Posts tagged ‘Sex’
Celebrating “Semi-Charmed Life”
In the summer of 1997, my girlfriends and I camped out in a backyard tent and listened to “Semi-Charmed Life” on repeat for several hours. I’m the kind of person who tires after hearing a threshold amount of even the best music (How many times can a person really stand to listen to The Joshua Tree or Thriller?), but this Third-Eye Blind hit has never ceased to astound me.
As thirteen-year-olds, we only somewhat understood the sexually and chemically charged lyrics. Also, the breezy, fast-faced tempo made it difficult to decipher what lead singer Stephan Jenkins was even singing. It didn’t help that we couldn’t just “Google” a line from the song and retrieve the lyrics. I recall mistaking “And I speak to you like the chorus to the verse” with “And it speaks to you like the birds in the forest.”
Now, of course, I realize that “Semi-Charmed Life” is the seminal anthem of sex, drugs, and rock & roll. It was also my brother’s theme song. We played it at his memorial service, and it was awesome to hear “Doin’ crystal meth will lift you up until you break” and “How do I get back there to the place where I fell asleep inside you?” blast in a room full of relatives, young people, old people, Christians, atheists, and floral arrangements.
I went to Newport Beach this past weekend and had a great time slowly running my bare feet through the sand. I thought, “I believe in the sand beneath my toes / The beach gives a feeling / An earthy feeling / I believe in the faith that grows.” I thought about how hard it really seems, sometimes, to get through this bittersweet, ironic, defeating, gratifying, semi-charmed life. I thought about how I can’t not believe that there’s life after death. I simply cannot accept a reality in which I will never see Alex again.
I’m not listening when you say goodbye…
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“I’d Rather Keep the Trash and Throw You Out”: Feminine Angstiest Songs #3
See also Feminine Angstiest Songs #2 and #1
“Son of a Gun (I Betcha Think This Song Is About You)” samples Carly Simon’s quintessential song of feminine angst, “You’re So Vain.” Janet Jackson sings, and Missy Elliott, a veritable hip hop guru, raps. The music video, clearly alluding to Michael Jackson’s “Thriller,” stars a fleet of undead women. Janet dances in the midst of the ghouls as she stalks her former lover through a creepy mansion, bathroom, and parking garage. She wields a baseball bat, strutting her svelte figure in a sexy outlaw getup. Missy accompanies Janet and the zombie women on this hot pursuit. In an eerily erotic scene, Janet seductively swallows a black spider and growls, “I’d never be your lover / I’d rather make you suffer / You stupid motherfucker.”
Basically, don’t fuck with, lie to, cheat on, steal from, or disrespect these women…unless you want to end up in a “show down, knock down, drag down, gun slugger, shoot ’em up” with demonic damsels. But this post isn’t about you anyway, is it?
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Punctuation
(written in 2005)
Whether that was a question or a statement
Affects whether I answer or respond
So Im adding structure to your ambiguity
Since you have broken the rules of punctuation
For the last time
I wanted to experience all of your etceteras
And I really liked how the apostrophes always followed our name
Or even better
How we were one pronoun or possessive adjective
I got a kick out of your interjections in bed
And your clever appositives in reference to me
But there is always a but
See the only conjunction I can tolerate is and
And you think or can replace and
And so Im ending with a period this time
Not an ellipsis.
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From the Vault: Nine 1/2 Weeks Gets 8 1/2 Stars
Three years after I was born, Adrian Lyne (Unfaithful, Indecent Proposal, Fatal Attraction) directed Nine 1/2 Weeks, starring Kim Basinger and Mickey Rourke. I saw it for the first time this weekend and felt puzzled by the film’s poor critical reception. Lyne manages to forge a balance between art and sex, creating an erotically-charged drama rather than soft core porn. The film is a meditation on the ambiguities and limitations of consensual liaisons between women and men.
Elizabeth (Basinger), a “divorced white female, beautiful statuesque blonde,” meets John (Rourke) while shopping for dinner party fare. John is concomitantly creepy and desirable as he makes overt sexual advances toward Elizabeth. “You’re taking a hell of a lot for granted, aren’t you,” Elizabeth remarks as John pointedly changes the bedsheets after their first outing. And thus begins a 9 1/2 week sexual journey. Elizabeth’s endearing naiveté complements John’s carnal authoritativeness. Scenes of sadomasochism, female masturbation, spontaneous lovemaking, and erotic food usage ensue. Lyne’s images at once titillate and disturb as the couple crisscrosses sexual boundaries and societal norms.
