THEYFRIEND 2024: Limitless Expression
Saturday, November 16, 2024
510 Firehouse
815 Alice St, Oakland, CA 94607
$10 - 25
Limited Pay What You Can tickets
Beats by DJ Chagga Star
Hosted by Mx. Bukuru and featuring Kulfi Jaan, Maya Songbird, Oddity & Kyle Kyle Kyle Kyle Kyle Kyle Kyle
About the Event
Step into a future where boundaries dissolve, creativity reigns, and liberation is a lifestyle.
Hosted by the magnetic Mx. Bukuru (Vancouver) and driven by the cosmic beats of DJ Chagga Star, this daytime celebration at 510 Firehouse in downtown Oakland brings together music, art, and community to explore the limitless possibilities of nonbinary existence and expression. 🌟
With performances from:
✨ Kulfi Jaan
✨ Maya Songbird
✨ Oddity
✨ Kyle Kyle Kyle Kyle Kyle Kyle Kyle
💫 Community Vendors
Browse unique creations from nonbinary artisans, support local makers redefining art, fashion, and culture, and learn more about community organizations offering cirtical services. Interested in participating? Vendor applications are open until November 8.
The future is nonbinary—a space where identity, expression, and community are celebrated without limits. Whether you’re vibing with the music, browsing the goods at the vendor stations, or simply basking in the energy of collective liberation, Limitless Expression invites you to be part of the movement.
Led by 2024 THEYFRIEND Advisor Aïma the Dreamer
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The 510 Firehouse is wheelchair accessible with ADA-accessible all-gender restrooms. The space also has two outside patio spaces. If you need ASL interpretation or ADA accessible seating for this show, please indicate so during the ticketing process no later than November 9th.
To access a map of existing blue accessible parking zones in Oakland, please visit: https://www.oaklandca.gov/resources/find-a-blue-disabled-parking-zone.
If you have questions or would like to contact someone to ensure we can meet your accessibility needs, please email sarah@diamond-wave.org.
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Masking STRONGLY encouraged! Participating artists and staff are COVID tested before the event. KN95 masks provided at the door.
About the Artists
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Chagga Star is an Oakland-based DJ, sonic alchemist, astrologer and natural healer of Tanzanian and German heritage. As DJ, they craft a ritual dance floor, serving club sounds of the African Diaspora. Chagga Star is dedicated to creating safe spaces for BIPOC & LGBTQI community to turn up, wild out, chill out and regulate. This year they had the joy of being invited as resident DJ to Oakland’s iconic queer BIPOC party Soulovely, as well as play The Ever Afters Campout and Burning Man with the BIPOC Beats Collective.
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The name is Mx Bukuru, a melanated, nonbinary, draglesque, fantasy being from your most titillating dreams. With a tight lip sync and loose legs, their performance will leave you bound (and gagged) and begging for more. A member of Enby 6, Vancouver’s best drag show 2023, and Diasporic Dynasty, Mx can be found twirling stages far and wide. A cofounder of Juicy Gems, after choreographing their groups debut at Vancouver International Burlesque Festival (2023) the group made their way to Fatlesque Seattle (2024) and won... Remember it’s: B-U-K-U-R-U and if you don’t know what it means honey, look it up.
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Kulfi Jaan (he/she/they), from the House of Vagistan, is a Desi drag deity and the people’s courtesan. As a courtesan, Kulfi Jaan teaches workshops on decolonizing gender and drag, and their community class “Bollywood is (a) Drag”. Kulfi's recent adventures in Boston have brought him to the Top 3 of the Serve Star! competition, winner of Lucky 13, and opener for Chappell Roan at House of Blues. This singing, dancing, emoting, genderfucking force is thrilled to be bringing the sweetness of life and Bollywood delight to the Bay Area.
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Maya Songbird, flamboyant songstress, born in the historical Castro District of San Francisco, sings of sex, love and living the life regally through every day expression. Creating music that takes you on a journey through whimsical ambient sounds, across hints of house beats and trippy synthesized tunes and lyrics that sing to your soul.
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With vocals as smooth as aged whiskey, Oddity follows in the long-standing tradition of queer jazz expression, while blending in modern elements of hip-hop and neo-soul. As a transfeminine Chinese-American, she manifests a certain yin-yang quality to her sound, embracing the duality of hope and despair, rage and tenderness, revenge and forgiveness. Oddity’s story is one of navigating the smoke and mirrors of false salvation, looking deeply into the abyss of the unknown, and ultimately emerging with a radical self-love and an unrelenting drive to answer the all-important question: what work is there to be done?
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When you're tired of a quotidian reality, deadpan comedic chanteuse KYLE will suck you off into a new world, deeply deranged but with a reassuring internal logic that renders it unforgettable.
KYLE KYLE KYLE KYLE KYLE KYLE KYLE is the creation of tragically American theatre artist Olivia Bratko, often seen performing in San Francisco with The Cockettes, and in Ireland making evening-length work with various collaborators around themes of collective action and the biological necessity of laughing with friends.
To Attend
$10 early bird | $15 online | $20 - 25 at door
Limited Pay What You Can tickets
About the Festival
Now in its fourth year, THEYFRIEND is the world’s first performance festival uplifting, centering, and celebrating nonbinary identity!
This event is supported by the Borealis Philanthropy, the California Arts Council, and the Zellerbach Family Foundation, and is presented in partnership with the 510 Firehouse. Diamond Wave is a fiscally sponsored project of Intersection for the Arts that is supported by Grants for the Arts, the Horizons Foundation, and the San Francisco Foundation.