This performer is keeping it tight and granting all our wishes on both drag and live music stages… Aladdin Firm! [Cover photo: Desireé Moonshine]
Thotyssey: Aladdin, hello! Happy Month’s End! You’ve had an interesting July I see… a few weeks ago, your band Space Station NYC performed at the Luna Bella Festival at 3 Dollar Bill! How did that go?
Hello! Hope you’ve been having a great summer! Yes, July has been a surprising adventure! Alex Julia and The Misfit Mime reached out to us about playing the show, and we couldn’t have been happier to be there. It was our first show in Brooklyn again since our first album release party in June of 2021. Since then, we’ve done one small tour around New England and mostly play as resident artists at Moonlight Market on Long Island, so it was really nice to be back in the boroughs. I personally had only ever performed at 3DB for drag–but wow, what a great venue for live music! All of the other performers were absolutely spectacular, and the audience had such a great vibe. I was amazed at how much people really seemed to rock with The Space Station!
While we’re on the subject of the band, can you tell us a bit about The Space Station’s sound, and how you all came together?
Initially, it started as a project between my fiancé Eddy Crash and his long-time friend and creative partner Master Computer. They began The Space Station during the pandemic as a podcast, actually! They would interview other artists and creators, report on current events, and write and release music. Around fall of 2020, Eddy and I connected online as I was doing bedroom drag, and he and Master Computer were releasing a single to raise money for the Audre Lorde Project. I was invited to work on a song with them as a feature, but we got along so well that they asked me to join the band! The song we ended up writing together is named “Aladdin Firm,” after yours truly.
The three of us have wildly eclectic music tastes, which I think keeps things really exciting. I would describe our sound as being somewhere between alternative rock, alternative hip-hop, and alternative pop music… very much a mishmash of queer, neurodivergent, spacepunk fantasy!
We also just acquired a new band mate, Ter0byte! We are set to start working on our next album at the end of this summer, and I’ll be really interested to see what elements he brings to the table.
How about your own self: where are you from originally, and were music and performance always a part of your life?
Aladdin is from Mars! And he definitely has lore… but the person underneath the makeup is from Dearborn, Michigan–a suburb that shares a border with Detroit. Both of my parents are creatives who have eclectic musical tastes as well, and my mother is also an extremely talented singer and musician. I grew up surrounded by music of varying genres, always!
I’ve been performing since I was about three, doing piano and dance lessons and recitals. I was a competitive dancer for much of my adolescence, but moved on at the age of 14 to join a pre-professional dance company called The Detroit Tap Repertory, which still exists to this day! During my teen years, I had the pleasure of studying with some of the greatest names and living legends within the tap community, learning so much about the history of the art form, jazz music, hip hop, vaudeville, Broadway, television, Hollywood, the breaking of color barriers within the entertainment industry, and just great life lessons in general.
At 17 I became a mentee of the late Professor Robert L. Reed, who sadly passed in July of 2015. He was the protégé of Maceo Anderson of The Four Step Brothers, and was a patriarch, if you will, of the community—a walking encyclopedia of the history of tap dance. He had the greatest impact on my life as a performer and musician, and I miss him in ways I can’t even begin to express.
During high school and some of early college, I did musical theatre, and was a member of four choirs and a vocal jazz ensemble. I just wanted to always be singing. I was the lead in my high school’s production of Bye Bye, Birdie my senior year, and competed in the Michigan High School Musical Theatre Awards. In 2016, I moved to NYC to attend The American Academy of Dramatic Arts—the nation’s oldest acting academy—and graduated in 2018. Since then, I’ve been a member of a dance company known as #Taplife, attended the New York School of Burlesque, and now… all of this! The theater-kid-to-drag-king pipeline is so real!
Tell us about your drag… what motivated you to explore that, and how might you describe Aladdin today as a performer?
In late 2019, by chance, I went with my friends from #Taplife to see a show at The Slipper Room, and in the lineup was a performer named Freddie Love, who is also an actor and opera singer. I was fascinated by how well they paid homage to the iconic Freddie Mercury through their looks and performance, but still let their own personality and niche skills shine through. During their act, my friend turned to me and said, “You would be really good at this.”
My very supportive mother bought me a six-week class package that culminated in a performance through Jo Weldon’s New York School of Burlesque—and using Freddie as inspiration, Aladdin Firm was born as my personal tribute to David Bowie (and was named Aladdin Firm as a play on his 1973 album Aladdin Sane). Shortly after this first performance, I escaped an emotionally abusive relationship…and the pandemic hit.
