HAPPY BIRTHDAY, STEVIE NICKS!!

You may or may not know it, but Stevie Nicks is an official goddess on earth. I have thus declared. Deal with it. The White Witch of Rock and Roll turns 67 today and I can think of no better reason to celebrate. Stevie has been nailing since the early '70s when she formed a duo with her then boyfriend/musical partner Lindsey Buckingham called Buckingham Nicks (how did they come up with that?) and were quickly snatched up to be a part of Fleetwood Mac. They did all right with them, if I recall correctly. Stevie stepped out on her own in the '80s and charted some classic pop rock tracks that blew my mind and made me want to do pivot turns and wear scarves for L-I-F-E! She's battled drugs, overcome great sadness in her life and put it all down on paper and vinyl to help us through the same things, so you better PRAISE her, y'all!!! Happy birthday, Stevie. Here is some of the Goddess' greatest. Enjoy!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY: COUNTRY LEGEND/LGBT ADVOCATE WILLIE NELSON

Willie Nelson, 82 today, is a legend, not only in country music, but in American culture in general, activism and all around bad-assery. Willie started his music career in the 1950s, writing songs for himself and others, but his major mainstream success came when he decided to start writing and recording "outlaw country" in the mid-70s on such albums as Redheaded Stranger and Wanted! The Outlaws. Nelson forayed into film in the 80s appearing in The Electric Horseman and Honeysuckle Rose, all the while dropping classic country tracks like My Heroes Have Always Been Cowboys, On The Road Again, Always On My Mind and Pancho and Lefty. Willie also crossed over to the pop charts with songs like Good Hearted Woman, the Julio Iglesias duet To All The Girls I've Loved Before, and the perhaps the first LGBT country anthem Cowboys are Frequently, Secretly Found Of Each Other, which was featured on the Brokeback Mountain soundtrack. Willie has been an outspoken advocate for many causes such as the legalization of marijuana and the use of biodiesel fuel, of which he has his own brand made from vegetable oil. Of course the thing that most endears Willie to me is his outspoken support for the LGBT community. Willie is quoted as saying, "It's ridiculous to me that this is something we're having a conversation about in this day and age....I thought it was something that was settled a long time ago. I've known straight and gay people all my life. I can't tell the difference. People are people where I came from." Amen, Willie! He added, "I'd never marry a man I didn't like." HA! There is that Texas sense of humor. So here is a big salute to one of MY heroes, Willie Nelson. Happy birthday, Outlaw! Here are some of his best, including the video for the LGBT anthem Cowboys are Frequently, Secretly Fond of Each Other and my fave Willie song EVER Blue Eyes Crying In The Rain.

BARBRA STREISAND TOPS THE BILLBOARD ALBUM CHARTS FOR SIXTH CONSECUTIVE DECADE!!!

Barbra Streisand doesn't need to do anything, thank you very much. Babs could sit back and polish those exquisite nails with $100 bills all day and still make more money than you. She doesn't feel like it though. She would rather put out an album of duets, called Partners, and crush the competition (namely that douchebag Chris Brown, whose new album X will debut at #2) by hitting #1 on the Billboard 200 album chart for the 10th time in her career selling a whopping 196,000 albums. Streisand now holds the record for posting a #1 album on the chart for SIX CONSECUTIVE DECADES!! What? Yes, her first #1 album, People, was in 1964 followed by 1974's The Way We Were, 1976's A Star Is Born, 1978's Greatest Hits: Vol. 2,  1980's Guilty, 1985's The Broadway Album, 1993's Back To Broadway, 1997's Higher Ground, 2009's Love Is The Answer and now Partners. She is tied for the most #1 albums in third place with Elvis and Bruce Springsteen, only bested by The Beatles, who have 19, and Jay-Z, who has 13. Work, Babs!! You get to hear Barbra call Babyface by his real name and say "Waiting to Exhale" in the most Barbra way imaginable, as if we'd never heard of it before. CLASSIC DIVA!! Here is the trailer for the making of Partners which is now available everywhere!!

REVIEW: BARBRA STREISAND, BACK IN BROOKLYN

OH MY BABS!!!!! Last night I was lucky enough to attend Barbra Streisand's Back to Brooklyn Concert at the Barclays Center with my husband and two of my very besties and witnessed what can only be described as perfection on the concert stage. Sigh... I was, of course, expecting Babs to sound lovely and be her candid self, but I didn't expect THE VOICE!! THE VOICE is still there! Barbra hit every single note you wanted her to hit and then some. She tore through classics like Don't Rain On My Parade and Enough Is Enough, wooed the audience with People, Evergreen and did a Jule Styne medley of songs from Gypsy and Funny Girl that had the crowd on its feet. Hitting the stage in a stunning black sequined Donna Karan (of course) dress and latter changing in the first act to similar pant suit, Barbra looked A-MAH-ZING! This woman is 70 years old and she is still like buttah! The first act had her opening with Andrew Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard stunner As If We Never Said Goodbye, but, in true Babs fashion, the lyrics were re-written for the diva to be about coming back to her home, Brooklyn. The second act started similarly with You're the Top, again about BK, and a cut-down-to-there red dress that proved Barbra's VOICE isn't the only thing still in good shape. The audience ate it up. Her son, Jason Gould, also joined his mother on stage and they sang How Deep Is The Ocean together then he sang a solo, This Masquerade. Turns out the guy can really sing, y'all. It was very touching. Special guests Chris Botti and Il Volo, who sang Smile with Striesand before their solo set, were lovely additions to the night as well, but the spotlight was firmly on Barbra and THE VOICE!! I truly can't get over THE VOICE! When Streisand sang the ending of Somewhere from West Side Story it was like she threw her throat in a time machine and out popped these familiar sounds from yesteryear. I was a little boy in my room listening to Barbra again. Well, THAT'S the gayest thing I've said in a while, and that's saying something. The girl's still got it! Sitting in a seat and seeing Barbra Streisand sing live in concert was surreal and amazing and a night I will never, ever forget. She is a one-of-a-kind legend and there will never be another. I'm still a little verklemmt. Talk amongst yourselves.