Seven years ago singer-songwriter Jsky went on the E4 show Body Fixers asking for help swapping his flamboyant style for a more 'masculine' look. The Manchester LGBTQ+ star - real name Jason Warner - was urged to ditch his floral outfit and oversized hoop earrings for jeans and a smart jacket with a scarf, and super-sleek hair as part of a 'masculine make-under.'
"Obviously I still want to be Jsky but I want to be more masculine with it do you know what I mean?" he asked the makeover team. "People see me and they don't really know know how to react. There's times I go to the toilet ad I'm told I'm in the wrong room."
He was delighted with the end result, declaring joyously "I'm a rock god. This is me going down Deansgate now." After the show was screened Jsky, who hosts BBC Radio Manchester's The Dead Good Show on Wednesdays and presents on Gaydio, the largest LGBTQ+ station in the world, received online abuse.
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But recently he says it has been a "nice surprise" to find that E4 owners Channel Four had been sharing his episode of Body Fixers across their socials since the show was screened on the streaming platform Netflix. A clip of his transformation shared on Facebook had over 250,000 views along with positive comments about Jsky and his makeover.
Pride of Manchester judge Jsky, who filmed the show when he was 28 and is now 35, said: "I usually don't pay attention to the comments section but I saw the comments on this and I'm glad that I did. The first time it aired people said 'what a freak' and 'what an attention seeker.' But seven years later and people are saying nice things and if anything nasty is said people are defending me."
He added: "Attitudes have completely changed. I think lockdown changed how people react to each other online and shows such as RuPaul's Drag Race have helped, as well as having same sex couples on Strictly and Ant and Dec in drag."
Jsky said about going on Body Fixers: "I was challenging myself. I wanted to see if someone could do a better job at styling me, and we should be allowed to experiment. It's okay to have fun and dress up. I want to put myself out there and say 'it's okay to experiment.'" As for the makeover, he said: "I kept it for a while, about a month, and I went to a few events wearing it."
Last year he performed the main stage at Manchester Pride and was selected to carry The Queen's Baton in July on its journey across the Commonwealth. Jsky became the first person to perform this feat in heels and the fashionista carried the symbolic baton at MediaCityUK in Salford.
He was chosen to represent the north west of England for his contribution to the arts, charity and for inspiring through fashion and the media. He said he wanted to show the "power of femininity" and raise "pride visibility" during the proud moment.
He ran from the Lowry Theatre to the BBC at Quay House in a pair of strappy white high heels. Cheered on by his proud mum he became the first to ever participate in heels since the first Queen's Baton Relay in 1958. In December he was honoured to be asked to perform a spoken word piece with the BBC Philharmonic Orchestra at their annual Christmas concert with BBC Radio Manchester.
In 2019 he was one of the body positive influencers on the groundbreaking Channel Four reality show Naked Beach, helping willing participants to gain the confidence to strip naked in Greece, and he'd love to see it return to our screens with a host of famous faces. "I'd be 100-per-cent up for doing a celebrity version," he said.
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