Words by Youth Music NextGen Fund artist, Megan Black.

"I’m a sweet bisexual, or whatever that’s supposed to mean" is a lyric I sing on stage in front of a crowd of people night after night - you’d think I would have a grip on the reality that I’m queer by now. You’d think the label bisexual would be one I’ve settled on, but it still feels like a ballpark estimate of my identity.

Like a lot of queer people, I was in denial that I could possibly not be straight. What should have given it away was the fact that I was in love with my best friend (she was also queer), but I chose not to admit that to myself. It didn’t help that I grew up in a small, working-class town in Scotland and only knew straight people and a handful of gay people - mostly gay men who knew how gay they were. I didn’t see myself in any of these people. I couldn’t understand if I liked anyone or who I was supposed to like. The shame drove me to pretend to be straight. I could pull off being a straight girl - until I started making music.

I started making music and my winged eyeliner grew, my style changed, and my ability to pretend weakened by the minute. This was alarming to me - someone asked me if I was gay once, and I knew I had to stamp out that possibility quickly. I listened to my best friend (the one I was in love with) come out to me, and I told her that I was fine with it but just couldn’t understand it. I listened to her talk about girls she liked, and when she got a girlfriend, I decided it was time I got a boyfriend. I carry the guilt and shame now of my dishonesty towards my first boyfriend - it was an unfair thing to do, yet at the time it felt like my only option. I pretended to be straight for a while, until I met a bisexual person at my first job in a theatre — it blew my mind. At this point I was around eighteen years old and had started writing songs. One in particular was about a woman I worked with who I had a MAJOR crush on. She wore fur coats - I sat at my keyboard and wrote a confession called “Fur Coat Queen”.

Music and performing were a way for me to never apologise for who I am. My outfits on stage started getting more and more eccentric, my hair grew bigger and bigger, and my acceptance of who I am became impossible to ignore. I released "Fur Coat Queen" in 2019 and came out publicly as bisexual in an interview with the BBC. People told me I was trying to be trendy, or that I was confused. I was confused. I still am - which, at twenty-six years old, does not feel very trendy. Music helped me accept being queer. It gave me a way to voice my queerness, to gain a community in my fans and fellow artists, and to feel celebrated.

The reality is that I’m very different outside of being Megan Black - I’m introverted, slightly boring, in the depths of mental illness, and mostly repulsed by having sex with anyone.

Whereas Megan Black does not care what anyone thinks - she doesn’t owe you anything. She gets on stage in a shower curtain and sunglasses and plays rock songs telling people to go f*** themselves. What I’m trying to accept is that both of these versions of me can exist at the same time - I don’t need to have it all figured out.

I use my music as a way to understand myself and the world around me, and I use the persona of Megan Black to say the things I otherwise can’t. I’m in the process of writing a concept album - the first track I’ve released from it is called ‘“Clementine” and the second, "You Have a Way". The album is a dramatised version of my own life and follows different colour schemes, worlds, and decades.

"Clementine" (set in 1968) is about my experience of queer love and being too afraid to express it: "I know a lady who’s all or nothing — one day she’ll be my wife. She’s got me where she wants me, she’ll take all she can get. She’s got me where she wants me, but I’m not quite ready yet."

"You Have a Way" (set in 1974) is about what happens if I never came out - I marry a man and we both resent one another. Both songs are love songs dedicated to the men, women, and everyone in between whom I've loved. My queerness confuses me, and I guess that’s okay.

I still feel the love. I still feel the shame. I’m boring and cool at the same time. My style will probably keep getting weirder. For now, I settle on the fact that I go by she or they. I’m a queer person somewhere on the asexual spectrum who makes rock ’n’ roll music and loves every minute of it. I’m fine with being confused - one thing I’m certain of is that I’m glad I came out. My queerness was never about anyone else. It’s not who I’m in relationships with - it’s part of my identity that connects me to love, creativity, and helps me write music I’m proud of. I’m okay with not having it all figured out.

Love from a sweet bisexual (or whatever that’s supposed to mean).

Connect with Megan Black:

Instagram: @meganblackmusic

TikTok: @meganblackmusic

Listen to Megan Black’s music: