When Jason King was a kid, his family had a compilation full of disco hits from K-tel records in their music collection. On that tape was the song You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real) from the singer Sylvester. Jason-who is a musician, a nationally recognized journalist, and the Chair of NYU's Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music-didn't know much about Sylvester at the time. In fact, he wasn't even sure if Sylvester's signature falsetto belonged to a man or a woman. But he knew it was his favorite song on the tape.
Sound Barrier host Jason King.
As an adult, Jason's love of this song led him to learn more about Sylvester, an openly gay Black man living in 1970s America who dressed in drag and challenged gender conventions with a fervor few other musicians possessed. Though he wasn't a household name, Sylvester's innovative sound and persona paved the way for countless artists-particularly LGBTQ artists-to express themselves freely. And this is a big reason why Jason's appreciation for Sylvester has made its way into his journalistic and academic work.
This has set the stage for the launch of Sound Barrier, our new documentary podcast hosted by Jason that aims to explore artists who have made pioneering contributions to music and culture. Fittingly, he has turned his focus to Sylvester for season one-exploring not only the singer's life, but also the influence Sylvester has continued to have on BIPOC and LGBTQ artists after his death.
In celebration of Black Music Month and Pride Month, For the Record caught up with Jason to talk about his journey creating Sound Barrier, Sylvester's one-of-a-kind music career, and why Sylvester is more relevant today than ever before.
The description for Sound Barrier labels Sylvester as a musician who is perhaps even more relevant today than in the '70s and '80s. In your eyes, what makes him so relevant right now? Sylvester is someone who was an intersectional figure before intersectionality was a buzzword. He's somebody who was operating at the nexus of being Black and being gay and being femme when those things were still considered stigmas-they still are to some degree. But they were certainly considered stigmas at that time.
He was just unapologetically himself despite incredible pressure from his record label to be more straight and more normative. Every time he met that pressure, he pushed back and he became more himself. And so I think he's instructive to contemporary generations of how to be yourself at all costs.
Are there any particular eras or aspects of Sylvester's life that you've focused on over the course of the season? It covers him chronologically in every aspect, but one thing we take a close look at is his musicianship. I feel like Sylvester is often celebrated for being a cultural icon, which he was, and for being a pioneer around issues of identity. But he did it through the lens of music, and he was a phenomenal musician.
I really wanted to talk about the way his career evolved over the years and to push back against the narrative that Sylvester's best work was in the '70s and everything that came after that was an afterthought. I think his '80s work is some of his most creative work, particularly given that he had an AIDS diagnosis in the late '80s and was still continuing to make really important music.
Sound Barrier features many notable LGBTQ artists who span multiple generations. How did you decide on these featured guests? Well, we knew that we wanted to have scholars who really studied and thought about Sylvester's life. So that includes Joshua Gamson, who wrote the biography of Sylvester, The Fabulous Sylvester.
We knew that we wanted to have his collaborators, his friends, and people who knew him at that time who could testify about who he was: singers like Jeanie Tracy and Martha Wash, as well as Patrick Cowley, who was an innovator with synthesizers. And then we knew that we wanted to also have the younger artists who may not have known Sylvester, who may not be vested connoisseurs necessarily, but who have been touched in some way by Sylvester's music or his spirit.
So I reached out to people whom I felt were in Sylvester's musical genealogy. That included Alex Newell, famous for their work on Broadway and Glee; that included Billy Porter, who I think is very outspoken about how much of a role Sylvester played in Billy's own self-acceptance-before and after he won his Tony award for Kinky Boots; that included the vocalist and rapper Mykki Blanco, who's maybe not directly in Sylvester's vocal tradition but is very much influenced by Sylvester in other ways.
In reporting out season one of Sound Barrier, the team managed to unearth some never-before-heard demos and interviews from Sylvester. How were you able to discover these, and what do they reveal about him? I thought I knew a lot about Sylvester, but I learned a lot through this series about what made him tick, his musical choices, his aesthetic, and the pressures that he faced.
