It was the USA’s 250th birthday this past weekend, and it felt like it was 250 degrees outside. During a heat wave, a pool is the place to be, and the annual Fourth of July party at Daddy’s Grotto was the cool down for the hottest queers in town.
Daddy’s Grotto is literally just the name of Brad Kutner and his husband’s backyard, where they have been hosting an annual Fourth of July pool party since 2018. But it isn’t just a pool party. It’s serving community, it’s serving lewks, it’s serving laughter and moshing and butt cheek, and it IS the function.
This being my first one, I was expecting more mayhem, but it was way too hot to exist, so I feel like people could only turn it up as much as their personal thermostats could stand. I got there around one, expecting it to be packed already, but things didn’t really kick off until the bands started around 3.
It was a crowd of cuties serving up the looks and lots and lots of butt cheeks. Thongs to the left of me, thongs to the right. I should have taken a group pic of all the thongs.
It was sooooooo hot that some people even brought a box fan and a generator, which seemed to die pretty early on, but I laughed about it for a long time.
I was there with my friend Heather Loop, and another friend of mine, JoAnna, came to meet me later in the day. JoAnna just happened to be driving through Virginia on her way back to Maryland. This was her first time in RVA, and she was LIVING for the vibe. She texted me afterward from the road: “This was an absolutely perfect spontaneous reunion, the BEST version of today. I feel all squiggly sparktacular. Our friendship transcends space and time, and I am excited for our next adventure.”
Needless to say, this was the perfect way to introduce her to Richmond. When I say JoAnna was loving the vibe, I mean she was loving the vibe. She looked up every band that was playing, even the ones that performed before she got there, and the lineup was HOT.
Ionna opened, bringing very dreamy pop music and getting interactive by “knighting” some volunteers. I am not totally sure why, but yes. The lead singer’s voice gave me a bit of a Kate Bush vibe, and it was a very chill way to start things off.
Next was Glop King, who delivered some sweet beats, and his voice reminded me of Empire of the Sun. You can check out some of their tracks HERE.
Strawberry Moon was up next. Those lil lambs were sitting next to me under a tent, and they were sweet as pie. The singer has some chops, and the band was serving a combo of funky riffs with a bit of punk edge.
Hardcore band The Get Off absolutely blew me away. I was living for this band. Hardcore meets Riot Grrrl with lots of growls and angst. This is how you get a trans mosh pit to open up. (I was told the Grotto is home to Richmond’s only trans mosh pit. I can neither confirm nor deny this.) With lyrics like “I am not saying that I’m sorry, I am saying you are wrong” and “I’ll smile when you’re dead,” this band was really speaking to me. Check their shit out HERE.
We went from the pit to total summer vibes. Pharaoh Sistare gives early Michael Jackson energy. His voice was epic. His swag was on point. Love, love, loved this. What a presence. This was THE MOOD. I can’t say enough about the singing and the swag here.
Photos by Danielle Flakes
Closing out was Trapcry, and man, did they have fans. First off, we should talk about his essence. God damn, so commanding. This dude was hot as hell, and at one point he performed on a chair and I was mesmerized. A bunch of mad hot daddies pulled the fuck up to the front and knew ALL the words. He’s played every Fourth of July at Daddy’s Grotto and is dropping new music this year. They really went loose for “What Do Boys Like,” and the music reminded me a lot of Zebra Katz, who I absolutely adore.
Photos by Danielle Flakes
The bands and the pool weren’t the only action. A group next to me started playing some sort of Monopoly card game. I didn’t want to commit to a full game, but I was invested. I had my horse in the race. Somehow the game evolved into a twerking class and then into a sort of yoga competition. I picked a great spot to sit.
And of course there was food and vibe-ations.Kwan’s Chicken Project was bringing the food. They had jerk chicken plates for $12, and glizzies were $5. There was a free keg and three different types of “Daddy’s Juice,” which was a mash-up of various boozes and juices. And of course, it was also BYOB. Basically, it was everything, everywhere, all at once that you could want at a party.
A couple of weeks before the shenanigans, I met up with Brad Kutner to talk about the annual party’s origin story and sip piña coladas by his pool before he had to jet off to a different pool party after our interview.
Kutner moved here from Northern Virginia 20 years ago. “I came here for a dude, and we broke up about six months before, and then I was like, well, fuck it, I got nowhere else to go. I’m from a long line of NOVA kids who end up in Richmond.”
He went to VCU, and his time there was a huge inspiration for the Daddy’s Grotto parties. “All this stems from going to Richmond parties back when I was in college. Slaughterama, Best Friends Day, Crowefest, and then Aqua Battle. We used to go to all those parties, watching folks get silly on bikes.”
If you’ve ever been to any of those legendary parties, then you know how they do. I used to come down from New York for every Slaughterama and Best Friends Day. The Cutthroats Bike Club knows how to throw an inspirational party.
“We throw a good party, man. It’s in honor and in tribute to the parties that I went to when I was younger, and I love having new folks come through. I love having old heads come through. It’s definitely a day that I’ll see some people that I only get to see once a year, for whatever reason. Much like Best Friends Day. It’s always the joke. How much longer can we do this? I don’t want to say this will be the last year, but we’ll see how things go. I always freak out about turnout and then, you know… two, 300 people show up.”
The pandemic also played a part in the birth of Daddy’s Grotto. The couple got their first pool that summer.
“So the pandemic hits, everything sucks, everything shuts down, including all the parties. And so it was a pretty depressing year, but we had the pool, and we had a little pod, like a pool pod, a small group of friends we would hang with during the pandemic.”
The first real Daddy’s Grotto party happened after the vaccine came out and was held in their previous backyard. It was a smaller yard, but they still packed it in and booked eight bands.
“We started throwing these smaller parties. The pool has gotten bigger. The first one was 13 feet, and this is now 15 feet. So this fits a lot of heads. I think 23 was the max that we fit in one year.”
The party is open to anyone over 21, and you can buy $20 tickets online or when you pull up to the pool. But the address isn’t posted online. Instead, you need to “ask a queer.”
Kutner explains the meaning behind that.
“The slogan, ‘Ask a queer, baby,’ gives the person that feeling like, ‘I’m special.’ I guess, ironically, it’s about being visible. You’ve just got to know where to go.”
For him, having to seek the party out helps build community.
“Why make the party hard to find? Because there’s value in knowing people, and there’s value in building the community that you interact with and that you find links with. And you gotta know people. You gotta know cool people. You gotta know decent people.”
Though you do have to ask a queer to get the addy, the party is definitely all-inclusive, and since the music varied so much, it brought even more diversity to the crowd, giving people a place to just get the fuck loose without any stigma.
Are you trans and looking to get in a mosh pit? You have a safe space here, baby.
Years in now, Kutner is very proud of the environment they’ve created, and the foundation of it all is building community.
“There’s a lot of divisions in the world, but Richmond, especially the kind of Richmond folks who come to parties like this, we share a lot of the same qualities and a lot of the same interests. And those interests, at the same time, are very diverse. I think that’s what makes this town so great and what makes this party so great. It’s all about meeting people, finding new people to hang out with, building community, and getting off our phones and existing in a space together.”
Even though it was as hot as a ball sack in a sauna, and the crowd wasn’t as big or as wild as I expected, it was just a perfect day. Here’s to many more Fourths at Daddy’s.
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