DJ goddess The Blessed Madonna on embracing queerness: ‘I don’t think anybody’s binary’

When The Blessed Madonna writes her memoirs, there will be a heated bidding war. Her remarkable life story — so far, because she’s only getting started — takes in more than 30 years of club culture in Chicago, Berlin, London and beyond. Born Marea Stamper in Louisville, Kentucky, she began attending underground raves in the early 90s and rose to international prominence as a DJ-producer two decades later. And now, she’s the winner of the Music Award at this year’s Virgin Atlantic Attitude Awards, powered by Jaguar

Having honed her songwriting skills during lockdown, she’s preparing to release Godspeed, a dazzling debut album that features transcendent, club- ready collaborations with Kylie Minogue, Gabriels frontman Jacob Lusk, and cult pop artist Uffie, as well ‘Happier’, her recent smash featuring rising star Clementine Douglas. “I knew my first album had to be two things — an expansive history of the world in terms of dance music and [a record] that has the intimacy and risk that I feel is lacking elsewhere,” says Stamper.

Few would deny that Stamper has earned the right to share her views on contemporary club music. The DJ, producer and musician who was previously known as The Black Madonna — more on this later — has done just about everything in the dance world: from selling bootleg mixtapes as a “dirty shithead raver” to DJing at the world’s greatest nightclub, Berghain in Berlin, and overseeing Dua Lipa’s 2020 remix album Club Future Nostalgia. The following year, her hit collaboration with fellow DJ-producer Fred again.., ‘Marea (We’ve Lost Dancing)’, beautifully captured the sense of spiritual bereavement felt by the clubbing community during the pandemic. “If I can live through this next six months / What comes next will be marvellous,” Stamper reassures us hopefully over a deep house beat.

In person, her free-flowing conversation can disarm you with its sheer candour and cast of fascinating characters. One minute she’s recalling the first time she had her photo taken professionally — by Turner Prize- winner and this year’s Attitude Pride Award-winner Wolfgang Tillmans, no less; the next, she’s remembering her “butch” late grandmother.

Stamper begins the interview by sweetly complimenting my Keith Haring sweater, before disclosing that she has recently been “very ill”. Just three days before her cover shoot for this issue, she underwent keyhole surgery to remove a benign tumour “the size of a plum” from her cervix. Stamper says she’s still feeling “a little bit sore”, but adds brightly, “I’m not feeling badly at all — I’ve got my life force back.”

We’re sitting in a cute, music-themed café in King’s Cross that has inexplicably run out of food, so Stamper is sipping on a milkshake while she waits for Uber to deliver a late lunch. She says she knew something was wrong in her body “for years”, but her GP initially dismissed her tiredness as a sign of perimenopause — Stamper is 46. But in August, her symptoms got worse, and she had to cut short a festival set when she realised she was about to collapse. A week ago, she was “rushed to hospital” with severe anaemia. “Finally, a doctor figured it out — they found this tumour that was causing internal bleeding,” she says. Stamper stayed awake while it was taken out — “I’m not weird about that stuff like that!” — and is grateful to feel her energy levels returning to normal. “I really don’t like to not work,” she says matter-of-factly.

Stamper says she’s particularly thrilled to win The Music Award at this year’s Virgin Atlantic Attitude Awards, powered by Jaguar, because it reaffirms her queerness as well as her impact on club culture. “It makes me feel good because [though] I am married to a man, I’m not straight. I’ve had boyfriends, girlfriends, boyfriends that were trans,” she says. Does she find that some people overlook her queerness because of her marriage? “Oh, 100 per cent. And I think if I was a man and people knew that I had been sleeping with other men, nobody would be confused about it — any man that’s ever taken a dick in his whole life, it goes on his permanent record.” We both laugh wryly. “But for women,” she continues, “it gets filed under some sort of weird bisexual experimentation [trope]. And I’m like, ‘That is not what this is.’”

This lightning-bolt moment was both exciting and terrifying. “I was so ashamed because I was going to try to get married [to a man] and be a good girl — you’ve never seen anyone clear their browser history faster,” she says. “I mean, the shame was so deep. This was in the era of Will & Grace, when even gay people were terrible about trans people.” Stamper, who has lived in London since 2017, pauses to correct herself. “There’s still a lot of real nasty anti-trans behaviour from the gays,” she says. “Over here [in the UK], you’ve got some special single- batch anti-trans shit.”

She believes her internal shame also stemmed from her family’s “complex” history with queerness. “I wanted to be a good girl because my dad’s mum was a lesbian,” she explains. “She was married her whole life to his dad, but she had girlfriends and even exchanged rings with [a woman]. She was institutionalised for it and underwent terrible experimental psychiatry.” When Stamper’s grandmother died, they found a heartbreaking memento of the life she probably wanted to lead: a scrapbook filled with pictures of k.d. lang, Melissa Etheridge and other out gay women. “She actually died from the cancer you get from, you know, eating box,” Stamper adds. “She was one of our strongest soldiers. I always say she went down in a blaze of glory and took one for the team.”

This is an excerpt from an interview in the Attitude Awards issue 2024. To read the full interview, order your copy now or check out the Attitude app. The Blessed Madonna releases her debut album God Speed, on 11 October 2024.

Photography Tom Johnson Creative director Joseph Kocharian Styling Deborah Latouche Hair and makeup Emily Tongue at ES Agency London