The female orgasm gets a raw deal in musical popular culture. In a world saturated by cock-centric hip hop, songs like Akinyele’s ‘Put it in my Mouth’ aren’t exactly flying the flag for fanny fun time, despite the rousing refrain (what ever you choose to lick/pussy or dick/ people of the world/ it’s your pick) and the fact that it contains one of my favourite lyrics in musical history (I’ll be like Herbie and hand you a cock.) But much of music today is somewhat lacking in the lady-pleasure element, relying instead on tired old tropes of female subjugation- everyone knows that ‘Come on Eileen’ is about bukkake, after all. And ‘Pretty Mess’ by Vanity, despite the fact that she sounds like she’s having multiples throughout, is actually about a man jizzing all over her dress. A massive dry cleaning bill kind of dampens the post-orgasm glow, dontcha think? And don’t even get me started on Bruce ‘the Boss’ Springsteen’s ‘For You’ (I came for you/for you/I came for you/but you did not need my urgency). I never would have pegged him as a premature ejaculator whose ‘electric surges free’, but hey ho.
In light of all these mangasms, I thought I’d try and redress the balance compile a list of my favourite ten songs about cumming, the womanly way.
10. She Bop, by Cyndi Lauper
Huh, yea, I wanna go south n get me some more/ Hey, they say that a stitch in time saves nine/They say I better stop – or I’ll go blind/ Oop – she bop – she bop
Cyndi is my idol. In this song, she actually refers to her vagina as the ‘Danger Zone’ (I can’t stop messing with the danger zone), pants a lot, and declares ‘there ain’t no law against it yet.’ An old Dylan Moran joke is that if Vaginas could sing, they would sound like Enya. Wrong. They would sound like Cyndi Lauper.
9. My Neck, My Back, Khia
In this early noughties original classic, Khia tells a man just how to make her ‘pussy pop’. ‘Put your neck into it!’ she orders, until she ‘busts a nut/all over your face’. This might be a bit explicit for some of our more sensitive readers, but it gets a mention because I CAN.NOT.LISTEN TO IT without dancing badly in my bedroom (not a euphemism). Plus she’s the boss. Terrifying, perhaps, but still the boss.
8. Feel It- Kate Bush
This list would not be complete without a mention of the Bush. I actually have this on vinyl (yes, I’m that twat) and every time I listen to it I feel inordinately happy. There are simply not enough experimental piano songs about fingering in this world, IMHO. The best bit is where she goes ‘God, but you’re beautiful, aren’t you?/ Feel your warm hand walking around.’
7. Slow Hand- The Pointer Sisters
I want a man with a slow hand/ I want a lover with an easy touch/ I want somebody who will spend some time/Not come and go in a heated rush
This one’s the fingering antidote. It’s basically the musical equivalent of a woman going ‘RUB, DON’T POKE.’ It has a wonderful cheesy eighties vibe to it that makes it half guilty pleasure, half wistful ‘I wish there were more mellow pop ditties about fucking.’ It’s so eighties, in fact, that it wants to make you have sex on a futon in a room with a spider plant and a set of black window-blinds, while wearing a side ponytail and smearing devil’s foodcake all over each other.
6. Icicle, Tori Amos
And when my hand touches myself/ I can finally rest my head/ And when they say take of his body/ I think I’ll take from mine instead
Pretty much every Tori Amos song I have ever heard is about masturbation. She’s like the Joni Mitchell of wanking, complete with twinkly piano. Maybe you thought this song was simply about some innocent garden-variety self-love, but it isn’t. It’s about getting off/while they’re all downstairs/saying prayers. FUCK YEAH TORI AMOS. ‘The good book is missing some pages’ says Tori. Whether or not this is because she’s torn them out to masturbate to or because she feels that the Bible’s latent misogyny is dampening her ardour is up to you guys. Either way it’s fucking awesome.
5. Nobody Does it Better, Carole King
There’s some kind of magic inside you/ That keeps me from runnin’/ But just keep it comin’
Ostensibly a worshipping ode to the man in her life, some may find Nobody Does it Better a little saccharine/man-centric. But she’s talking about one thing, and one thing only: her orgasm. And this dude does sound AWESOME. He’s so good that he makes her feel bad for the rest of those sexually incapable cretins who couldn’t find her clitoris. ‘Why do you have to be so good?’ she implores him, in a post-orgasm haze. He’s basically ruined her for every other man ever through his sensational multiple orgasm-giving. Who is this guy? Is it the same guy as the one in You’re So Vain? Because if so a.) you can’t really blame him, and b.) most women would happily overlook an apricot scarf for that level of lovemaking.