In her early 30s at the time of the film’s production, Basinger is, in retrospect, living proof that some women are like wine; they improve with age. While undoubtedly attractive, Basinger’s Renée Zellweger-like poutiness in this film pales in comparison to her fetching sophistication in L.A. Confidential and The Door in the Floor (both filmed over a decade later). Rourke, on the other hand, has endured a transformation in the opposite direction. The intensive reconstructive surgery he underwent after his professional wrestling career has rendered his once-alluring face almost unrecognizable. That said, he still has the body of an Olympian and acting talent that ranks him among the very best. His portrayal of John in Nine 1/2 Weeks made me further appreciate his wide range as an actor, as evidenced in Body Heat, Sin City, and The Wrestler.
If nothing else, this film depicts two major actors at pivotal moments in their respective careers. Beyond that, the disquieting interactions between Elizabeth and John speak to the complications of human nature and the overwhelming responsibility that accompanies sexual desire.
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Blame It (On the Concert Hall)
Warning: This post contains a lot of adult language.
I surprisingly didn’t feel offended when D12 ordered “all the independent women in the house” to “show [them their] tits and shut [their] mother fuckin’ mouth[s]” in 2001’s “Ain’t Nuttin’ But Music.” Nor did I get upset when Jay-Z boasted, “I thug ’em, fuck ’em, love ’em, leave ’em/’Cause I don’t fuckin’ need ’em/Take ’em out the hood/Keep ’em lookin’ good/But I don’t fuckin’ feed ’em,” in “Big Pimpin.'” With lyrics so blatantly misogynistic, it’s difficult to take these songs too seriously. Maybe that’s why I rhymed along with the rappers instead of sending them hate mail. Lately, however, two songs have almost made me lose sleep at night.
“Baby, Let Me Rape You” might be a more appropriate title for Jamie Foxx’s (feat. T-Pain) latest hit, “Blame It (On the Alcohol).” The song describes a relatively innocuous situation: A bachelor is in town for the weekend and hits up the club scene because he wants to get some tail. But then he meets a “girl” whose looks probably wouldn’t suit him in the light of day (I was unaware/How fine you was before my buzz set in), and she doesn’t seem too interested in hooking up (She say she usually don’t/But I know she front). Deciding to create his own window of opportunity, the guy “seduces” the girl with alcoholic beverages (Girl, what you drinkin’?/Go on, let it sink in) until she gives in to his sexual advances (Fill another cup up/Feelin’ on your butt, what?/You don’t even care now).
I could be overreacting. After all, there’s nothing wrong with sippin’ on some “‘tron” and gettin’ it on. But if the prospect of having sex isn’t consensual before drinks enter into the equation, it’s not OK to proceed. Jamie Foxx goes beyond just talking smack about women: He seems to endorse forced sex through inebriation. All that said, the song is catchy as hell. Maybe I just need to take a few shots, crank up the stereo, and blame it on the ah-ah-ah-ah-ah-alcohol.
If “Blame It (On the Alcohol)” teeter-totters the line between impertinence and acceptability, 3OH!3’s “Don’t Trust Me” completely obliterates it. The female victim is under 21 (X’s on the back of your hands/Wash them in the bathroom to drink like the bands), and the guy we shouldn’t trust preys upon her vulnerability and anonymity (B-b-b-bruises cover your arms/Shaking in the fingers with the bottle in your palm/And the best is, no one knows who you are/Just another girl alone at the bar). The instructions he gives her speak for themselves: “Shush, girl! Shut your lips/Do the Helen Keller and talk with your hips.” If “Don’t Trust Me” is an electronica or hip hop parody, it’s one thing, but the song doesn’t give me satiric vibes a la Weird Al.
Sometimes I really miss the days when Milli Vanilli and Lisa Lisa & Cult Jam dominated the air waves.
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I Didn’t Mean to Be Mean
I didn’t mean to be mean
When I screamed, when I wept
I didn’t want to be wanted
I just needed to be kept
I’m so used to being used
Your pure intentions
Are abuse
If you’d struck me, if you’d fuck me
You’re like the others –
Cold but lucky
It was simple being easy
So I blame you
When you please me
For saving me from deadly habits
That die hard
For making me smile
For taking me far
Far from here
Far from blue
Further from home
Furthest from you
So, to that end, I must implore:
If you hated me
Would I love you more?
Disparate but never desperate
We’re violently in love
As luck would have it
The Lollygabber 
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