If you thought that YMCA by Village People was a gay anthem, think again. According to Victor Willis, who wrote the lyrics, the famous song is entirely heterosexual – and anyone suggesting something to the contrary should “get their minds out of the gutter”.
“Come January 2025,” Willis added on Facebook, “my wife will start suing each and every news organisation that falsely refers to YMCA, either in their headlines or alluded to in the base of the story, that YMCA is somehow a gay anthem because such notion is based solely on the song’s lyrics alluding to elicit [sic] activity for which it does not.”
YMCA appeared on Village People’s third album, Cruisin’. It was an international smash hit, getting to No 1 in 17 countries on its release in October 1978. A much-loved staple at sports events, wedding receptions and student discos, it has sold 12m copies. In 2020 it was preserved for posterity by the National Recording Registry of the US Library of Congress as “culturally, historically or aesthetically significant”, and inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.
That same year, Donald Trump started playing it at rallies, and has done so consistently ever since, often dancing to it and another Village People hit, Macho Man. While most musicians have reacted with horror to Trump using their songs, Willis says that YMCA has “greatly benefited”.
Willis said on Facebook: “The financial benefits have been great … YMCA is estimated to gross several million dollars since the President Elect’s continued use of the song. Therefore, I’m glad I allowed the President Elect’s continued use of YMCA. And I thank him for choosing to use my song.”
It had previously been assumed that the lyrics of YMCA advised young men who were new to a big city to head to the eponymous men’s hostel and gym, where they might find likeminded friends in the communal showers. However, Willis wrote that the line “You can hang out with all the boys” is “simply 1970s Black slang for Black guys hanging out together for sports, gambling or whatever. There’s nothing gay about that.”
It is, however, undeniable that the Village People were put together in order to appeal to the burgeoning gay market as disco swept America in the late 70s. Their name comes from Greenwich Village, at that point New York’s most vibrant gay neighbourhood. In 1977, the French disco songwriter Jacques Morali made an album called Village People, on which Willis was the singer.
When it was a hit, Morali, who died of Aids in 1991, recruited the band in New York gay clubs and via an ad which read: “Macho Types Wanted: Must Dance And Have A Moustache.” He dressed them as fantasy gay male archetypes including a cowboy, leather man, cop, Native American and construction worker.
However, they rapidly crossed over to a mainstream audience. In 1979, the US Navy considered using their song In the Navy for a TV recruitment drive, and to this day another tune, Go West, is sung by Arsenal fans, the lyrics changed to “one nil to the Arsenal”.
Perhaps all three Village People hits have returned to their heterosexual roots - although Willis added: “I don’t mind that gays think of YMCA as their anthem.”
