Get your Phreak on at the Phreak N’ Queer Music and Arts Festival

Messapotamia Lefae will perform in the Phreak N’ Knnnky cabaret.
Credit: Tara Lessard

You’re never know what you’re going to get at the city’s annual Phreak N’ Queer Music and Arts Festival. But chances are it’s going to be something that you aren’t seeing anywhere else.

Take, for instance, the fest’s Phreak N’ Knnnky cabaret Friday XO Lounge on South Street. Wurli and His Ragtag Vintage Orchestra, Brooks Banker, Lance Pawling and more are set to perform.
“It’s a little naughtier than other cabarets,” says festival co-organizer Kate Gormley.

So what makes it more naughty than nice?

“Some of the organizers are playing their cards close to their chest,” Gormley says. “I can’t tell you. I’m not in on all of their secrets.”

But there’s a serious side to the fun at the third annual Phreak N’ Queer fest. The event, which takes place at several Philly locales Thursday through Sunday, safe and accepting spaces where queer and transgender artists and friends can, well, get their Phreak on.

“We provide spaces so that performer can really take some risks and try something new and know he or she will be supported in whatever they’ll be doing,” Gormley said. “We see people trying out different themes and then there will be different collaborations between artists, which makes for an interesting show.”

“They know the audiences will support the risks they’re taking and they don’t have to play it down or dumb it down to play to a certain crowd or follow a script,” she adds.

More than 50 musicians, visual artists, spoken word poets and others are slated to perform. Festivities kick off with Trash Landing, the opening party, Thursday night at the Rotunda in University City. The Homo Rama music night — featuring everything from punk, to hip-hop, to electro — happens at MilkBoy on 11th and Chestnut on Saturday, and the newly revamped Dolphin Tavern will host the closing party Sunday, with DJ Robert Drake spinning.

All are invited, Phreaky or not.

“Whoever you are, you are welcome to come,” says co-organizer Sara Sherr. “You don’t have to be LGBT. You’re going to hear something you’ve never heard before.”

Phreak N’ Queer Music and Arts Festival
Aug. 1-4
Various locations
Prices vary
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