Pella Felton

The PopCulteer
March 29, 2024

Easter Sunday is also Trans Visibility Day this year, and in advance of that (because hardly anybody reads this blog on Easter), I decided to remind you of that fact today.

I haven’t addressed much in the way of Trans issues here in PopCult because…well…this is not a political blog, and I haven’t really explored the pop culture aspects of Trans culture, at least not yet.

Not being a Trans person, I’m hardly an expert on the issue. All I know is that I have several friends who have, or are, transitioning, and since I love my friends and want them to be happy and healthy, I want to do whatever’s in my power to support them.  I am horrified that the far-right have politicized what is a very serious and delicate personal issue. I am disgusted by the people who, in a most un-Christian manner, attack and villify people who are already vulnerable and in need of sympathy and understanding.

One way I can support my friends is to help boost their visibility on their designated day, and the best way to do that, rather than attempt to be an expert on the subject, is to turn the blog over to someone who is. Below you will read a brief introduction and see a Ted Talk by my friend, Pella Felton, who is a Transwoman, and who coined the term you see at the head of this post:

From Pella Felton

Hi. Many of you reading this post remember me from my days as Patrick Felton, the irrepressible gadfly which haunted Charleston for years with his perverse and often baffling performances and art projects including the podcast “That Conversation” My 1997 performance as Templeton the Rat in “Charlotte’s Web” and various Stand-up Comedy, Film Exhibition, and Theatre events. About 5 years ago, I discovered that I didn’t want to live under the identity I was assigned when I lived in the Kanawha Valley. I discovered that a lot of the things I thought I was and thought I wanted weren’t at all who I was or who I wanted to be. Earlier today, I signed documents to legally change my name to Pella Felton. Pella comes from the Italian “Pellagrina” meaning “pilgrim,” because I’m on a journey.

Because I want to bring as many people on my journey with me as I can, I’m sharing this video of my 2023 TEDx Talk at Bowling Green State University to honor National Week of Trans Visibility and Action. To be visibly trans in 2024 is to be objected and slandered online by people who will never know and understand me. Visibility represents being disowned by humans I used to break bread with on Sunday mornings. However, Visibility is also hope. Visibility is looking in the mirror and recognizing myself. It’s finally feeling in control of my body in a way that I never knew before. This is why I have created Transphilogyny as a term to express my hopes and fears for myself. Cheers. Pella (She/They)

Sunday, please try to see the Trans men and women in your life, and see them as fellow humans, deserving of love and mercy and dignity and respect.

Friday Afternoon On The AIR

Friday at 2 PM on The AIR, Mel Larch devotes her hour of Disco to more club hits of the late 1970s, as MIRRORBALL shines its multicolored spotlight on the songs that were moving butts on the dancefloor and creating a huge club scene.

It’s a short list of long songs designed to make you want to sweat and groove. You’ll get everything from slow, sexy grooves to explosive dancefloor beatfests. Nearly four years in, Mel still finds fresh music from the classic Disco era.

Take an hour and dance like nobody’s looking.

And maybe hope that’s really the case.

Check out the playlist…

MIRRORBALL 096

The Silver Convention “Fly Robin Fly”
B.T. Express “Do It (‘Til You’re Satisfied)”
Cerrone “Love In C Minor”
Sylvia “Pillow Talk”
Barry White “Love Serenade”
King Floyd “Groove Me”
Doris Troy “It’s All In The Game”
The Brothers Johnson “Welcome To The Club”
The Meters “Disco Is The Thing Today”
The Players Association “Turn The Music Up”
Leon Haywood “I Want’a Do Something Freaky To You”

You can hear MIRRORBALL every Friday at 2 PM, with replays throughout the following week Monday at 9 AM and Tuesday at 1 PM and a mini-marathon Saturday nights at 9 PM

At 3 PM we bring you a two-hour salute to the pioneering New Wave band, Ultravox.  In this edition of Sydney’s Big Electric Cat, Sydney presents a mixtape retrospective of Ultravox, in both of their best-known incarnations.

With an exclamation point at the end of their name, the original line-up of Ultravox was John Foxx, Stevie Shears, Chris Cross, Billie Curie and Warren Cann. After three albums that failed to chart  with roughly this line up, front man John Foxx exited for a solo career. Instead of disbanding, as was expected, the group recruited Midge Ure and went on to find commercial success in the 1980s.

While the original version of the band did not figure out how to sell records, they remain one of the most influential bands in New Wave, having blended Krautrock with punk and somehow making it all work. With the addition of Ure in 1980, they became a record-selling behemoth for a short time.

This week Sydney will present music from both incarnations of the band, with the first 45 minutes of the show devoted to the John Foxx lineup, and the remainder bringing you highlights of the band’s output from 1980 to 1984 featuring Midge Ure.

Check out the playlist…

BEC 114

Ultravox

“Dangerous Rhythm”
“Saturday Night In The City of the Dead”
“Wide Boys”
“The Wild, The Beautiful and The Damned”
“Rockwrok”
“Fear In The Western World”
“Hiroshima Mon Amour”
“I Can’t Stay Long”
“Blue Light”
“Some of Them”
“Maximum Accelration”
“Vienna”
“Astrodyne”
“Mr. X”
“Sleepwalk”
“The Voice”
“Rage In Eden”
“The Ascent”
“The Thin Wall”
“Reap The Wild Wind”
“Hymn”
“Visions In Blue”
“When The Scream Subsides”
“White China”
“One Small Day”
“Dancing With Tears In My Eyes”

Sydney’s Big Electric Cat is produced at Haversham Recording Institute in London, and can be heard every Friday at 3 PM, with replays Saturday afternoon,  Monday at 7 AM, Tuesday at 8 PM, Wednesday at Noon and Thursday at 10 AM, exclusively on The AIR. Classic episodes can be heard Sunday morning at 10 AM.

That’s what’s new on The AIR Friday, and that is this week’s PopCulteer. Check back for our regular features every day.