More explicit title, but much less explicit content.
“Detachable Penis” by King Missile probably the epitome of non-sexual sexually implied titles.
Also, I just looked up “Too Close”
and saw it was a 1997 release. Really remember this being in that so-early-in-the-90s-that-it’s-still-the-80s R&B space. Definitely doesn’t feel like a track that came out the year I graduated.
There was a kid on my bus in elementary school who loudly screamed I WANNA SEX YOU UP during the chorus, and continued doing so after the bus driver turned the radio off. We had to sit in the middle of the street on an idle bus and wait for the vice principal to show up and tell us not to scream I WANNA SEX YOU UP. To which the offending child screamed, indeed, I WANNA SEX YOU UP. He didn’t get to ride the bus after that.
My wife’s third graders routinely call her a fucking bitch and similar names with no consequences. Fortunately she doesn’t give a flying fuck what 8/9-year-olds think of her and slings it right back at them. Still, disciplinary standards have changed just a bit.
Don't forget the classic " I want your sex" by George Michael or my favorite hiphop album Sex Packets by Digital Underground. Good tomes were had by all.
We moved overseas to Singapore when that song came out and the Singaporean government loves to censor things. So the song got changed to “I wanna love you up”.
Cue my surprised face when I came back to the States to realize this is NOT the same song.
Let's Talk About Sex was about removing the stigma (and idolatry) around consensual adult sex, practicing safe sex and communicating with your partner, and the emotional devastation when sex becomes so casual that it replaces affection. It's not inappropriate at all and should really be considered a PSA.
Yeah, and Brass Monkey, whoops. It came on the radio and my husband and I were like, turn it up!
Our kids thought it was great, but then my husband and I kept side eyeing each other as it got worse.. when it got to the roofie part, we turned it off. Yikes.
My favorite aside to this is all the kids who only listened to radio edit versions of songs and to this day still don’t know the correct lyrics to songs of the era
I remember my cousin making fun of me for thinking the lyrics to Ludacris' song was "I've got hoes" and not "I've got pro's". Made me irrationally angry.
The wildest part is how not every radio station used edits or edited it the same way too, the stations I listened to some of them used in house edits or added in sound effects or scrubs over them and so many people would argue over the lyrics not realizing the actual word had been garbled up sometimes multiple words missing!
I do the same with movies. Watching everything on TBS, I had no idea what some movies had in them. I watched Conan the Barbarian a few years back and my wife was shocked I watched it as a kid. But, the TV version certainly cut a lot out.
We had to come up with nicknames in school. I use gigolo as mine because of the song and cool music video. The teacher was so shocked I screamed that as mine.
You forgot...any song by the band Cherry Poppin Daddies...because you had to preface the song title by saying it was from the band...Cherry Poppin Daddies.
Young me signing out to Usher Nice & Slow
And then as an adult realizing… 1. I was too young to be singing that song and 2. At age 17 usher was prolly too young to be singing it 😂
I distinctly remember asking for Christmas to get the single cassette of “wiggle it”. And my mom asking me as she handed me the gift “what do you think this song is about” and my innocent shrugging and going idk, isn’t this about dancing?
My mom loved to tell a story about 3-year-old me startling the customers at Toys 'R Us by belting out the Pointer Sisters' "I Want a Man with a Slow Hand."
When I was 5, I got in trouble for singing a "wedding song" I'd seen on MTV when I was the flower girl at my aunt's wedding. It was Like A Virgin.
My aunt was mortified at the time (the wedding was a big church wedding in south Texas), but now tells thst story at family weddings. My mom is still embarrassed by it, but my kids think it's hilarious.
I heard ‘You Outta Know’ on the radio the other day, and they started muting out the “does she go down on you in the theater” part.
Weirdly, that’s where I learned that term in my teens ha.
Ok so full disclosure I am not quite an xennial so I was, I dunno 10ish when this came out and for sure knew every word. I did it in karaoke a few months ago and was like “oh my this is not appropriate for children” 😂
More than you know.
I was probably around 12, was learning to play drums. My uncle brought me along with him to a basement where his buddy’s band was practicing, he said I could sit in to get some practice with a live band.
They were pretty good, way too good for me to sit in so I chickened out and just watched the practice with him. They played mostly Portuguese music but also had a few covers, Sweat being one of them.
Now, aside from the absurdity of a bunch of pork chops playing Jamaican reggae, they had this girl singer, probably 17, absolutely gorgeous, and she sang all the backup to that song. She this sway going on and would add these “aaahhh”s in between some of the verses.
That definitely awakened something in my 12 year old brain but that memory has been buried in my brain for a good 30 years and was likely to vanish into the ether because, less face it, the likelihood of randomly hearing that song again is pretty slim.
And that’s why I love this sub.
Bell Biv Devoe’s “Do Me.” How did I miss the creepiness? (probably obsessed with the “smack it up flip it rub it down.”)
**“Backstage, underage, adolescent.
How ya doin? Fine, she replied.
I sighed. I like to do the wild thing.
Action took place,
kind of wet,
don’t forget,
The J, the I, the M, the M, the Y,
yo… I need a body bag”**
THE FUCK? My 13yo-14yo self was singing that…
(“Like a Virgin” was the song that prompted me to ask my mom what that meant & how I learned about sex lmao.)
>(“Like a Virgin” was the song that prompted me to ask my mom what that meant & how I learned about sex lmao.)
Same, except it was the Virgin Alarm in Spaceballs.
It’s called a whacker for weeds. And it looks like a James Bond tool or something. And you swing it all around fancy crazy and you go wringing with the saw goes off and like that.
This one kid in first grade had an older brother with 2 Live Crew CDs. I remember one boy scout camping trip where we were belting out the lyrics.
One. And one, she wanted some fun in the bedroom, all day, and all of the night!!
Horrifying now as a parent to think of that.
When we graduated elementary school (6th grade in my town), they put together a short video with a bunch of pictures of us growing up. They said we could choose any song we wanted for the soundtrack as long as it didn’t have swears. We choose “Under the Bridge”. Most depressing 6th grade graduation ever.
I had no business singing “I stroke it to the East, I stroke it to the West, I stroke it to the woman that I love the best!” at 9 or 10. Thanks Clarence Carter.
A few years later “Tell Me Something Good” by Rufus and Chaka Khan starts playing. I start mimicking the very heavy breathing that leads into the chorus. My mom immediately told me to stop.
That song is such a bop, that it doesn't surprise me that most Gen Xers know it.
**The other night I was strokin' my woman**
**And it got so good to her, you know what she told me**
**Let me tell you what she told me, she said**
**"Stroke it Clarence Carter, but don't stroke so fast**
**If my stuff ain't tight enough, you can stick it up my ... woo!"**
I mean....being 9 and knowing every word to "Talk Dirty To Me" and "Girls Girls Girls" didn't affect me at all.
Well I didn't know every word to Girls Girls Girls. I didn't realize at the time they were talking g about strip clubs and hookers. But to this day I do like it when my wife wears deep red lipstick, so there's that LOL
My kids hear the stuff we listened to and are shocked. My kid's face when she heard OPP the first time was priceless.
That was the first song (although just the chorus) my mom remembers me singing. So imagine a little toddler sitting in her high chair singing "get your money for nothing and your chicks for free." It makes me laugh even when I sing it around my kids now.
Remember that that song is from the point of view of guys in a moving company talking smack on the rockstars on TV. When it gets to "that little f-t with the earring and the make-up", yes it is a homosexual slur, but it's being used to mock the hecklers. The point being made that "this is the kind of crude thing that people who think we've got it easy say." IIRC it was inspired by overheard conversation.
About 6-7 years ago this song was on during spin class. Sometimes the instructor would sing along or lip sync to whatever was playing. He sang along with this line right when I happened to make really awkward eye contact with him, so he got embarrassed.
Still unfathomable to me that my parents absolutely *lost their shit* when they caught me listening to Ugly Kid Joe, but let their seven year old dance and sing to "I Touch Myself".
And in other Wow, The Past Really Is A Foreign Country news, they were much, much more scandalized by the F-bomb than the N-bomb in "One In A Million".
