Mary Lambert - Macklemore and Ryan Lewis

Once upon a time, there was a Hip Hop duo, whose debut album was a huge success. In one of the songs, they collaborated with a lesbian singer. The song was released as a single - and it became the anthem for the celebration of legalized gay marriage in the US.

Macklemore & Ryan Lewis are an American hip hop duo, formed in 2008, from Seattle, Washington. The duo is composed of Ben Haggerty, a singer who goes by the name of Macklemore, and Ryan Lewis, a record producer, DJ, and professional photographer, who met the former at a photo shoot and they have significantly collaborated ever since.

Their debut studio album, The Heist, was released on October 9, 2012. The album sold 78,000 copies in its first week, debuting at number 2 on the US Billboard 200 chart and at number one on the Billboard Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums and Top Rap Albums charts, while entering the Canadian Albums Chart at number 4. The album received generally positive reviews from critics. On January 26, 2014, it won the Grammy Award for Best Rap Album, where it was also nominated for Album of the Year and earned Macklemore and Ryan Lewis the award for Best New Artist. As of early 2016, the album has sold 1,490,000 copies in the United States.

As for the singles, I won't confuse you with the original release dates, because that's not the way they charted: their first single to enter the US Top 10 was Thrift Shop (featuring Wanz), in mid December 2012. It reached #1 in January 2013 stayed there for 4 weeks.

Then a previous single, Can't Hold Us (featuring Ray Dalton), entered the US Top 10 in early April 2013. It too peaked at #1, and stayed there for 5 weeks.

Same Love entered the US Top 20 at #16 in mid July 2013. It moved up to #14 and then to #11, where it spent a couple of weeks. It then dropped at #12, and then tauntingly returned to #11 for a couple more weeks. It's as if it hit a glass ceiling. The song was nominated at the 56th Annual Grammy Awards for Song of the Year.

The track, featuring vocals by Seattle-based singer Mary Lambert, talks about the issue of gay and lesbian rights and was recorded during the campaign for Washington Referendum 74, which, upon approval in 2012, legalized same-sex marriage in Washington State. The song was also a great hit in Oceania, where it reached #1 in both Australia and New Zealand. It also made #4 in Canada, #6 in the UK and Ireland, #9 in the Czech Republic, #11 in Belgium, #13 in the Netherlands, #19 in Austria, #20 in Italy, and #25 in Germany.

Here are the lyrics:

When I was in the third grade I thought that I was gay,

'Cause I could draw, my uncle was, and I kept my room straight.

I told my mom, tears rushing down my face

She's like "Ben you've loved girls since before pre-k, trippin'."

Yeah, I guess she had a point, didn't she?

Bunch of stereotypes all in my head.

I remember doing the math like, "Yeah, I'm good at little league."

A preconceived idea of what it all meant

For those that liked the same sex

Had the characteristics

The right wing conservatives think it's a decision

And you can be cured with some treatment and religion

Man-made rewiring of a predisposition

Playing God, aw nah here we go

America the brave still fears what we don't know

And "God loves all his children" is somehow forgotten

But we paraphrase a book written thirty-five-hundred years ago

I don't know

If I was gay, I would think hip-hop hates me

Have you read the YouTube comments lately?

"Man, that's gay" gets dropped on the daily

We become so numb to what we're saying

A culture founded from oppression

Yet we don't have acceptance for 'em

Call each other faggots behind the keys of a message board

A word rooted in hate, yet our genre still ignores it

Gay is synonymous with the lesser

It's the same hate that's caused wars from religion

Gender to skin color, the complexion of your pigment

The same fight that led people to walk outs and sit ins

It's human rights for everybody, there is no difference!

Live on and be yourself

When I was at church they taught me something else

If you preach hate at the service those words aren't anointed

That holy water that you soak in has been poisoned

When everyone else is more comfortable remaining voiceless

Rather than fighting for humans that have had their rights stolen

I might not be the same, but that's not important

No freedom 'til we're equal, damn right I support it

We press play, don't press pause

Progress, march on

With the veil over our eyes

We turn our back on the cause

'Til the day that my uncles can be united by law

When kids are walking 'round the hallway plagued by pain in their heart

A world so hateful some would rather die than be who they are

And a certificate on paper isn't gonna solve it all

But it's a damn good place to start

No law is gonna change us

We have to change us

Whatever God you believe in

We come from the same one

Strip away the fear

Underneath it's all the same love

About time that we raised up... sex

And I can't change

Even if I tried

Even if I wanted to

And I can't change

Even if I tried

Even if I wanted to

My love

My love

My love

She keeps me warm

She keeps me warm

She keeps me warm

She keeps me warm

Love is patient

Love is kind

Love is patient

Love is kind

(not crying on Sundays)

Love is patient

(not crying on Sundays)

Love is kind

(I'm not crying on Sundays)

Love is patient

(not crying on Sundays)

Love is kind

(I'm not crying on Sundays)

Love is patient

(not crying on Sundays)

Love is kind

(I'm not crying on Sundays)

Love is patient

Love is kind

And here's the song:

Mary Danielle Lambert (born May 3, 1989, in Seattle, Washington) is an American singer, songwriter and spoken word artist. Before she became well-known for her chorus on their song, she was an aspiring singer-songwriter who worked as a brunch waitress and bartender. Her friend, Hollis Wong-Wear, who has sung on the duo’s White Walls, recommended Mary to Macklemore and Ryan Lewis, who were trying to write a chorus to Same Love.

“Hollis said, ‘Ryan’s going to send you the track. You have two hours,’” Lambert recalls. “I got off the phone and ran across the street to the bar where I worked and told my boss everything. We did a shot, then I sabered a bottle of champagne with a sword. Then I was like, ‘Okay, I’ve gotta fucking write this thing.’ Priorities.”

Lambert's contributions to Same Love draw upon her experiences as "a lesbian growing up in a tumultuous, Christian upbringing." Lambert took the content she created for "Same Love" and used it to develop the song She Keeps Me Warm which she released on July 30, 2013.

Lambert was sexually abused by her father and others as a child, and has described herself as "end[ing] up being a depressed eight-year-old". She was raised as a Pentecostal, but her family was expelled from the church when she was six after her mother came out as lesbian. Lambert later became an Evangelical Christian, attending Mars Hill Church beginning when she was in high school. She struggled for many years to reconcile her Christianity and her sexuality, even after coming out as lesbian at the age of 17. She eventually concluded that homosexuality does not conflict with Christianity, and that condemnation of gay people is antithetical to the Christian message.

She also abused drugs and alcohol before being diagnosed with bipolar disorder. She was hesitant to put her song Sarasvati on her 2013 EP called Welcome to the Age of My Body because she wrote it around the time she attempted suicide at 19. It's a good thing she did include it.

Secrets, the follow up single to She Keeps Me Warm, released in 2014, was an upbeat, optimistic song. Hopefully, it reflects Mary's own peace of mind and inner strength. She's a fighter, and she will prevail.

Her latest single, Hang Out With You, appeared on YouTube just 2 months ago. It's a lovely tune, breezy and self-assured. There'll certainly be more to come from Mary Lambert. We'll be here, applauding, when it does.