Young Girls Shouldn't Sing That

Note: This is my contribution to a challenge posed by Phil Flannery on the VSS page. His prompt: "I have written this as a challenge for the Vocal Social Society. Feel free to share the songs that you loved as a child but were unaware of their meaning until much later."

When I was around eight, I was a musical kid who had played bass for about a year and loved singing. At this time, Rock music had its lyrical "dang!" moments, but Disco was a very sexy genre that was pushing the limits of what could be played on radio...and what a little girl like me should sing aloud. I was old enough and intelligent enough to converse with adults. However, I did not have enough life experience to catch nuances, especially when it came to sex, violence, and the "way things are". So many songs have made that crystal clear as an adult!

We can start with "In the Bush" by Musique. I started singing along with it one day, and my Mom very quickly but calmly said, "You can't sing that." I asked her why, and she replied, "You'll know why when you're older. Young girls shouldn't sing that." Clearly, I didn't understand which bush they were alluding to. Then there was "Inside My Love" by Minnie Riperton. I loved her voice and did not think much about the lyrics. One day, as an adult, it came on the radio, and I was like, "WHOA. Okayyyy, she was being LITERAL." "Love to Love You, Baby". I thought all that moaning was dumb when I was a kid; however, as an adult, the moaning was still a bit much, but I understood she was not talking about familial or platonic love. "Pull Up to the Bumper". By then, I was onto those dirty bird songwriters. I knew it was naughty, and that song got grimier as I got older. Now, I chuckle when I hear it. "Drive it in between". I mean, come on.

I began to notice sexy songs that I hadn’t paid much attention to or thought they were singing about something else. For example, I realized Montrose’s “Hot, Sweet & Sticky” was not just about some cute, sweaty chick. Led Zeppelin’s “Lemon Song'' was a little more obvious. Bon Scott singing he’ll be your “backdoor man” meant maybe a little more than him assassinating an annoying girlfriend/wife and escaping through the home’s back exit.

There were also a lot of “underage girl” songs, with seventeen apparently being the “magic age”. Benny Mardones upped the ante by lowering the age to sixteen with “Into the Night”. As a young girl, I thought it weird. Now, it’s just gross.

It wasn't just sex, though. In 1979, the band Machine released the song "There But For the Grace of God (Go I)". It was a hard-driving, hard-edged disco song. The lyrics are what made the song stand out, however. It was about a couple that had a baby girl, and they would ensure she would grow up in the right neighborhood, with the right people, and with the proper morals. The radio played the line, "Let's find a place, they say, somewhere far away, where only upper-class people stay". The ACTUAL lyric was, "Let's find a place, they say, somewhere far away, with no Blacks, no Jews, and no gays." When we bought the original long-player and heard those lyrics, I knew why they changed it for radio. Still, I only understood the depth of what it meant once I became an adult who needed a place to live.

The song “Breathing” was my introduction to Kate Bush. I focused on what a beautiful piece it was musically and on her unique voice, not the lyrics. It wasn’t until much later that I grasped how tragic it was. She sang as a fetus who was afraid of the fallout from a dropped bomb while absorbing the nicotine from the still-smoking mother.

When I was a teenager, the song “Voices Carry” sounded like she was dating a jerk; as an adult, the lyrics and video made me believe there was more than verbal abuse happening in that relationship.

I surprise myself sometimes with the misogynistic, predatory lyrics that didn't register immediately, like "Under My Thumb" by the Rolling Stones.

I have to credit the songs that attempted to be covert with specific subject matter that gave me an “aha!" moment later in life (like many cartoons). Nowadays, that is a lost art in popular music when it is all about how graphic one can be. Metal has yet to rein itself in (you don’t even need to hear the lyrics with titles like “Stripped, Raped and Strangled”), but that was not being played on commercial radio back when it was released. However, there's today's radio and Rap. Back in the day, “In the Bush” was banned from some stations, but still made it onto the radio because it meant what it meant if you were of a certain age. It was a metaphor, not a guidebook. If I had a daughter today, the conversation about “WAP” would be slightly different, with even the clean version not leaving much to the imagination. I was shocked the first time I heard it, and shocking me is difficult. I remember wondering what happened to nuance and being suggestive, encouraging the listener to envision their own ribald scenario - if they were old enough to do so. But I guess in this modern world of limited character platforms, 30-second clips, and memes, no one has time for that. In fact, I believe the very topic of this piece won’t be relevant twenty years from now.

The question then becomes, is that a good thing?