 |
| Tell me what you really think Enrique. |
A couple of weeks back a very prim and proper lady of probable Chinese descent came up to me at the Club Med disco and asked if she could request a song. As money dripped off her wrists and fingers, she pointed at my computer screen and commanded: “Tonight I’m f**king you.” “How does your husband feel about this?” and “I hope not,” were among my potential responses, but instead I told her I wasn’t going to play a song with an f-bomb in the title at a family resort.
She then reassured me there was a clean version of the song called Tonight I’m Loving You. “Who’s it by?” I asked expecting it to be an cuss-tastic regular like Akon or 50-Cent, only to find it was Spanish crooner Enrique Iglesias. ENRIQUE IGLESIAS! The son of the ultimate sexy crooner, Julio Iglesias. I’m neither a prude nor immune to the fact the f-word is getting more and more common in popular music, but these are men who are meant to make love to their women, not to eff them, as it were. I didn’t play the song.
Iglesias seems to be loving the minor controversy surrounding his latest US top 10 hit, telling MTV news that it, “isn’t meant to twist up any knickers, but rather is just good, kind-of clean fun.” He went onto say that, “Music has become so direct and you can say whatever you want, which is cool……you can have fun with it.”
Here’s the issue Enrique. You are quite right, you can say whatever you want, but that doesn’t make it cool, particularly if yours’ is not an image that can pull it off. And let’s not forget that music is art and just as you can paint anything you want, that doesn’t make it automatically good or the right choice.
 |
| The Rolling Stones’ Some Girls. |
It’s one thing when a band whose entire persona is entrenched in attitude and sexuality like the Rolling Stones drop f-bombs (as they’ve been doing on and off since the early 70s – Starf**ker and Some Girls the most obvious examples). Curtis Mayfield became one of the first mainstream black artists to swear on vinyl back in 1977, but he was assuming the character of an incarcerated man, locked away for a heinous crime, determined to stay a “black mother-f**ker,” (Do Do Wap Is Strong In Here from Short Eyes).
Throughout the 80s and early 90s Prince would alternate between filthy, foul-mouthed club anthems (Erotic City) and often brilliant spirituals (The Cross) and even the otherwise Grandma-friendly Billy Joel managed to let an f-word slip in the song Laura from 1982.
By the 90s and 00s, swearing was so commonplace in popular music that even the gals were getting in on the act with Janet Jackson releasing a succession of albums telling the world just how rampantly randy she is. At least when Avril Lavigne shouted that she’s the “motherf**king princess” in Girlfriend she convincingly pulls off the school-girl brat image she’s attempting. As for hip-hop and rap, just try finding an album in that genre without a warning label.
What grates so much about Iglesias spouting that you can now “say whatever you want” in music is that even an absolute hero of mine, a man I’d give a kidney to, someone who can proudly stand amongst the very greats of American music, seems to have already taken this on board. Bruce Springsteen has dropped a couple of f-bombs on record in his time, though not until the mid 90s. But notice the difference in him talking about life’s up and downs, of learning from mistakes, of wanting to be a good father this time around and not wanting to “f**k it up this time,” as used in Long Time Coming from 2005’s Devils And Dust, compared to the atrocious Queen Of The Supermarket from his last album Working On A Dream.
Springsteen has always gotten into character with so much integrity and while I’d rather Long Time Coming said “mess” or “screw” instead of “f**k,” it is convincing in the context of the song’s narrative. Supermarket is unfortunately not in the same masterclass of normal Springsteen writing. The character in the song is, as the title suggests, in love with a girl who works in a supermarket, aisle two to be specific. The Boss sings about pining for his check-out-chick, seeing her smile as he packs his groceries into his car and the subsequent feeling of wanting to “blow this whole f**king place apart.”
Bruce if you are reading this, I love you. I love the music, the intellect, the values. But please don’t ever sing another Roy Orbison-esque love ballad with a clunky f-bomb in it ever again. As for Enrique Iglesias, the very fact that the word “f**king” is replaced with “loving” in his latest song raises an interesting question in terms of music history. What if every artist followed and had been a follower of Iglesias’ rationale regarding the f-word: it’s just a bit of fun, it’s how we all talk, it’s only a word. Imagine these following songs (with apologies in advance):
You Make F**king Fun – Fleetwood Mac
I Can’t Stop F**king You – Ray Charles
All My F**king – The Beatles
I Just Can’t Stop F**king You – Michael Jackson
And what of those classic, sexy soul songs by the likes of Teddy Pendergrass, Barry White, Marvin Gaye, Roberta Flack etc. Yes, those songs were about sex, but they were also about love’s complexities and once again, making love. Would Flack’s soul standard Feel Like Makin’ Love benefit from a more explicit title? Was Marvin Gaye’s Let’s Get It On not direct enough? Is Enrique Iglesias an idiot?
I would have to agree with you there my man. What I don't like about it is that is a shameless attempt to get the younger kids to buy his music. The clean version is ok with a good dance beat but not special. Add some controversy and get the young kids talking about it and there's a recipe for record sales.
James Blunt did it too with "Your Beautiful."
It's a good song for us older people but drop in the "F" Bomb and you get the young kids buying and singing it just so they can say that word. Pretty sad really! I imagine that this marketing ploy will continue for some time but will become so commonplace that the kids will be desensitised to the word itself and won't even care when it is in a song or not. At that point, a crap song will remain a crap song. It's a long way off though.