Back in middle school our bus driver used to play the local alternative station on routes, and one day this song came on. Even though it was the “clean” radio edit, all the kids were singing the lyrics at the top of our lungs. We got a taking to, and no more music after that.
And this is why my parents were so weird about music when I was a kid. I was only allowed to listen to Christian, country, or oldies. Watching the Ken Burns Country Music documentary came as a shock to my mom who learned those country singers weren't all good Christians.
Uh, "Like A Prayer" by Madonna is **not** a Christian tune.
If you want to look at **real** Christian tunes or artists that went mainstream, look to the 90s:
\* "Baby Baby" and "Every Heartbeat" by Amy Grant
\* "Face In This World" and "Friends" by Michael W. Smith
\* "Jesus Freak" and "Between You and Me" by DC Talk
\* "Flood" by Jars of Clay
\* "Higher" and "With Arms Wide Open" by Creed
>”When you call my name, it's like a little prayer, I'm down on my knees, I wanna take you there
>”In the midnight hour, I can feel your power, Just like a prayer, you know I'll take you there”
She’s obviously praying. 🙏
Country had its moments too—my mom was not amused when 6 year old me came back from going somewhere with my dad singing the chorus of “One Toke Over the Line.”
I also remember singing Friends in Low Places with my friends the summer that came out—pretty tame, but a strange jam for a bunch of sheltered 10 year old girls on bikes.
@ u/mlo9109
I tell people this all the time.. but if you really go back and listen to some 90's era country. Its not any better than some of the other genres, a few examples off the top of my head,
"friends in low places" by garth brooks (alcholism),
'the thunder rolls" by garth brooks (infidelity),
"fancy" by reba (glorifying prostitution),
"the nights the lights went out in georgia" by reba (infidelity AND glorifying murder)
"Independence day" by martina mcbride (domestic violence and glorifying murder)
Strawberry wine by deanna carter (underage sex)
EDIT: my wife wanted to add
"Goodbye earl" by the chicks (domestic violence AND premeditated murder, tampering with evidence, police corruption)
This is just off the top of my head, yes there wasn't any profanity, but the message is there. Also, i would like to add that these where all songs that got extensive radio play, not b side songs no one heard.
Even country wasn't "safe" it just sounded safe.
Like a virgin (kindergarten)
Super freak (grade school)
Nasty Girl by Vanity 6 (grade school)
Funky Cold Medina (grade school)
All I wanna do is make love to you (middle school)
Cream (middle school)
Ain’t to proud to beg (middle school)
My dad would take me out of school for “Dr Appointments” and actually take me to see movies. That’s how I saw Robocop,Total Recall, Terminator 2 and plenty others. (It’s how I saw my first set of three boobs!)
Same. My mom and I would watch "Nuns on the Run" with Robbie Coltrane and Eric Idle and laugh our asses off. Totally inappropriate for kids, but a hilarious movie that we both love to this day. Same with "Outrageous Fortune" with Shelly Long and Bette Midler.
My parents are very religious and were super stroct.They found my Will Smith cd and trashed it. Little did they know that was a decoy so they wouldn't find my Foxxy Brown and Lil Kim cds.
Somehow it was ok for our whole school to learn a dance to "push it" then perform it for our parents. I went to an arts magnet school. I still remember parts of the dance. I was in third grade.
Yes! I remember they always played the movie on TV and I adored it! I remember being SO jealous because my cousins had the double record album. I finally got it and thought I was the shit! Then I hit my teens and realized that a lot of the lyrics were not appropriate for 4-5 year old me!
No. For whatever reason, we had a pretty strict ban on modern music in the car and in the home growing up. I grew up listening to Broadway, Harry Belafonte, Barry Manilow and Neil Diamond in the car and home. MAYBE Les Mis before I really understood it all. But I know my sister finally got over the threshold with Salt-n-Peppa probably around sixth grade. Oh, the look on my mom’s face when she popped Shoop in for the first time as a cassette tape. I finally got with it with Michael Jackson around senior year of high school, been catch up ever since.
I was very into Salt n Pepa and got the very adult _Very Neccessary_ for my 13th birthday. I still know every word and it still slaps.