And having heard Sylvester's unreleased early 1970s demos before, I felt like one of the things I could bring to this series was to connect our team to Universal Music Group executive Harry Weinger, who has been in possession of these unheard recordings. They were produced by Rolling Stone founder Jann Wenner, and they're fascinating because they capture Sylvester as a work in progress who was really figuring out who he was and how to be his most authentic self. And he did that in these first recordings.
In one of the demos, he's singing Superstar, which is a song that's incredibly famous because it's a Leon Russell song that was performed by the Carpenters and later by Luther Vandross. Sylvester is doing maybe the first cover of it, but it's ast
Most recent headlines
11/12/2025
Dalet, a leading provider of cloud-native, end-to-end media workflow solutions, ...
28/11/2025
The Professional Fighters League is looking to super-serve fans of mixed martial...
28/11/2025
Fubo has released in beta on select Roku devices a new feature that lets users display up to four simultaneous streams at once....
28/11/2025
The WNBA playoffs and Week 4 of the NFL regular season highlight the list of live sports events airing on television this weekend....
28/11/2025
The 32nd class of honorees to the B+C Hall of Fame took to the stage at New York's Ziegfeld Ballroom on September 26 for a gala induction event. Click below...
28/11/2025
We hold in our hands the very last Next Text for Next TV, the weekly back-and-fo...
28/11/2025
DirecTV said it made a deal with EchoStar to buy EchoStar's video businesses, including satellite-TV provider Dish TV and virtual MVPD Sling TV, for $1 plus...
28/11/2025
The Broadcasting+Cable Hall of Fame, the premier industry event paying tribute to the influencers, innovators and shining lights of broadcast, cable and streami...
27/11/2025
LONDON Vizrt has added several AI-driven advanced features offering improved speed, intelligence and accuracy in the newest version of its media asset managemen...
27/11/2025
Prime Video has launched AI-powered video season recaps in a beta version for select English-language Prime Original series in the U.S., a move Amazon is callin...
27/11/2025
27 Nov 2025
GSMA brings M360 Eurasia 2026 to Samarkand in partnership with VEON...
27/11/2025
Tahar Rahim and Izuka Hoyle star in the gripping six-part Sky Original from Acad...
27/11/2025
Thursday 27 November 2025
Sky Arts Reveals the Nation's Greatest Basslines - and Queen Reign Supreme
The UK's most iconic basslines have been revealed...
27/11/2025
Back to All News
Stranger Things 5': Prepare for One Last Adventure With O...
27/11/2025
The media industry has a paradox at its core. It's an industry built on light, color and imagination, yet behind the scenes, it's powered by one of the ...
27/11/2025
Rating reflects rating progress across areas including policies, diversity & inclusion, health & safety and Net Zero leadership
Winchester, UK, 27 November 202...
27/11/2025
What are the industry standards for Retail Media? Kathryn explains that certification is based on the IAB Europe Retail Media Measurement Standards and the IAB ...
27/11/2025
World champion boxer and Irish sporting icon Katie Taylor will be in studio this...
27/11/2025
Roblox, one of the world's most popular online gaming platforms for primary ...
27/11/2025
Black Friday is leveling up. Get ready to score one of the biggest deals of the season - 50% off the first three months of a new GeForce NOW Ultimate membership...
26/11/2025
SVG Sit-Down: Prime Video EP Mike Muriano Previews Massive Black Friday Slate Fe...
26/11/2025
A cinematic snow sculpture at the 1995 Sundance Film Festival. Photo by Randall Michelson...
26/11/2025
Book podcasts are booming. On Spotify, you'll find everything from celebrity book clubs to deep dives with bestselling authors. And in markets where audiobo...
26/11/2025
Mumbai, November 24, 2025: In a first-of-its-kind initiative, JioStar, in collab...
26/11/2025
LONDON Factual content producer ITN Productions has launched a new low-latency IP gallery for news bulletins....
26/11/2025
MIAMI TelevisaUnivision said it struck a new multiyear distribution agreement with YouTube TV that includes distribution of TelevisaUnivision's U.S. network...