4. Je T’Aime (Moi Non Plus), Serge Gainsbourg
The only song in the list by a man, but a valid choice on the basis that everyone knows that the main point of this song is the Jane Birkin orgasming in French in the background. Plus it was in that beer advert with the ladybirds fucking. For some reason, the sweet sound of female pleasure is made a gazillion times better by being in French. Which brings me to…
3. Moi Je Joue, Brigitte Bardot
‘Joue’ is French slang for ‘come’ (I was promiscuous and used to live in Paris), so this song is basically I’M COMING I’M COMING I’M COMING I’M COMING I’M COMING. All the way through, pretty much, until she starts making exaggerated cumming gasps (translated: OH YES! OH YES! HARDER HARDER! Aiaiai!’ Plus it has a charming retro vibe (probably already been capitalised upon by Stella Artois) which serves to undermine the filth and make it charmingly continental. Ooh la la!
2. Kiss Kiss Kiss- Yoko Ono
Legend. Not only did Yoko get to do sexy time with one of the most attractive and talented men of the twentieth century, but she is also all-round awesome. This is punk cum ska cum proto-bjork experimental orgasm madness. Ignore the haterz, this is fucking marvellous. At the end she has an orgasm that is Japanese in nature and probably real. It is completely and utterly barmy and wonderful and surreal. So, like coming, then.
1. Breakfast in Bed- Dusty Springfield
It’s Dusty doing cunnilingus! With a beehive! And a horn section (FNAR!) OMFG. SO GOOD. I DEFY YOU to find a better song about lesbian sexcapades. ‘Dry your eyes on my dress’, says Dusty, huskily, ‘I’ll lock the door’. ‘YOU WILL COME AGAIN’ she assures her partner, and ‘you don’t have to say you love me’. Just ‘Don’t eat and run’. Quite.
Honorary mentions:
I Touch Myself, by the Divinyls- An excellent tune, but too easy for the list. Love the ‘when ‘I’m feeling down/I want you above me’. No one has ever better encapsulated the therapeutic nature of sex than these ladies.
Strawberry Wine- Deana Carter- Technically no mention of orgasm, but it IS about losing your virginity. Deana was ‘thirstin’ for knowledge, and he had a car’, so she fucks him on the riverbank. YEAH. It’s almost unbearably mawkish but the strawberry wine/bloody hymen metaphor saves it, I feel.
This list is really missing Tweet and Missy Elliot, “Oops (Oh My)”. How can you not love a song about a woman getting home and finding her own body so sexy she just can’t help herself?
Another honorary mention should perhaps go to ‘Pleasure is All Mine’ by Björk, which is actually not really about orgasm but on first listen it sounds like it is, what will all the inuit throat singing going on in the background and sounds that are basically sex noises.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zIP1vtEPWqk
You can add your own suggestions to the collaborative spotify playlist Jessica has so kindly created for us: http://open.spotify.com/user/figs23/playlist/5OCfaUuUEBdwsvNvq0VCLa
pssst – Vagenda… it’s Carly Simon not Carole King xx
Surely also there should be a mention of the wonderful Diana Ross singing quite specific instructions in Chain Reaction:
You make me tremble when your hand moves lower
You taste a little then you swallow slower
Nature has a way of yielding treasure
Pleasure made for you, oh
The most enticingly detailed guide a fifteen-year-old boy could have asked for. I didn’t get to use the knowledge for a couple of years but, damn, I thought about it. A lot.
“Love to Love You Baby” by Donna Summer – 1975
It’s the sound of a woman orgasming. What’s not to like?
‘Pretty much every Tori Amos song I have ever heard is about masturbation. She’s like the Joni Mitchell of wanking, complete with twinkly piano.’ This whole piece is fabulous. (P.S. That’s my favourite bit in ‘Feel It’ too!)
Nice to listen to a few decent songs about something I have never-ever experienced…
First Orgasm by the Dresden Dolls. Although, it’s kind of sad…
How can this list have excluded Amoureuse by Kiki Dee?? http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hal465rjRYc
Just a small thing about Brigitte Bardot: “je joue” means I play/I’m playing. To come is to “jouir”, so she’d have to be saying “je jouis”. Easy mistake to make!
But the gist of the song is that she’s playing the love game with this man and winning, and if he’s naughty she’ll just love him harder
Ps: since I’m on the subject of translations, the sentence “je vais et je viens/ entre tes reins” from Je T’Aime… I’ve often seen it translated as “I’m coming and going between your kidneys” which is technically correct. But what we call “les reins” is a euphemism for the small of your back (“la chute de reins” is the curve above your backside, and by extension, said backside). So he’s just using fancy words to say they’re doing it doggy-style…
French lesson over! x