After the rally and the Gay Pride Parade, the next activity on the Madison Gay Pride Celebration was the Pride Picnic. The cost to enter the picnic celebration was $5 per person. You were not allowed to bring food or drink in the park because the food and drink vendors desired to make sells. This was the only downfall of the picnic. Most of the food there was not nutritious (greasy and fattening) and expensive, and the beverages were expensive too, especially the tap beer at $4 for a 12-ounce plastic cup. On a brighter note, the entrance fee provided you with entertainment.
The park had ticket booths where you had to purchase tickets to enter the park, portable toilets, vendors (food, drink, merchandise, and informational), and generators.
To start off the entertainment expo at the park were the Dairyland Cowboys and Cowgirls (LGBT country western dancers). They were strutting their dance steps of two-step, line, circle, etc. Since 1993, this group has hosted scores of country dances with instruction, canoe trips, potlucks, and rural barn dances. Then there was the Drag Show, with several men dressed as women and lip-synching to music.
There was also a couple of drag kings (women dressed like men) lip-synching. One was dressed in studded black-leather pants, with a muscle shirt supporting fake facial hair, and the other one was dressed in cowboy wear crooning "Getty up and Ride with Me." There was also a heavy-metal musical group called All the Pretty Horses. This group is from Minneapolis, MN. All the Pretty Horses brings back the David Bowie era with a hard twist. It is a dark glam-rock band that definitely left an impression on me. I was mesmerized by their antics on stage with power tools, their fierce dancers, and their transgender performance artist named Venus. This artist played the guitar for the band.
She was adorned with feathers, leather, and sequins. In heels, this performer is over 6 feet tall and definitely towered over most of her other band members.
After All the Pretty Horses finished their act, another artist took the stage. This performer was the headliner and the big finale of the gay pride picnic. The artist’s name is Simone Denny. She sings dance /disco music. Her presence and voice was powerful. As she entered on the stage, you could feel it. I even noticed the officers I had met at the picnic moved closer to the stage and were tapping their feet.
Denny is best known for the theme song for NBC/Bravo Television’s hit reality show "Queer Eye For The Straight Guy." "All Things Just Keep Getting Better" is the catchy tune, which opens the show for the Fab Five, as the show’s resident gay experts have come to be known. The song is also the lead track on the "Queer Eye For The Straight Guy" soundtrack CD, which was recently released by Capital Records.
If you are interested in attending next year’s gay pride celebration in Madison, WI, you can write and tell the Madison Pride Board members that you want to be put on their email list. The address is Madison Pride, P.O. Box 1403, Madison, WI 53701-1403.