26/11/2025
OpenDrives, Inc., a leader in software-defined data storage and data services, today announced the launch of the Atlas Corporate Creative Solution. This new Atl...
26/11/2025
Disguise, the industry-leading company powering the world's biggest live performances, is partnering with pioneering LED wall manufacturer DVS to give atten...
26/11/2025
HighField AI, the pioneer in agentic and multimodal automation for broadcast and media production, today announced the expansion of its global channel partner n...
26/11/2025
As high-stakes Premier League fixtures approach and additional premium content launches, with MONO positioning themselves to dominate Thailand's sports stre...
26/11/2025
Hosting a wide variety of events from high-intensity NHL games to complex live music concerts and major entertainment productions, Montreal's 21,000 capacit...
26/11/2025
Vizrt, the leader in live production technology revolutionizing viewer engagement and experience, releases AI-driven advances focusing on speed, intelligence, a...
26/11/2025
ITN Productions, an award-winning factual content producer, today launched a new low-latency IP gallery for news bulletins. Responsible for delivering a leading...
26/11/2025
Ikegami reports ongoing advances throughout 2025 in developing and delivering coordinated television production solutions that maximize quality, versatility and...
26/11/2025
Following the Nov. 21 blackout of NBCUniversal channels on Fubo, the two sides have traded barbs about their inability to reach a new carriage deal....
26/11/2025
LONDON As TV sports rights become increasingly important for both broadcasters and streamers, Ampere Analysis predicts global investment in the genre will surpa...
26/11/2025
LOS ANGELES Vubiquity said it has achieved the Amazon Web Services (AWS) Media & Entertainment Competency as part of the AWS Partner Network (APN). This designa...
26/11/2025
WASHINGTON The Federal Communications Commission's Enforcement Bureau said it has entered into a consent decree with Comcast calling for the cable company t...
26/11/2025
Berklee Named to the Hollywood Reporters Top Music Schools List The publication highlights the college's screen scoring program, industry partnerships, and ...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
Animated Series Love Through a Prism' Casts New Light on ...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
NALIP Unveils Fifth Cohort of Director Incubator
Social Impact
26 November 2025
United States
Link copied to clipboard
The National Assoc...
26/11/2025
YouView Achieves Greenly Gold Certification for SustainabilityNov 26, 2025
YouView is proud to announce a Gold Certification award from Greenly for our perform...
26/11/2025
Back to All News
Netflix Deepens Partnership with Taiwan's 62nd Golden Hors...
25/11/2025
Tracy Bonareri Onchoke, an investigative journalist from Kenya is the winner of the Thomson Foundation's Young Journalist Award 2025.
The 26-year-old-sele...
25/11/2025
SVG All-Stars: Blayke Scheer, Senior Director, Creative Content, YES NetworkThe Indiana alum has turned storytelling into an artform for more than two decadesBy...
25/11/2025
Op-Ed: With FCC's C-Band Auction on the Horizon, Broadcasters Need Proven, C...
25/11/2025
Analysis: Is Baller League really the future of sport? By Callum McCarthy, Editor-at-Large
Tuesday, November 25, 2025 - 10:10
Print This Story
With KSI on...
25/11/2025
Platinum Whitepaper: The Growth of Broadcast in the World of Major Large Scale E...
25/11/2025
SVG Summit 2025 Preview: SVG Women's Sports WorkshopBy Samantha Gabay
Tuesday, November 25, 2025 - 10:27 am
Print This Story | Subscribe
Story Highlig...
When Jason King was a kid, his family had a compilation full of disco hits from K-tel records in their music collection. On that tape was the song You Make Me Feel (Mighty Real) from the singer Sylvester. Jason-who is a musician, a nationally recognized journalist, and the Chair of NYU's Clive Davis Institute of Recorded Music-didn't know much about Sylvester at the time. In fact, he wasn't even sure if Sylvester's signature falsetto belonged to a man or a woman. But he knew it was his favorite song on the tape.
