Live music is always at the heart of the Nashville Pride Festival, drawing queer acts and allies from Nashville and beyond to several stages during the two-day celebration. This year’s lineup is one of the festival’s best yet, bringing together local favorites like Bully, up-and-comers like The Kentucky Gentlemen and icons like Tanya Tucker for a diverse celebration of all things queer. And while Pride is always a crucial event, this year’s celebration feels particularly essential as the LGBTQ community weathers increasing scrutiny from right-wingers and mounting legislative attacks, like Florida’s controversial “Don’t Say Gay” law and anti-trans legislation here in Tennessee.
Below, the Scene rounds up six acts not to miss on the main Equality Stage at this weekend’s Nashville Pride Festival at Bicentennial Capitol Mall State Park.
The Kentucky Gentlemen
Twin brothers Brandon and Derek Campbell are The Kentucky Gentlemen, an emerging duo with a genre-defying sound, newly settled here in Nashville. Born and raised in Versailles, Ky., the brothers began singing together at an early age, coming back together after separate stints in college and moving to Nashville to craft their own take on R&B-influenced country music. The duo has found a breakout hit in “Whatever You’re Up For,” a clever, hook-laden love song that would liven up any country radio playlist. 12:30 p.m. Saturday
Daisha McBride
Nashville’s hip-hop community has received a lot of well-deserved — and long overdue — attention in recent years, in large part thanks to long-standing local acts like Daisha McBride. McBride is a prolific solo artist and frequent collaborator with fellow locals like Tim Gent and Mike Floss, earning acclaim and attention for tracks like 2020’s “On for the Night,” on which she shows off her singing chops, and her infectious 2019 album WILD. Look for newer tunes in McBride’s set, like this year’s bold, brassy “BUSS IT” and 2021’s icy “Nerve,” the latter off her excellent Let Me Get This Off My Chest. 2:45 p.m. Saturday
Bully
There’s nothing quite like a Bully show, making the punk act’s early-evening set on Saturday a no-brainer. Principal member and songwriter Alicia Bognanno knows how to put on one hell of a performance, commanding the stage with her unrelenting vocals, wailing guitar and seemingly endless well of energy. Bognanno recently announced on Instagram that she’s tracking a new record, so keep an ear out for new tunes as well as cuts from Bully’s most recent LP, 2020’s critically acclaimed Sugaregg. 5:40 p.m. Saturday
Bantug
Bantug is a fixture of Nashville’s pop scene, with the Atlanta-born artist first coming to prominence with 2017’s dreamy Blue EP. Fronted by Amanda Bantug, the band makes soaring, gauzy indie pop — a sound that should go over well with fans of Japanese Breakfast and Best Coast. Look for songs off the band’s most recent full-length LP, 2021’s 12 Songs About Loneliness, which boasts the excellent single “High Worry.” 1:50 p.m. Sunday
Michaela Jaé
Michaela Jaé is perhaps most famous for her role as Blanca Evangelista on FX’s critically acclaimed series Pose, which dramatizes the drag-ball scene of ’80s and ’90s New York. The Golden Globe winner is also a Berklee College of Music-trained vocalist and Broadway performer, as well as an emerging pop star. Jaé’s 2021 single “Something to Say” showed the multihyphenate could helm a pop tune with the best of them; if that track’s disco-tinged arrangement is any indication, Jaé’s set should turn Bicentennial Park into one giant dance floor. 4:30 p.m. Sunday
Tanya Tucker
Country legend Tanya Tucker will close out the festival’s Equality Stage on Sunday evening. A longtime ally of the queer community, Tucker is sure to draw a huge crowd of fans hoping to hear her massive 1972 hit “Delta Dawn” or, more recently, tunes from her Brandi Carlile- and Shooter Jennings-produced, Grammy-winning 2019 LP While I’m Livin’. Entering a triumphant new act of her already-storied career, Tucker is still full of sass and swagger, and her performance should be, too. 6 p.m. Sunday
The Nashville Pride Festival, the city’s queer history, a proposed LGBTQ community center and more
