Let’s be real: rock and roll has never been about playing nice. It’s always fed on rebellion—about destroying rules, turning up the volume on voices that refuse to shut up, and creating space for the outsiders. And although history books are fond of highlighting leather-jacketed guys with guitars, the actual heartbeat of rock has always been queer, feminist, and unapologetically bold. Women, queer musicians, and Black trailblazers didn’t just play a part in rock—they made it. So, crank up the volume and get ready: here are 10 anthems and icons that confirm rock’s strongest heartbeats belong to those who shattered barriers while making music history.
10. Billie Eilish – Lunch
Billie’s not only chart-topping—she’s proudly claiming her desires. Lunch fell like a lightning bolt, delivering lyrics regarding queer desire so raw and celebratory that the fans simply couldn’t shut up. It’s saucy, raw, and unashamedly sapphic. With this song, Billie gave women-loving-women everywhere the anthem they’ve been longing for, and made it impossible to overlook.
9 . Boygenius – Not Strong Enough
What do you have when you put Julien Baker, Phoebe Bridgers, and Lucy Dacus together in a supergroup? A queer indie powerhouse. Not Strong Enough mingles anguished vulnerability with sweeping harmonies, providing the ideal soundtrack for road trips, breakups, and introspection. It’s indie rock at its most intimate—infused with the sort of queer insight that strikes straight to the core.
8. Against Me! – True Trans Soul Rebel
When Laura Jane Grace declared herself trans, punk gained one of its strongest truth-tellers. True Trans Soul Rebel isn’t a song—it’s a battle cry. Brutal, defiant, and extremely personal, it became an anthem for trans children and punks around the world who needed affirmation that their voices belonged on stage as well.
7. Tracy Chapman – Fast Car
Tracy Chapman’s ghostly Fast Car has always had themes of escape and yearning—but for queer fans, its power goes deeper. Chapman’s personal life, combined with her heart-tormented, gender-bending vocals, made the song a low-key queer classic about fantasizing about something more open, something more free. Even after decades, it still sounds like a promise moaned through the speakers.
6. Bikini Kill – Rebel Girl
If you’ve ever screamed Rebel Girl in a hot, sweaty mass of people, you understand its naked intensity. Kathleen Hanna’s punk anthem of feminist power was both a love song to queers and a call to solidarity. With such lyrics as tasting revolution on a kiss, it’s both a punk manifesto and queer party. Riot grrrl was never a scene—it was a revolution, and this was its soundtrack.
5. Indigo Girls – Closer to Fine
Well before Barbie brought it back to the mainstream, Closer to Fine was a lesbian sing-along anthem at campfires, road trips, and karaoke nights. The Indigo Girls’ harmonies created a safe, celebratory space in folk-rock for queer identity, and their music still resonates through communities founded on self-discovery and chosen family.
4. Hayley Kiyoko ft. Kehlani – What I Need
They don’t nickname her “Lesbian Jesus” for nothing. Hayley Kiyoko’s collaboration with Kehlani is not just a bop—it’an an unapologetic affirmation of queer love in plain speech. The video, where the two share a kiss, was a seismic event when it comes to representation in mainstream pop. It’s visibility that rings loud and clear: love between women can take the main stage.
3. Brandi Carlile – The Joke
With a voice that can move mountains, Brandi Carlile sang one of the most powerful queer anthems of the decade. The Joke is for all outsiders who’ve ever been dismissed or underestimated, a soaring reassurance that the world is larger than its judgy little mind. Carlile’s Grammy-winning ballad cemented her status as a queer icon of Americana and beyond.
2. Sister Rosetta Tharpe – The Godmother of Rock
And before Elvis or Chuck Berry, there was Sister Rosetta Tharpe, who was blending gospel and electric guitar and creating what we today refer to as rock and roll. A queer Black woman of the 1930s and 40s, she tore up riffs with distortion that would make generations to follow green with envy. She is the basis upon which rock stands—and yet she remains criminally under-credited. Rock history simply doesn’t exist without her.
1. Beyoncé – Ya Ya and Rock’s Reclamation
With Cowboy Carter, Beyoncé didn’t so much dabble in rock—she reappropriated it. On Ya Ya, she reaffirms that Black artists were the genesis of the genre, name-dropping Sister Rosetta Tharpe while incorporating nods to Elvis, The Beach Boys, and beyond. It’s not nostalgia—it’s reclamation. Beyoncé isn’t seeking approval; she’s updating the script, installing Black origins where they rightly belong: at the forefront of the story of rock.
From Rosetta Tharpe’s guitar licks to Beyoncé’s unapologetic reclamation, these songs and artists prove that rock’s fiercest edge has always been queer, feminist, and radical. So whether you’re screaming Rebel Girl in a mosh pit, harmonizing Closer to Fine at a bonfire, or blasting Ya Ya on repeat, remember: the revolution didn’t just start with rock and roll—it is rock and roll.