When the Band Played on: The Life of Randy Shilts, America's Trailblazing Gay Journalist

2025 Lambda Literary Awards Finalist in Gay Memoir/Biography

Randy Shilts was the preeminent LGBTQ+ reporter of his generation.

He was the first openly gay reporter assigned to a gay beat at a mainstream paper and one of the nation's most influential chroniclers of gay history, politics, and culture. Shilts wrote three seminal works on the community: The Mayor of Castro Street, on the life, assassination, and legacy of Harvey Milk; And the Band Played On, detailing the failure of politics as usual during the early AIDS epidemic; and Conduct Unbecoming, a history of the US military's mistreatment of LGBTQ servicemembers.

Yet the intimate life story of Randy Shilts has been left unwritten. When the Band Played On tells that story, recognizing his legacy as a trailblazing figure in gay activism, journalism, and public policy.

Author Michael G. Lee conducted interviews with Shilts's family, friends, college professors, colleagues, informants, lovers, and critics. The resulting narrative tells the tale of a singularly gifted voice, a talented yet insecure young man whose coming of age became intricately linked to the historic peaks and devastating perils of modern gay liberation.

When the Band Played On is the authoritative account of Randy Shilts's trailblazing life, as well as his legacy of shaping the history-making events he covered.