The queer release calendar has once again decided subtlety is for straight people. This week’s spotlight goes to Zolita, whose third album Hell’s Belles arrives August 28 with country twang, sapphic melodrama, and enough camp to qualify as its own weather system. While we wait for the full record, here are two more LGBTQ+ artists worth keeping in your headphones: MIKA, still turning pop maximalism into a survival skill, and August Ponthier, whose Texas-born indie pop keeps asking what home is supposed to mean.
Zolita — Hell’s Belles
Zolita’s Hell’s Belles is the week’s essential queer-pop appointment. The title track is a country-pop revenge fantasy set somewhere between a dive bar, a girls’ reform camp, and the kind of sapphic thriller where every woman has excellent eyeliner and at least one secret. The accompanying video leans fully into that campy detective-horror premise, because apparently “just release a normal music video” was never on the table.
The album is due Friday, August 28. Until then, the single is a neat preview of Zolita’s gift for making desire, danger, and a big chorus feel like they were always meant to share a motel room.
Listen: Zolita
MIKA — Hyperlove
MIKA’s Hyperlove came out earlier this year, but its glossy universe still feels like a useful antidote to the week’s general atmosphere. The album is bright, romantic, theatrical, and gloriously unwilling to behave like emotional restraint is a virtue. “Excuses For Love” is the sort of title that would sound corny from almost anyone else; from MIKA, it sounds like a policy platform.
He has spent years making queer joy feel enormous rather than apologetic, and Hyperlove keeps that tradition intact: big melodies, bigger feelings, and absolutely no interest in lowering the volume for people who prefer their pop beige.
Listen: MIKA
August Ponthier — Everywhere Isn’t Texas
August Ponthier’s Everywhere Isn’t Texas is a sharp, funny, tender record about leaving the place that made you and figuring out what parts of it get to come with you. The title track turns geography into emotional paperwork: you can move, reinvent yourself, and still find the old state laws lurking in the margins like an unwanted group chat.
Ponthier’s queer storytelling is conversational without being slight, pairing intimate lyrics with arrangements that let the feelings sneak up on you. “Everywhere Isn’t Texas” is the right song for anyone who has ever escaped one version of themselves and then had to explain the whole journey at brunch.
Listen: August Ponthier
Bottom line: stream Zolita’s “Hell’s Belles” now, mark Friday for the album, and keep MIKA and August Ponthier nearby for the emotional aftercare. The queer music scene remains dramatic, melodic, and—thankfully—far too busy to be boring.
Sources: Them; Femme Music; GLAAD; Wikimedia Commons.
Related reading
- Queer Music This Week: Cowboys, Crying, and Being Permanently Obsessed
- Queer Music Is Having a Very Loud, Very Good Week
- Music Spotlight: Adam Lambert’s Vampire Pop Moment, Steve Lacy’s Long Game, and Kelela’s Reinvention
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