Throughout the pandemic, I made many, many, attempts at bedroom drag; I was trying to invent this character as I reinvented myself. I had made myself so small because of this abusive relationship, and truly didn’t know who I was anymore. I was a shell of my former self. Aladdin was born out of a need for catharsis, self-expression, and growth after wasting away for so long. Aladdin’s a Martian, which is definitely an on-the-nose allegory for feeling out of place, unusual, for being queer, and feeling misunderstood—all things that I still struggle with. But through doing this bedroom drag on TikTok, I ended up connecting with Eddy Crash and The Space Station. And the rest, as they say, is history!
I’d say my drag started as a tribute to 70s glam and retro pastiche, but has grown into the club kid from space you see today! I draw lots of inspiration from Vaudeville, Old Hollywood, glam rock, sci-fi, fantasy, and lots of countercultural genres and movements like punk, new wave, goth, metal, hardcore, cyberpunk, the club kid scene, and more.
Have you had a favorite performance yet on the drag stage, or even a favorite backstage moment?
I’d have to say that one of my favorite performances on the drag stage was presenting my pageant package at “Fresh Face of Drag 2022″ in Asbury Park, NJ. The “Fresh Face” pageant is a 6-month mentorship program for drag newcomers that culminates in a competition. At the time, I was unemployed and doing drag to stay afloat, and Eddy and I were living in a horrible apartment that we’re fairly certain was an illegal apartment. Anway! I had practically nothing to put my package together, and was gifted with enough money to buy all of my materials by a generous friend of mine at the last minute. I was still rhinestoning one of my costumes in the dressing room just hours before the pageant began! But I went on stage and sold the hell out of what I brought, and won the title as the first and only drag king to compete. I made so many incredible friends through that process, and now get to act as a mentor to the new contestants each year. It was truly so rewarding in so many ways.
You have what looks like a fun show coming up on August 9th at Culture Lab LIC, where you, host Majesty Jekyll and a cool cast of drag folks will be paying homage to some great retro musicals.
I’m so excited for Theater Camp at Culture Lab! The last show I did with them was their CATS show, which was an absolute blast. This next show is called “Summer Nights,” which will be drag tributes to some of your favorite songs from Grease, Footloose, and Hairspray! You can expect to see (and hear) live singing, dancing, draglesque… and if I’m not mistaken, a standup comedy set. I’m hoping to sing and dance to something fun from Hairspray, but don’t wanna give too much away! The cast is stacked, there are a couple of my favorite performers sprinkled in, as well as some people I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting yet. Theater Camp always has impeccable casting choices mixed with such high-energy music, so this is bound to be a good time! If you’re planning to come see it, put on your dancin’ shoes!
What else is coming up for you?
The next big thing for me and for The Space Station is Moonlight Market at Great South Bay Brewery on Long Island on October 5th. Moonlight Market is an oddities and artisans festival that Eddy and I have the pleasure of being the entertainment directors for. There’s something for everyone: beautiful and bizarre handmade wares, nerdy stuff and collectibles, great drinks, food trucks, live bands, burlesque, and drag!
But if you can’t make it out to Long Island, The Space Station is also gearing up to do a show at Arlene’s Grocery on November 10… more details to come very, very soon. More information can be found on our page. We’re also starting to talk about potentially going on a small tour with another incredible artist, so please stay tuned for that! Big things are happening!
Lastly: we have a new Drag Race All-Star: Angeria Paris VanMichaels! While she’s beloved, there is some controversy with the choice! If you’ve been watching the season, any thoughts?
I hate to admit… I watched some of Drag Race when I was in early college, but don’t keep up with it much anymore. My current (and only) Drag Race controversial opinion is that I think Sapphira Cristal deserved to win Season 16, but I’m biased because I’ve gotten to meet her a few times and work with her once through Paradise in Asbury Park. She is just as sweet and talented in real life as she was on TV. But unfortunately, that’s kinda where my knowledge ends!
That’s a good thing to know, though! Thanks, Aladdin!
Check Thotyssey’s calendar for Aladdin Firm’s upcoming appearances, and follow them on Instagram and Twitter. Also follow their band Space Station NYC on Instagram and their site.
Thotyssey 