Sex and pop music
Nov. 4th, 2022 09:16 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
Started writing this as a rant on FB, but it got long (and FB will likely bury any post this long anyway), so figured I'd crosspost it.
I'm honestly amazed when folks (and by folks I guess I mean Ben Shapiro and the sort of person who thinks Ben Shapiro is an intellectual) get upset by songs like WAP and complain that pop music is too dirty.
The '80s gave us BOTH Madonna and Prince. And Lauper's "She Bop." Not to mention "Pleasure and Pain" by The Divynals ("I Touch Myself" wasn't until '90). Oh, and a little George Michael song called "I Want Your Sex."
But if that's not enough, the entire third verse of Bruce Springsteen's "Pink Cadillac," a song that dates back to the early '80s, is about how Springsteen's cock is too large for most women, and he needs the woman with a "Pink Cadillac" that can hold him.
And that's specifically the stuff from when I was growing up. The '70s had "Bang a Gong," "Afternoon Delight," "Hot Stuff," "Lady Marmalade," and more. In the '60s, we literally had Aretha talking about a lover so good he made her feel like a "Natural Woman," and Mick Jagger laying a divorcee in New York City ("She blew my nose and then she blew my mind").
And it keeps going back. "Poon-Tang" is a song by The Treniers -- and NOT a subtle one -- from 1953, and it's about exactly what you think. And that was only a year before The Toppers gave us "Baby Let Me Bang Your Box." And that decade's Bull Moose Jackson made Prince look subtle (you've likely heard Aerosmith covering his "Big Ten Inch Record," but you really don't even need to listen to "I Want a Bow-Legged Woman" to know what it's about.)
And it keeps going back before rock, before the blues, before Cole Porter was writing showtunes about "Nudist Parties," etc. It's in old sea shanties and ballads, and in songs by Shakespeare ("Where the Bee Sucks There Suck I" is not exactly subtle).
So if you don't want to listen to songs about sex, that's fine (there are plenty that aren't). But if you don't think sex belongs in music, well, music would beg to differ.
I'm honestly amazed when folks (and by folks I guess I mean Ben Shapiro and the sort of person who thinks Ben Shapiro is an intellectual) get upset by songs like WAP and complain that pop music is too dirty.
The '80s gave us BOTH Madonna and Prince. And Lauper's "She Bop." Not to mention "Pleasure and Pain" by The Divynals ("I Touch Myself" wasn't until '90). Oh, and a little George Michael song called "I Want Your Sex."
But if that's not enough, the entire third verse of Bruce Springsteen's "Pink Cadillac," a song that dates back to the early '80s, is about how Springsteen's cock is too large for most women, and he needs the woman with a "Pink Cadillac" that can hold him.
And that's specifically the stuff from when I was growing up. The '70s had "Bang a Gong," "Afternoon Delight," "Hot Stuff," "Lady Marmalade," and more. In the '60s, we literally had Aretha talking about a lover so good he made her feel like a "Natural Woman," and Mick Jagger laying a divorcee in New York City ("She blew my nose and then she blew my mind").
And it keeps going back. "Poon-Tang" is a song by The Treniers -- and NOT a subtle one -- from 1953, and it's about exactly what you think. And that was only a year before The Toppers gave us "Baby Let Me Bang Your Box." And that decade's Bull Moose Jackson made Prince look subtle (you've likely heard Aerosmith covering his "Big Ten Inch Record," but you really don't even need to listen to "I Want a Bow-Legged Woman" to know what it's about.)
And it keeps going back before rock, before the blues, before Cole Porter was writing showtunes about "Nudist Parties," etc. It's in old sea shanties and ballads, and in songs by Shakespeare ("Where the Bee Sucks There Suck I" is not exactly subtle).
So if you don't want to listen to songs about sex, that's fine (there are plenty that aren't). But if you don't think sex belongs in music, well, music would beg to differ.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-11-04 02:28 pm (UTC)Dude. DUDE. I can't rant right now, I literally don't have time, but I want to.
(no subject)
Date: 2022-11-04 05:16 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2022-11-04 05:34 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2022-11-04 04:22 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2022-11-04 05:16 pm (UTC)