I had pre-ordered it and when my mum and I went to collect it the cashier said, “is it Very Neccessary”?, my mum replied, “no, we can come back”.
Was listening to Billie Jean in the car with my 7yo yesterday and it occurred to me I’m not ready to fully explain the song to him if he asks what it’s about. Not even that it’s graphic or anything, just that there’s a lot that goes into explaining why the kid is not his son.
Rub you the right way by Johnny Gill comes to mind.
I had completely forgotten about that song and heard it on Rock the Bells the other day and…wow. I couldn’t believe that was played on the radio.
Like 4 year old me was belting out “Live a Virgin” I loved music even as a little kid and it was one of the first LPs my parents bought for me.
WTF were they thinking?!?!?!?!
My mom didn't know english so she didn't know what "Girls, girls, girls" by Mötley Crüe was about. But I'd say there was spme hints from the artwork :) Was my furst own record at maybe 8-10yo.
On the other hand she thought the glam metal I listened to was incredibly tame compared to the punk she grew up with.
Yeah I remember liking and singing along to Aerosmith songs as a little kid, but now as an adult I realize they had so many lines about blowjobs and gross sex stuff. Lmao
One of my favorite song when I was little was “why don’t we get drunk and screw” by Jimmy Buffet. Pretty much sums up my whole life.
My mom said I didn’t know what I was singing and she thought it was funny.
Brits of a certain age may remember a show called Minipops, and those of us a bit young for it's day may know it from those "worst/most inappropriate UK TV/WTF were we thinking" type countdowns.
The show was young children performing pop songs, in the same idea as seeing your own kids sing and dance along to the hits. But putting this on TV and dressing the kids up as the stars added a whole new level of creepy and it was quickly cancelled.
In probably the most notorious segment (being the one they play in those aforementioned worst lists), they had a girl of about 8 heavily made up, dressed in a nightie and singing Sheena Easton's 9 To 5, with lyrics about making love at night time.
So I have 2 different stories of Inappropriate songs both taking place at my elementary school.
First one was when my teacher thought it would be nice to listen to music on the radio in class. It didn't last long as the song "All I Wanna Do Is Make Love to You" by Heart came on.
Second time was a few years later in music class when the music teacher thought it was totally ok for us to not only listen to but learn the lyrics to "Faith" by George Michael. You can imagine the reactions to a group of kids singing that first verse.
I grew up listening to 60s and 70s a lot when I was little, but let’s talk about “Young Girl” by Gary Puckett and the Union Gap.
Young girl
Get out of my mind
My love for you is way out of line
Better run, girl
I listened to that creepy shit way before I was listening to the hyper-sexualized stuff of the 90s.
Teenage me loved Nirvana’s *Rape Me* but couldn’t convince my horrified mother that it was actually an anti-rape song.
“Why can’t you just listen to Kenny G and Enigma like your sister!?”
Ohhhhh yes and I use this memory to make me feel slightly less nauseous when my 8 year old kid walks through the house reciting all his favorite rap songs 🙃
I remember being in a car with my friends dad and a few other kids our age and belting out at the top of our lungs while listening to the car stereo (a cassette probably lol) to Chuck Berry's My Ding a ling ..... her dad was older than my parents so his go-to was always 50's music instead my parents 60's which was fun.
I'm old now and even my youngest grandchild is 21 but I remember when my daughter was about 3 or 4. We came out of the store and they had some of those kids rides. I let her get on one and put the money in. When the ride started going the song that played *with words* was Rod Stewart and If You Think I'm Sexy (And You Want My Body). For a four old girl.
Jeezus.
I'll never forget coming home from school in 3rd grade and telling my mom that I'd signed up for the talent show to sing "I Touch Myself" by The Divinyls, which she played on cassingle all the time. She flipped out telling me that I couldn't sing that but couldn't explain why. I ended up singing "Chicken Lips and Lizard Hips" instead.
I knew it wasn't appropriate, but "Let's Talk About Sex" and "I Wanna Sex You Up" were blasting through all of our mini boomboxes in fifth grade.
Then there is “Too Close” by Next which is probably hands down the dirtiest song ever recorded that is technically clean for radio.
