Mika - Gay / Post-Gay / Not Gay

Pop singer Mika, who's performing Sunday night in Miami, is featured on the cover of July's Out magazine. Is Mika gay, post-gay or not gay? Should we care? And what exactly is post-gay?

Pop's New Queen: The more Mika avoids the question, the more persistant the question becomes

By Matthew Breen, Out magazine

For better or worse, the question of what it means to be Mika—a pop star whose rise in Europe and the U. K., in particular, has been nothing short of meteoric—has become inextricably bound up with what it means to be a gay artist in 2007. The musician, whose debut single, “Grace Kelly,” earned him comparisons to Freddie Mercury, has made a fine art of dodging the question of whether he’s gay, straight, or something in between, but the more he ducks and weaves, the more pertinent—and persistent—the question becomes. Is he being coy or calculating? Is he part of a new generation of artists who feel able to divorce their sexuality from their music, or does he reflect a more typical (and dispiriting) scenario? George Michael, Morrissey, and Elton John have all been here, coming out only after their careers had peaked or when events forced their hand. Is Mika just the 21st-century version of Mozza?

Or is Mika not gay at all? He may even be making a profound point about the inherent futility of labels. “Why pigeonhole myself like that so immediately?” is his practiced response to the question, but given the ubiquity of the words camp and flamboyant in profiles and interviews, it’s clear that many writers have already made up their minds. So should we care if Mika resists clarifying the media’s implicit assumptions?

To read more of the Out article, click here.

To read Howard Cohen's profile in The Miami Herald, click here.