Singer and “artivist" Mykal Kilgore says, in many ways, he feels like he is starting over. Having achieved success on Broadway (Motown The Musical, The Book of Mormon, HAIR!) and television (The Wiz Live!, Jesus Christ Superstar Live In Concert), Kilgore made history in 2021 when he became the first openly queer singer to receive a Grammy nomination for Best Traditional R&B Performance. Now, Kilgore is laser-focused on his budding recording career and “The Man In The Barbershop Tour,” which kicks off in Atlanta on February 3 at Vinyl. 

It feels appropriate that he would begin his 13-city east coast tour in Atlanta now that he’s a new resident. Kilgore’s sit down with The Reckoning was his first matter of business and official welcome to the South after getting settled into his new Atlanta address. Without hesitation, he made it clear why he chose to make Atlanta home. 

“I wanted to be around Black queer folks because the art is for us,” he said. “I want to test out the work and I want people to be able to say, this is what we want, or this is what we need, because sometimes the music may not be exactly what you think you want, but I want to give us the music, the art, the craft, the work that we as a community need.”

Just as he did in the song and visual for “The Man In The Barbershop,” Kilgore’s latest single and follow-up to “Let Me Go,” the Grammy-nominated single from his “A Man Born Black” album, is based on real events.“Barbershop” is a beautiful display of unrequited love in one of the most challenging spaces for Black queer men. The reaction from fans, many of whom, with their own experiences of being Black and queer while navigating the hetero-normative space of the Black barbershop, felt seen and represented in Kilgore’s work. 

“I didn't realize that [Man In The] Barbershop was going to hit the way that it did,” Kilgore says. “I knew that I wanted to tell that story and I knew I was willing to take that risk, but it was so fulfilling to see Black queer folks say, ‘Oh, I felt that same thing. I've had the same experience.’ I'm so glad that I finally have a song that speaks to that.”

Twenty years ago, Kilgore’s success as an openly queer Black man in the music industry, specifically the R&B genre, would have been unimaginable. Today, he is allowed the opportunity to occupy each space he enters as his full authentic self without the fear of his career imploding. And after engaging Kilgore in conversation, one quickly learns that he wouldn’t have it any other way. 

“You cannot have the art without having me,” he says. “And I think there's some kind of activism in that. It's easy to take someone's good parts and leave the stuff you don't want to take. But with me, if you want me, you have to take the Blackness, the queerness, you have to take it all with me. And you have to be able to wrestle with it if you need to wrestle or accept it, but you can't have the art without me,” Kilgore says, adding this core belief as the inspiration for his “artivist” title. “My art is my activism.” 

The Power of Black Queer Mentorship 

With musical influences that span all genres from Donny Hathaway, Bjork, Renée Fleming, to Daryl Coley and Janet Jackson, Kilgore is keenly aware that he stands on the shoulders of other Black queer performers who preceded him, specifically his mentor, Emmy, Tony, and Grammy award-winning artist Billy Porter. 

“I really feel like my success is Billy's success. It's Luther's success. It's Tevin's success,” Kilgore says. “It's all those people who had to do it and play the game, and live in a way that was, I wouldn't say they were living a lie or a secret, but they were just giving a portion of what they were allowed to give or what they could have given. And I'm able to give more because of them.”

Kilgore says it’s because of the love and mentorship he’s received from Porter that he’s been able to blaze a trail of his own. 

“I’m very indebted to him,” Kilgore says. “He snatched me up immediately. He was my first director in New York. He actually told me to move to New York. I owe so much of my career to him professionally because he helped me as I maneuvered, but also because his life has been a lesson in authenticity. The price of authenticity, as well as the benefits of authenticity. You pay to tell the truth. The truth isn’t free.” 

Kilgore tells The Reckoning that he is aware that he is now in the position of being the mentor Porter was for him to the next generation of Black queer artists. 

“There are all these young artists, and I was like, man, I was a kid just five minutes ago,” he says through laughter. “What happened? But now there’s all these kids and they're looking to me. I don't feel the weight in a negative way, but I do feel a responsibility that young people are looking. And I guess that’s what I learned from him [Porter] is that it’s worth it.” 

The Fruit Of Authenticity 

A Lakeland, FL native raised in Orlando, Kilgore’s journey towards the truth-telling authenticity that he revels in today was hard won. 

“I just grew up lying a lot,” he says. “I cultivated a sense that the truth was going to hurt me, so it would be better to just to just lie and make everyone happy.” 

Raised in a church-going Black family, Kilgore says he was largely detached from his family out of fear of “confirming the negative thing they already thought” about the unspoken truth of his sexuality. He vividly recalls being pulled aside by an uncle to address his detachment. 

“I don't know what family you think you're in, but you're in this one, so you're going to have to connect with this family that you're in,” Kilgore recalls his uncle saying. 

“As a family front, we had to present in a certain way and I didn’t want to be the crack in the plaster,” Kilgore says. “I wanted to make sure to keep everything up. I think I was 14 or 15 when I realized I'm the best of us. I make great grades. I speak extremely well. I'm extraordinarily talented. I'm handsome. I'm funny. I'm liked. And I'm never going to be the good kid cause I'm gay. No matter what good I do, I will always be bad because of this.”

Though Kilgore may have felt despondent at the time, he mustered the courage to come out at 16, receiving what he describes as “complete opposite reactions” from his mother who pulled him out of the closet after reading his journal, and the equivalent of a shoulder shrug from an aunt after she learned of his sexuality.

Kilgore recalls his mother asking, “Is this true? That you want to be with a man, lay with a man, sleep with a man?” 

“I said, you have no right reading my journal. And I ran up the stairs… big white girl… flopped on my bed, crying and everything, and we never discussed it again,” he says. 

"And then my aunt was like, ‘What'd you think we're going to do, treat you bad? Okay. Get back in the kitchen.’ We went back to the kitchen and continued cooking. And that was it,” Kilgore says. “Honestly, I just felt like everyone was like, child, we all know you're gay. Everybody else was playing football, and you were jumping rope. We got it.”

Just as many in Kilgore’s family say they knew his truth before he verbalized it, he says they also take credit for predicting he’d be selected as a Grammy nominee.

“Every once in a while I forget and I get introduced, and people are like, ‘Grammy award nominee, Mykal Kilgore.’ And I go, oh my God. That is who I am.”

He’s also a natural-born performer, which is why Kilgore says he can’t wait to kick off his upcoming tour. 

“I’m built to perform. I’m not just built to record some stuff in a studio and then hide. I'm built to get on that stage,” Kilgore says. “I can't wait to get back on tour next month. If you've seen me before, it will not be the same thing that you saw before. It will be something new. And if you've never seen me, it's going to be more than what you expected.”

In a nutshell, Kilgore promises “The Man In The Barbershop Tour,” will be a “real Black-ass time.” 

You can purchase tickets for opening night of “The Man In The Barbershop Tour” in Atlanta here.