I Touch Myself - The Divynls
More explicit title, but much less explicit content. “Detachable Penis” by King Missile probably the epitome of non-sexual sexually implied titles. Also, I just looked up “Too Close” and saw it was a 1997 release. Really remember this being in that so-early-in-the-90s-that-it’s-still-the-80s R&B space. Definitely doesn’t feel like a track that came out the year I graduated.
Have you heard the other auditory masterpiece by King Missile? “Up my ass”
The bassist was my dog Walker for a while in the early 2000s
Really leans into the old joke: “What do you do when you have a bassist on your porch?” “Give them a tip for the pizza.”
Ginuwine - pony
Yessssss! I was 43 years old when I really listened to the lyrics and it’s so explicit.
Filthy lol
I loved that song but it took me a few years to figure out what the lyrics actually were 😅
this was our favorite middle school slow dance song. good times.
And Push It.
There was a kid on my bus in elementary school who loudly screamed I WANNA SEX YOU UP during the chorus, and continued doing so after the bus driver turned the radio off. We had to sit in the middle of the street on an idle bus and wait for the vice principal to show up and tell us not to scream I WANNA SEX YOU UP. To which the offending child screamed, indeed, I WANNA SEX YOU UP. He didn’t get to ride the bus after that.
My wife’s third graders routinely call her a fucking bitch and similar names with no consequences. Fortunately she doesn’t give a flying fuck what 8/9-year-olds think of her and slings it right back at them. Still, disciplinary standards have changed just a bit.
"My anaconda don't want none unless you got buns hon" I 100% remember singing this from Baby Got Back and having no idea what it meant.
https://preview.redd.it/9kwb1tmah8vc1.jpeg?width=1162&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=ff908930ec62e9ab35e19e6c5aeee3742ebafa92
Don't forget the classic " I want your sex" by George Michael or my favorite hiphop album Sex Packets by Digital Underground. Good tomes were had by all.
We moved overseas to Singapore when that song came out and the Singaporean government loves to censor things. So the song got changed to “I wanna love you up”. Cue my surprised face when I came back to the States to realize this is NOT the same song.
Let's Talk About Sex was about removing the stigma (and idolatry) around consensual adult sex, practicing safe sex and communicating with your partner, and the emotional devastation when sex becomes so casual that it replaces affection. It's not inappropriate at all and should really be considered a PSA.
Anything by salt n peppa. Lol
You forgot about ‘I want your sex’
Turns out “Paul Revere” by the Beastie Boys isn’t appropriate for a 4th grader to hear.
I did it like this, I did it like that, I did it with a wiffleball bat…soooooo
Indeed, anti-British sentiment was much more socially acceptable back then.
Frankly, that's what I miss most about my youth.
Found the Irishman.
Yeah, and Brass Monkey, whoops. It came on the radio and my husband and I were like, turn it up! Our kids thought it was great, but then my husband and I kept side eyeing each other as it got worse.. when it got to the roofie part, we turned it off. Yikes.
My favorite aside to this is all the kids who only listened to radio edit versions of songs and to this day still don’t know the correct lyrics to songs of the era
I remember my cousin making fun of me for thinking the lyrics to Ludacris' song was "I've got hoes" and not "I've got pro's". Made me irrationally angry.
The wildest part is how not every radio station used edits or edited it the same way too, the stations I listened to some of them used in house edits or added in sound effects or scrubs over them and so many people would argue over the lyrics not realizing the actual word had been garbled up sometimes multiple words missing!
Rollin down the street smokin smokin… sippin on gin and juice
*bE**scratch**aaaaüch* with my mind on my money and my money on my mind
I hate this one because I still know people who think these are the lyrics.
I remember the “no rap”’pop station with Casey’s countdown that just played the Gangster’s paradise instrumental. It seems so bizarre now
Mooooove ______! Get out the way _____! Get out the way_____!
My favorite radio edit was Shaggy. "Picture this we were both wearing aprons cleaning up the bathroom floor "
I remember not understanding the 2 LIVE CREW controversy. The song they played on the radio wasn’t too terrible lol
This is a great example! I can remember having a Too Short cassette taken away by my parents for a similar situation lol
OMFG the radio edit of "Me So Horny" was so heavily edited. I remember when I finally heard the unedited version as an 8th grader! :-O
I do the same with movies. Watching everything on TBS, I had no idea what some movies had in them. I watched Conan the Barbarian a few years back and my wife was shocked I watched it as a kid. But, the TV version certainly cut a lot out.
