slut summer (Images by Matthew Rettenmund)

On July 30, I was invited to catch Tammy Faymous at Joe's Pub — and I'm glad I made the effort.

Tammy, the creation of journalist and performer Alexander Kacala, was a queen of whom I was aware, but inaccurately. I thought, due to her cultivated messiness, she was going to be sort of Jayne County or a shock act. That's not up my alley, but when Kacala invited me, I knew that the venue was a dream of his, and hers, so I simply could not miss it.

@boyculturedotcom Tammy Faymous is a rock ‘n’ roll drag queen making drag FUN again. At her Joe’s Pub debut in NYC on July 30, 2024, she made a play for Gen Z with a heartfelt Chappell Roan cover. #chappellroan #drag #queer #gay #lgbt #lgbtq #casual #music #cabaret@chappell roan @Faymeproblems ♬ original sound - Matthew Rettenmund/BoyCulture

Turns out that Tammy is messy, but in a deeply relatable way. More a rocker with pop tendencies than a provocateuse, her cabaret act plays as a way of finding herself in songs as she goes along. Instead of a polished act, Tammy is an act in progress, and all heart.

More proof I was wrong in my assumptions, her set included Sabrina Carpenter, Melissa Etheridge and even Chappell Roan. Most surprisingly, she can sing! Some drag acts rely on lip-synching (no shame in that game), but Tammy is a singer first, and a rocker in need of a stylist (purposefully so) second.

For me, the show's highlight came when Tammy explained that her mom had been devastated to realize her husband liked dressing in women's clothing. That, Tammy opined, might be why her own looks are less than chic — a desire to do it, a fear of doing it too well.

In this way, Tammy's both performance and performance art.

And don't sleep on her banter. Her crowd work is presented as mostly casual, and some is ad-libbed, but it's her face that does most of the heavy lifting. For example, when she asked where her lesbians were and NOBODY MADE A PEEP — not one lesbian to be found — she didn't have to say a word to capitalize on the unexpected development. There's a reason her motto is MAKE DRAG FUN AGAIN.

Check Tammy out the next time she invites you into her world, especially if you're a lesbian.

The girl with something extra (GIF by Matthew Rettenmund)