GIDEÖN: The Return of "Men Adore" (The Original Bitch House Track)

The Bitch House anthem by Fierce Child (aka Fat Tony) entitled “Men Adore” featuring NYC nightlife icon M.P. aka Michael Patterson was first released back in 1995.

It has just been reissued along with a counterpart double remix pack and is causing a veritable commotion in the clubs.

The original 12” tore up nightclubs both in London and New York back in the mid nineties because it captured and celebrated the burgeoning spirit of queer countercultural resistance in house music in its own raw, unrefined way. Its unapologetic attitude and take-no-prisoners fierceness was single handedly down to the genius of M.P, Fat Tony’s collaborator and vocalist on the track.

It was a landmark release in many ways and Michael’s words subsequently became part of house music’s core DNA from then on in and formed a fundamental part of my understanding of house’s queer political, cultural & philosophical meaning. Out there on dance floor the release helped propagate a broad recognition of the LGBTQ+ communities' role in the development of the genre itself.

Fat Tony, however, was not the only person who spotted the sheer magnificence of Michael Patterson. Eleven years before Fierce Child back in 1984, Jean-Michel Basquiat approached M.P in a New York Nightclub and asked him to model for a painting (now worth upwards of five million dollars). My favourite part of this legend is that M.P failed to show up for the first sitting at the Basquiat studio citing the fact, “he didn't take Basquiat seriously.”

The times, it seems, have changed somewhat significantly. Today, as we are faced with a global far-right resurgence dead set on dismantling the decades of hard fought LGBTQ+ equalities we have come to know, we are faced with the jarring fact that the LGBTQ+ DNA at the heart of house may suffer its attempted erasure.

House music however is no pushover! It will never yield to the re-writing of its own birth story. Anywhere you have real house music you have blackness, queerness and a large helping of get up and fight, anti-fascist attitude. 

The recent renewed interest in queer history and our musical contributions to the house music story has led to fresh interest in early house recordings and their genesis stories, including that of Bitch House.

Bitch House tracks like "Men Adore" did not appear out of nowhere. The phenomenon of promoting and celebrating the queer DNA at the heart of house emerged on labels like E-SA, Tribal and React from around 1992 onwards and helped cement this markedly non-hetrosexal musical tradition in fine style.

My all time favourite Bitch House track is Fierce Men On Wax - Go Girl (Fierce Groove Mix) on E-SA from 1992, but there are so many amazing records out there hidden in the crates. Easy finds for today's diggers come in the form of the genius Kinky Trax compilations on React Records. These complications were a veritable who’s who of LBGTQ+ comrades. Producers like DJ Sneak, Kenny Dope & Louie Vega, Victor Simonelli and Kerri Chandler all despite their straightness paid formidable respect to house’s queer sense of self on these records. Their reverence, palpable on these releases, pay dues to the influence and creative contribution of the LGBTQ+ nightclubs, DJ’s, producers, promoters, door-whores and pickers, club kids, dancers and associated entourage who made house music what it was.

Bitch House immortalises the fact that queerness reigned supreme at the birth of house and I would argue still does today. In my humble opinion the best night clubs on Earth still orbit around our community’s identities, values and character.

As we watch the far-right horror show unfold in real time in the news everyday my parting words are this: We must fearlessly protect and defend the trans and queer voices in house music’s past, present and future. Any attempt by the reigning EDM-tech house bro-mafia currently colonising the mainstream dance music landscape to rewrite the history of house and amend its LGBTQ+ origin story, will be met with fierce resistance. 

Listen to Fat Tony/Fierce Child's Men Adore (The Mixes) EP with remixes from GIDEÖN, Cormac, Cinthie, Catz 'n Dogz and KDA below, or check it out on Beatport.