Ari Gold & Sarah Dash - Sparkle

Girl, You Are Wearing That Drag!

"Girl, you are wearing that drag!" said Miss Patti Labelle to one of an endless stream of stagefront admirers at Thursday's over the top concert of the reunited Labelle at the Beacon Theater in NYC. Aaron and I had great seats just a few rows behind none other than Ashford and Simpson themselves. Fancy! The audience mostly comprised keening gay men in their late 40's and 50's and dressed-to-the-nines African American glitterati. Mink coats and hats abounded - including on one nonagenarian in a wheelchair (plus a mink hat.) Rough Gods photographer Michael Alago was seated next to me, drag impresario Joey Arias was a few rows away (and was called out from the stage by Patti.) And there was a posse of JMG readers in the house - hello to Ralph, Alberto, and Wilson. Swag tickets winner Mark and his hubby were down front.

The show was, as you might expect, a two hour love fest that began moments after Labelle was introduced by Joy Behar. Kicking off with Miss Otis Regrets [video below], the ladies rollicked through most of their new album Back To Now and tore up their classic Can I Speak To Before You Go To Hollywood? As is tradition, they brought up three volunteers from the audience to share vocal duties on Lady Marmalade. However, unlike their show at last fall's Out 100 Awards, there was no Wilson Cruz in the house for a proper battle this time.

As noted by the title of this post, Patti was nonstop with gay references and lingo, she clearly knows who's kept her in the limelight all these years. She even asked one well-aged gentleman if he recalled having seen the ladies perform with Bette Midler at the Continental Baths. Throughout the show, verklempt gay men streamed to the lip of the stage to present flowers and gifts. No opening act, no intermission, just three divas in their mid-60's whom you can easily see going on for another 20 years - especially when the cat-like Nona Hendryx pounced to the top of the drum kit to keep the beat with her feet.

Almost outshining Labelle was the fabulously remodeled Beacon Theater, which has to be seen to be believed. After a $16M facelift, the venue reopened two weeks ago to agog reviews from both music fans and design critics. While the ladies of Labelle and the Beacon may be in their dotage, all are extremely well preserved.

Special Swag Wednesday

Courtesy of Fly Life Inc, we have a special Swag Wednesday giveaway today - two tickets to the fabulous reunited Labelle concert on Feb. 26th at Manhattan's Beacon Theater. I saw Labelle's first performance together in decades at last year's Out 100 Awards and the ladies just blew the roof off the place. Tickets are on sale now.

Enter to win your tickets by commenting on this post. Only enter once and please remember to leave an email address you check frequently. Tickets are transferable to another party, so if you can't get to NYC for the show, you can gift the tickets to your favorite local homo. Entries close Thursday night at midnight PST.

The Out 100 Awards

Friday night I attended the Out 100 Awards at Gotham Hall. It was a fancy-schmamcy shindig populated by pop stars, publishing honchos, pouty models, glamazon drag queens, and a veritable who's who of the gay glitterati. I spent most of the evening in the company of handsome Robert Cameron (VP of Levi's) and activist/radio host Michelangelo Signorile, we had a blast together. There were several musical performances over the evening - Nikki Costa rocked with house with her Janis Joplin-meets-James Brown act, but the absolute highlight of the night was the very first performance of the reunited Labelle in 33 years.ABOVE: How amazing does Nona Hendryx look? She's 64! She's openly bi, you know.ABOVE: Cheyenne Jackson accepts his award.

I'll have video of the Labelle's first number up a bit later - Patti got quite verklempt at singing with her old bandmates for the first time in so long. For the last number, she asked for three volunteers to come up and perform Lady Marmelade. One of the volunteers was actor Wilson Cruz and he fucking stole the show, seriously everybody thought he'd been planted, he was that good. I ran into Wilson at the rally on Saturday and he was still on a complete high, but denied that it had been staged. Below is a slideshow of the evening - I got some amazing shots. Go here for full-screen versions of the photos plus captions.

UPDATE: Here's the video. I was right under the speakers so the sound is lousy, but after the song ends there's a couple of minutes of applause and you can see how moved they were by their reception. Later in the set, they spoke passionately about marriage equality. I'll try and find a clip of that.

Swag Tuesday

Courtesy of FlyLife Inc, today's Swag Tuesday prize is Back To Now, the first album from the reunited Labelle in 32 years! Nona Hendryx, Sarah Dash, and Patti Labelle have finally gotten back together and the advance word is terrific.

In the history of female groups, none has ever achieved the longevity, or experienced the kind of creative evolution, that Patti LaBelle, Nona Hendryx and Sarah Dash have. Since their original formation at the dawn of the girl-group era as The Bluebelles (with then-fourth member Cindy Birdsong) in 1961, through their incarnation as R&B powerhouse (Patti LaBelle & The Bluebelles), and on to their pioneering years as the unprecedented rock-soul-funk trio Labelle, Hendryx, LaBelle and Dash have remained peerless.

These three women spent fifteen years together with a consistent commitment to bringing energy, excitement and soul power to live performances, and cutting-edge innovation to a series of classic albums until 1976, when they separated without fanfare to pursue individual goals and aspirations. Thirty-two years later, with the release of a brand new Verve Records album (featuring such top notch producers as Lenny Kravitz, Gamble & Huff, and Wyclef Jean), the aptly titled Back to Now, Labelle is back on center stage.

Album highlights include “Candelight,” a Hendryx original (“That’s old-styled Labelle!” says Sarah), “Super Lover,” a Hendry/Celli collaboration, and two G&H productions: : a rocking version of Mother’s Finest’s “Truth Will Set You Free” and a dance classic cover of Sylvester’s “You Make Me Feel Mighty Real.” [JMG:!!!] Nona remembers, “I worked with Joyce Kennedy (of Mother’s Finest) with the ‘Daughters Of Soul’ tours I did in Europe and Asia. “Truth Will Set You Free” was a great song from a great band and I felt it was something we could do.” For the dance floor, what better choice than reviving a song made famous by a dear friend: Sarah smiles, “What can I say? Sylvester was an icon. I loved doing this. I got use all aspects of my vocal range on this track.” As Patti says, “It ain’t nothin’ but a jam. It’s gonna make you dance like a fool.”

Labelle's Back To Now hits stores nationwide on October 21st. Sample tracks here. Today we've got five copies to give away. Enter to win by commenting on this post and please remember to leave an email address you check frequently. Entries close at midnight Wednesday. Publicists: if you'd like to take part in Swag Tuesday on JMG, please email me.

RELATED: I'm sure most of you are very familiar with Patti Labelle's solo work, but here are my favorite solo tracks from the others: Nona Hendryx's Keep It Confidential (1983) and Sarah Dash's Sinner Man (1978).