A Drag Queen’s Album is #1 on the iTunes Christian Music Chart
Flamy Grant's "Bible Belt Baby" soars up charts after TikTok fans support drag queen following right-wing preacher’s criticism.
Last Wednesday, Sean Feucht, a conservative Christian preacher and performer with strong ties to Donald Trump, tweeted that it was the ‘end of days’ in response to a collaboration between singer-songwriter Derek Webb, a former member of the Christian rock group Caedmon’s Call, and the drag queen Flamy Grant on Webb’s new country album.
The two artists collaborated on two songs: “Boys Will Be Girls,” which appears on Webb’s solo album The Jesus Hypothesis, which was released in April, and “Good Day,” which appears on Grant’s album Bible Belt Baby, which was released last October.
The two artitst most recently partnered together last month to film the music video for “Boys Will Be Girls,” which features Grant giving Webb a drag makeover.
Linking to an article that quoted Christian rock artist Plumb praising the artists’ collaboration on “Boys Will Be Girls,” Feucht took to the platform formerly known as Twitter, tweeting: “If you’re wondering the end goal of the deconstruction movement in the church, then look no further than former worship leader @derekwebb’s new collab with a drag queen. These are truly the last days.”
Feucht’s tweet made its way into drag queen Flamy Grant’s Twitter feed, prompting the Christian music artist to reply: “Baby, we’re just getting started,” adding a kiss emoji.
“Well good for us hardly anyone listens or cares what you do. Bad for you is one say you’ll sit before Jesus and give an account for the perversion you tried to force on kids. There’s a verse about a millstone to warn you,” Feucht responded, citing the Gospel of Matthew.
But Grant took the conservative Christian pastor’s taunt as a challenge, hoping to prove Feucht wrong. She turned to TikTok, her preferred social media site, explaining how the preacher had attempted to drag her on Twitter.
In a video, Grant provided background on Feucht, including explaining how he had hosted multiple “massive, unmasked worship services” during the peak of the COVID-19 pandemic and how close the preacher was to the three times-indicted former president Donald Trump. She issued a call to action to her 77,000 followers – which has since grown to 87,000 – asking them to help get “Good Day” onto the Christian Music iTunes charts.
“Go find the last track on my album Bible Belt Baby and stream it a lot,” she said. “I know it’s a long shot, but I am personally tired of Christian music being dominated by guys like Sean Feucht. I think it’s time for a girl like us to crack the charts.”
Her video got over 90,000 views since it was posted on Thursday, and the charts have shifted, thanks to her TikTok followers streaming the hit. As a result, “Good Day” briefly hit the top of the iTunes Christian single chart on July 27, and still remains in the top 50 spots, at 37th overall.
Meanwhile, Grant’s debut album, Bible Belt Baby, began to rise up the iTunes Christian album chart, eventually becoming the No. 1 Christian album in America. The album also peaked at the 48th-highest spot on iTunes’ all-genre album chart last Thursday, and is currently ranked 73rd on the all-genre chart.
Webb, Blake’s co-collaborator on “Good Day,” celebrated Bible Belt Baby’s success.
“Artists like Flamy and I both wait for these moments because there’s really no better press than somebody hating what you’re doing for the right reasons,” he told Rolling Stone.
Webb hopes that the surprise of the song’s growth on the Christian charts will show some music executives that the message is more important than how the person singing chooses to identify.
“I bet there were a lot of Christian music industry executives who woke up Thursday morning and were demanding answers to how in the world a drag queen was at the top of their chart,” he said. “How in the world a drag queen boxed out their artists, who they’ve been spending tens of thousands of dollars on marketing, out of the top spot.”
Grant, who goes by Matthew Blake when out of drag, also spoke to Rolling Stone about what it means to be a Christian music artist and a drag queen with a charting album that was released nearly a year ago.
Blake explained that they wrote “Good Day” in 2016 while they were working at a progressive church in San Diego, before they began doing drag. The song is an exploration of how being queer in the church shifted their way of thinking. Blake was inspired to write the song after meeting in a church basement with other queer Christians who also felt conflicted about balancing their faith with their LGBTQ identity.
“I just kind of blacked out and when I woke up, there were the lyrics in front of me,” Blake said.
While Blake, when they initially issued the challenge to their TikTok followers, acknowledged the possibility that they might fail in getting “Good Day” to land on the iTunes charts, they feel vindicated by their success, which is thanks to the efforts of their loyal fans.
“I interact with trolls and negative people all the time online, but never somebody who has 100,000 followers and is known for being aggressive with some of his stances,” Blake said of Feucht’s taunts. “His point was, no one cares, no one listens to you, you’re a non-entity, you’re not going to make an impact. And just knowing what I know about the queer community and allies, I rolled the dice and placed my bet on that being dramatically wrong. And I think I won.”
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