing to avoid jet lag. She kept herself and her entire entourage on Barbra Time and never changed her watched or observed our day or night time. That's so fierce!