The Gay Book

So anyone who has followed this blog from the start (all 4 of you), knows that originally it was expo-ing a book in which I would paste my male-focused straight porn into when I was a closeted teen. The point being that so I could kind of jerk of to pictures of guys without feeling like so much of a fag.
Obviously this is something I've gotten over. Somewhere in the interim between masturbating to pictures of hottish guys fucking girls and writing a blog about a gay porn there came "the gay book".
The main difference between the two "projects" is that
A) I knew I was gay and was relatively comfortable about it when I did my second cut and paste project.
B) I had developed my "gay sensibility" enough to not use "Post-it"s and masking tape to hold my craft together.

This version of my insanity was conceived and realized during a bizarre weekend where I was stranded in Illinois.
I had to go to central Illinois for a grad school interview and there was one of those completely inexplicable travel restrictions that reduced the fare by 500$ if I stayed over a Saturday night, even though the interview was on a Thursday.
So I had this completely unreasonable amount of downtime in a weird boring city (which btw I would ultimately spend 4 years in). So my solution to deal with that downtime was to bring along several bottles of Rush and a bunch of porn mags to try and condense them into a volume I could hide in plain sight.
My volume of choice was this issue of Muscle and Fitness:

It's no secret that muscle mags have a homoerotic aspect, particularly if you lean towards brawny types like I do. When no real porn was available, I've gone there. So it seemed like a logical medium to work with.
The "spreads" that I came up with were hybrids of the porn and the muscleheads already in the magazine. I think I did okay aesthetically considering how much beer and poppers I consumed during my odd Illinois bender.

The first two pages were this ad for some weight loss pill:

And the lovely Steve Kelso, from a Colt ad:

Not too different huh?

More to come....

The Book, page 1, Steve Drake

When I was a budding gay in high school (and not quite sure how to deal with the fact that I was a budding gay), I would scour straight porn for hot guys. Anyone who tried this in the early 90's knows that there were very few hot guys in straight porn, so it really was a time intensive labor of love in the pre-internet days. It mostly involved a lot of disappointing late night purchases from magazine stands and porno shops. So, rather than keep bundles of disjointed pornography under my bed that would surely be discovered by my snooping mother, my solution was to take the hottest images I could find, then paste, tape or staple them rather amateurishly inside a book that I thought my parents would never open. It was a book called "Gods and Goddesses" from a Time/Life series called "The Enchanted World". Not only was it unlikely to be nabbed off the shelves, but in my teenage mind thought the choice was a little funny in a tongue in cheek sort of way (I was 16...give me some leeway). In some of the scans you can see tidbits of book in the margins. The bit of prose captured are often nearly as apropos/comical as the ridiculous porn type that accompanies the photos. The beginning of this blog will be a trip through this book, which I have always wanted to preserve for the insight it gives into my horny pre-gay teenage mind. The blurry focus is clearly on the guys, but I must warn you, there is some vaj.

Page 1

Steve Drake is the guy with the stache, and he was one on my favs. His Magnum PI-type looks really got me going. I stumbled on a detailed site dedicated to him recently that I would have killed for when I was younger. Kids today have it so easy. Much more on Steve to come.

Franco Arbruzzi in Honcho

If you could only see the magazine that this spread came from. Its from 1979, and to say its falling apart is being kind. With every turn of a page something else rips or falls out. It's an absolute goldmine of quality vintage porno too; it should be in a museum. If it were an example of another type of art it would be in a dark room handled by elderly esthetes wearing white gloves and using tweezers to turn the pages. Instead its only hope for preservation is half drunk me, mayonnaise dripping down my chin, considering using it as a coaster for my beer. The world is doomed.

Franco Arbruzzi also made an appearance in what I have referred to as The Gay Book in previous posts.

You can tell by the way I 'carefully' cut him out of "The Hairy Chested Male" that I should be no curator.  (If you're wondering who the other guy is, he just happened to be on the opposing page of the book, so I included him).

For your viewing pleasure, more Franco:

The Gay Book Part 2, more Steve Kelso

As I continued to mangle my old Colt magazines and paste them into my new book, my fascination with Steve Kelso would become apparent to any casual observer. I once described him as looking like a Hungarian plumber to a friend, but believe me I mean that as a compliment. He's masculine, hairy, not too pretty, not too big and has that butch eagle tattoo. Once upon a time he had a website called "Hairway to Steven", but it's long since defunct. And Steve, I'm still waiting for that T-shirt I ordered in 1999...

The next two pages weren't as pretty Feng Shui wise as the first but with all that Steve you can't really go wrong.

