#1
“Coming Out Of Hiding”
Pamala Stanley
Was there a gayer song in the 80’s than “Coming Out Of Hiding?” Not according to my mother.
PICTURE IT: A small town in 1984. A young boy sneaks downstairs one Friday night to watch Night Tracks on TBS, because they featured music videos that were ignored by MTV. He instantly became entranced by a vibrant if confusing video called “Coming Out Of Hiding,” and barely managed to record half of it (the way every kid recorded music on TV and radio in those days, by shoving a tape recorder directly against the speaker).
He knows he must have this song, and begs his mother to take him to Camelot Music at the mall. They don’t have the single for “Coming Out Of Hiding,” but they have something even better, and he ends up purchasing his very first 12 inch record.
Over the next few weeks, he plays it nonstop, even when his sister tells him to “turn that retarded song off,” and oblivious to the signals he was ending his mother by singing “boy I've been watching you, now you’re gonna watch me too” around the house.
Years later, his mother would tell him that one of the clues she had to his eventual coming out was that “damn gay song” he would play over and over.
“Coming Out Of Hiding” is the only song on this countdown that didn’t actually hit the Hot 100, but it spent weeks on the “Bubbling Under” chart, peaking at #104 (and reached #4 on the dance chart).
Here’s the 12 inch version that outed a boy to his mother.
Pamala Stanley had other killer dance songs, including a HI-NRG version of Fleetwood Mac’s “Rhiannon,” “If Looks Could Kill” (later covered by Heart), and “I Don’t Wanna Talk About It.” Here’s the glorious “This Is Hot.”
Pamala continues to perform. Here she is with “Is There A Straight Man In The House?”
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