![]() ![]() “To know that I was one of the last shows that would happen with all ages with drag performers is just… I am not scared, because the queer community is strong, we have each other’s backs, and we will overcome hate. “It was a very emotional show, it was heartbreaking,” she says passionately, tearing up. The same day the Tennessee General Assembly passed a bill that prohibits “adult-oriented performances that are harmful to minors” in public spaces and non-age restricted venues, she was performing with drag openers in Nashville to a crowd of many queer people. When Kayleigh wrote “Pink Pony Club,” when she planned these live shows, she didn’t know the significance they would take on in a country where trans rights are under attack, where public drag shows are being restricted. For each night on this tour, she recruited local drag queens in each city to open for her, a way to pay forward these influences on her work and celebrate local queer communities. On March 9 she released the new music video for the angsty slow-burn rock ballad “Casual,” which she describes as “ Aquamarine, but like, gay.” It’s a culmination of the references that shape her visuals and live shows, heavily inspired by art films, cabaret, and drag performances. I’m like, fire.”) Experiencing “Femininomenon” live, however, is transcendent, iconic. Someone's like, I hated that song when you put it out. When she released “Femininomenon,” about an online relationship gone sour, friends and fans told her it was “jarring.” (Kayleigh interjects herself: “Side note, I don't know why people feel the need to tell me this every night. I was like, how do I make the crowd do that?” “I saw a Queen video where they're singing ‘Radio Ga Ga’ at stadium and the whole crowd was doing this thing. I just go in to the studio every time like, how do we make the biggest, funnest song ever?” Two weeks before her 2023 tour started, she wrote an instant hit called “Hot to Go,” which she created with a cheerleading dance in mind, one that she guides the audience through each night. (Meanwhile, her 12-year-old brother can often be found rolling around on his hoverboard singing “Pink Pony Club,” a song her parents love, too.)Īs she prepares to release her debut full-length album later this year, Kayleigh is always thinking about the live show. It was validating, a dream come true of the career she’d made up in her head as a teenager. When she was finally able to tour in 2022, she met people who had fallen in love with “Pink Pony Club” and her other 2020 singles, “Love Me Anyway” and “California.” Those songs had come out in one of the darkest periods of her life, but they had gotten other people through those early pandemic years. “I made it while making $1,400 a month when my rent was a thousand dollars.” “It was hard, but it made me not afraid to be there again because I know I was okay,” she says, thankful she had the backup option with her parents. By summer 2021, she could quit the donut shop - Sony had signed her. She took on gigs as a production assistant and a nanny, and got part-time work at a donut shop. I was 22 and I was like, what is this anymore? I don't know.” She felt like she had one last shot to move back to L.A. I was literally sleeping in a twin bed in my parents' office space. “Everything was leading me to tell me that I need to stop,” she says. It was the closest she came to leaving music altogether. The same month she got out of the relationship, she was dropped from her label, Atlantic Records, which she had signed with at 17 years old. She was in a period of hypomania with her Bipolar II. That year, Kayleigh had run out of money in L.A., ended a four and half year relationship, and moved home with her parents, working the drive-through at Midwest chain Scooter's Coffee. Though “Pink Pony Club” is her biggest record to date, the song - produced by Olivia Rodrigo collaborator Dan Nigro - didn’t result in instant fame and money. Kayleigh imagined it as an oasis, and the anthem that now closes her live shows in a whir of confetti and euphoria was born. “They have fog shooting out whenever the beat drops, and there's dancers swinging from the ceiling,” she says. It was her first time in a gay club as a 21-year-old. It's boring.” Per the lore in the creation of her 2020 hit “Pink Pony Club,” she went to The Abbey. “ just literally not fun,” she reflects now. Kayleigh’s full queer awakening came when she moved to Los Angeles in 2018 she had been dating men and feeling lackluster about the vibes. ![]()
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