The book, page 11, Jerry Butler and "Channel J"

Even for me this page lacked some finesse. The clear use of staples and I believe "post-its" to attach the pictures could have been improved on from an artistic standpoint. The pictures are all kind of hoo-hum too. Clockwise from the top left the boys are Jerry Butler, Randy West, Cal Jammer and Sean Michaels. Everyone has other appearances in the book, but Jerry Butler deserves some honorable mention for his historical value.

First I'm going to *gasp* break with format skip ahead to show you a larger picture of him from later in the book:



Not a particularly breathtaking guy, but he had a husky, daddy thing going that hit the right spot.

Anyhow, in New York City in the 80's at the dawn of cable TV, the channels above 13 were given letter denominations (MTV was "G" etc.). Channel J was community access, but after 11 pm they showed adult content. All pre-teen boys knew about this quickly, and many a sleepover featured viewings. Its was mostly boring: Naked talk shows, "The Robin Byrd Show", phone sex ads ("970-PEEE...add an extra E for extra pee!") and ads for escort agencies like "Geisha to Go" were their standard fare. Between this unending boring content there where occasional snippets of porn movies to keep you interested. The clips were less than 3 minutes I would say, but through deft use of our VCR, I managed to capture Jerry Butler doing a girl doggie style in a field for about 60 seconds. That grainy, crappy mini scene was the first porn I ever really owned, so Jerry has a space in my heart.

He has an autobiography called "Raw Talent", but it was pretty self congratulatory and I admit I never finished it.

Channel J also showed gay content on Friday nights after midnight. I swear I wasn't looking for it, but one night I happened upon the moment that "made me gay". The scene I stumbled on was two guys in a dorm room talking about girls. They were drinking beer in cut off sweat pants, shirtless, so I suppose I should have seen it coming, but when one guy suggests that its okay for men to "use each other" when girls aren't around and promptly begin to blow the other one, I was shocked. I scrambled to change the channel immediately but it was too late. The hard-on in my pants was all the proof really needed that another fag had been born.

The book, Peter North

Peter North aka Matt Ramsey is back in this one, clearly pretending he's the one getting fucked.
Actually I have no doubt that Mr. North is straight. Its just a fact that men make more money in gay porn, so I get it. I wish he'd stayed with Falcon a little longer though. Not even because I loved his old gay porn...I just wish I could dig up more gay shit for comparison now. According to wikipedia he's been in 1,700+ films and only a handful of gay ones, so I think his preference is clear.


He was a standby for me back in the straight days--that body speaks for itself. Although I could never shake the feeling he was just a nerd with a big dick. He certainly did fill a successful niche, I'll give him that.

Jake Taylor

I'll return to "The book", but this blog is supposed to be about gay porn....so lets talk about my first gay porn crush.
Jake Taylor was a mid 90's porn star who worked mostly for Catalina (now managed by Channel One). He was hairy (quite unusual back then), which made him jump off the box at me when I wandered into the all male section of the porn store. "The Best of Jake Taylor" was the first gay porn I ever bought and kept (I think I bought a few others but threw them away in gay shame, coupled with frustration that the guys were not to my liking). The first scene is an all oral number with Dane Tarsen that I must have watched thousands of times. The fact that there was no butt-sex made it a little easier for me to deal with...I'd never actually been with a guy at this point and was still freaked out by anal anything. The one-camera cinematography and awkward scene jumps are intolerable by today's standards, but that scene was my gold standard for a while. The photos below are Jake from a variety of films, including Blow Hard, Code of Conduct by Falcon, and a few I can't identify.

Bob Paris

When I was in my early twenties, and still quite closeted, I surmised I could probably find a work-out book full of eye candy. And I could actually keep my book out on the shelf with no gay accusations from my friends since most straight guys wanted to look like those guys too. What I came up with was "Flawless" by Bob Paris. The guy is a former Mr. Universe, and totally hot. That shot of him stepping out of the pool is amazing and somehow bypasses the iodine tan/neanderthal image I usually have of professional body builders. He still features prominently in one of my stock fantasies: The athlete who REALLY needs to make the football team and would do anything to convince the coach....then the coach locks the door and says "Anything?"...you get the picture.
Not everyone is a fan of all those muscles, but he was truly a legend in the 80's in his field. And wouldn't you know it, he's a gay too!. He's written several books including one called "Gorilla Suit" about his adventures in bodybuilding that I really want to read. Somehow I cant bring myself to do it because I know its not going to be as hot as I want it to be....probably not filled with Bob ogling guys in the shower, helping them lube up just a little too long or staring at their sweaty pectorals as they coax out that one last rep...and very unlikely that he'd mention "helping" the guys make the football team.








Chest Hair!!! So rare in a bobybuilder!




He's still super hot although he is 50 pounds lighter now and doesn't compete anymore. On his website he mentions being a tad possessive of his intellectual property rights, so Bob if you ever read this I assume all these photos are public domain except the last one, which links to your site.