A pineapple express was reaching its climax when my husband, Aaron, and I entered Stud Country.
As we trotted inside, we slipped on white N95 masks and peeled off our raincoats, revealing wet T-shirts tucked into our respective jeans and cargo pants, cinched with belts that matched our cowboy boots.
This was our usual get-up, but it wasn’t our usual routine. It was just after 8 p.m. on a Thursday (a school night!) and we’d come to Los Globos — home to Stud Country, tonight’s country dance event— to boogie. In my early 20s, I spent many evenings at this club in Los Angeles’ historic Silver Lake neighborhood, dancing at late-night techno-house DJ sets and taking weekday salsa lessons. Tonight, we were here for a beginner’s two-step class.
Aaron and I had gotten married at a courthouse a few weeks earlier, before the Supreme Court could take on a case that might overturn same-sex marriage. (In a rare win, the court declined it. Take the L, Kim Davis!) We wanted to celebrate our marriage with family and friends at a small desert reception in the spring — meaning that we needed to practice for our “first dance.” What could be better than a two-step?
Stud Country is best known for parties featuring classic and ’90s country dances to Western and modern pop songs. Over the last few years, its events have gained popularity across California, continuing LA’s half-century tradition of queer line dancing and LGBTQ+ cowboy culture. (The phenomenon has become bicoastal, reaching to New York City; they sell muscle tees that read “I’m Bi for Stud Country.”)
The dance floor was nearly empty. Then the steely twang of a dobro spilled over the loudspeakers, the lights dropped, a disco ball spun, and we were treated to a handsome two-step by Stud Country co-founder Sean Monaghan and Los Angeles queer country sage Anthony Ivancich. They embraced each other in looping twirls and elegant holds. Like that iconic Western avian dancer, the greater sage grouse, they demanded the room’s attention, though instead of a mating dance on a lek, this was a whir of intergenerational camaraderie.
Stud Country started in 2021 shortly after Oil Can Harry’s, a legendary gay country-
western bar, shut down. (Ivancich danced at Oil Can Harry’s for over 50 years.) Located in Studio City, the venue was one of the oldest queer bars, not only in the LA area but in the entire U.S., operating since 1968, a safe haven for all types of expression over the decades, from disco to leather. It survived the targeted police raids on LA’s queer spaces in the late 1960s and the AIDS crisis that swept the city in the 1980s, becoming a mutual aid hotspot where queer fundraisers ignited and community members showed up for one another. But it did not survive the COVID-19 pandemic.
Today, the building that hosted Oil Can Harry’s — alongside other important LA queer sites like The Black Cat, where some of the first LGBTQ+ protests in the U.S. took place, pre-Stonewall — is listed as a historic-cultural monument by the Los Angeles Conservancy. Stud Country has taken on the queer country mantle by hosting events at venues across the city and now the country. Similar pop-up parties have become more common over the years as rising rents and gentrification shutter LGBTQ+ bars around the country.
“Remembering that the elders that come to Stud Country now literally got arrested for trying to create this culture is remarkable,” Monaghan said in a short Los Angeles Times documentary. “They laid the foundation for what we do now.”
Upstairs at the class, Aaron took the lead and I followed. My right hand held his left, and my left rested on his hip; he laid his right on my shoulder, and we slowly moved counterclockwise around the dance floor with over 20 other dancing pairs. A two-step features two quick steps, followed by two slow steps over a repeating six-count pattern. “Quick, quick, slow, slow!” our instructor shouted over the music. My feet tangled as I worked on the odd rhythm, but when I closed my eyes, we grew as confident as sage grouse. Like all good relationships, pair dancing is built on trust.
My right hand held his left, and my left rested on his hip as we moved counterclockwise around the dance floor.
Two-stepping is a nuanced dance with many local variations, including queer-
specific traditions; one of these is called “shadow dancing,” an intimate variation where partners face the same direction and save no room for Jesus. Our instructor told us that two-stepping was more than a partner dance; it brought people of different age groups together to strengthen bonds in the community. “It’s a way to cross generational divides,” he said.
Just when Aaron and I were flying, our instructor commanded everyone to switch partners. Suddenly I was paired with purple-lipsticked Ariella, then bedazzled-
boots Bri, then crop-top Jorge, as we practiced adding twirls and reverse spins to the basic step. Each partner led in a different way; it was fun being spun by people of different genders and heights as we figured out the new steps together.
Afterward, we walked back to our car in the pouring rain, continuing to move with the beat of the two-step. Quick, quick, slow, slow. I dreamed of our first dance, wondering if we could two-step to The Chicks’ “Cowboy Take Me Away,” the song our friend Taylor sang and strummed at our courthouse ceremony. (No eye was left dry.) For two queer cowboys like us, the song had deep meaning: We blared it on road trips across the Southwest to see desert blooms, cross seas of sage and sleep under sheets of stars, just like the lyrics say.
One thing was for sure: We had our work cut out for us. We needed to oil our weaves and shadow dance in order to do the song justice, especially if we wanted to extend the legacy of our queer ancestors on this dusty desert dance floor.
Confetti Westerns is a column that explores the queer natural and cultural histories of the American Southwest.
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This article appeared in the February 2026 print edition of the magazine with the headline “Shadow dancing.”