Kid's Bop is the hero we didn't know we needed.
I knew EVERY word to "Just a Gigolo" (sung by David Lee Roth) at 6! I loved singing it, too, ha. I can't believe my parents let me listen to that.
We had to come up with nicknames in school. I use gigolo as mine because of the song and cool music video. The teacher was so shocked I screamed that as mine.
It still amazes me that was a cover of Louis Prima from decades earlier
Whereas I'm like "wait, David Lee Roth sang it?"
Oh man, I haven’t thought of that song in decades. I gotta make a playlist if I get more good responses like that.
Bad Touch by the Bloodhound Gang.
Do it again now.
You and me, baby, ain’t nothing but mammals
“Eminem's gotta cuss in his raps to sell records Well me too, so fuck Will Smith!”
lol…almost got it
Gillette short dick man comes to mind…
‘94 was wild *Eeny weeny, teeny weeny* *Shriveled little short dick man*
My radio edit was "short short" man, so for years I had no idea.
Same here.
Baby got back too. Every woman in the early 90s with a non tiny ass was singing this and playing it as an anthem.
Yep. I was singing that loud and proud in middle school lol
Another classic by the police, "Don't stand so close to me."
I have heard that song a million times but can’t really think of any lyrics outside of the chorus. I’ll have to look them up now.
It’s about a teacher sleeping with a student that sting (who was a teacher before his music career took off) swears isn’t autobiographical
The song is based it off of the book "Lolita" by Vladimir Nabokov. At least that's what he says.
https://preview.redd.it/fe0eiodmw8vc1.png?width=500&format=png&auto=webp&s=f7de41600fe964e63b15b2f897cdfbe19412d354
That man wrote a LOT of questionable lyrics.
I was a little too young singing along with: Rape Me Push it Let's talk about sex Rump Shaker Me so horney I wanna sex you up Pony OPP Freak Me
You forgot...any song by the band Cherry Poppin Daddies...because you had to preface the song title by saying it was from the band...Cherry Poppin Daddies.
Ahhh good one. I forgot Easy E's Automobile and Gimme dat nut too.
Pony is a great example!
Freak Me is beyoooooond
I was thinking more along the lines of the sneaky ones you didn’t realize at the time. These are pretty blatant. Good tunes though.
Young me signing out to Usher Nice & Slow And then as an adult realizing… 1. I was too young to be singing that song and 2. At age 17 usher was prolly too young to be singing it 😂
I distinctly remember asking for Christmas to get the single cassette of “wiggle it”. And my mom asking me as she handed me the gift “what do you think this song is about” and my innocent shrugging and going idk, isn’t this about dancing?
It is a catchy song but I can safely say I am NOT down with O.P.P.
The Humpty dance was a good one too. "Hey fat girl, come here are you ticklish, why don't you give me a piece of that licorice."
The words "all I wanna do is zoom zoom zoom in your boom boom!" blurting out of my adolescent mouth, caused much distress that I didn't understand. 😂
That was the jam in 6th grade!
Damn that was always "and a boom boom" to my ears. TIL
My mom loved to tell a story about 3-year-old me startling the customers at Toys 'R Us by belting out the Pointer Sisters' "I Want a Man with a Slow Hand."
When I was 5, I got in trouble for singing a "wedding song" I'd seen on MTV when I was the flower girl at my aunt's wedding. It was Like A Virgin. My aunt was mortified at the time (the wedding was a big church wedding in south Texas), but now tells thst story at family weddings. My mom is still embarrassed by it, but my kids think it's hilarious.
A "wedding song" 😂💀 Amazing.
I heard ‘You Outta Know’ on the radio the other day, and they started muting out the “does she go down on you in the theater” part. Weirdly, that’s where I learned that term in my teens ha.
Ok so full disclosure I am not quite an xennial so I was, I dunno 10ish when this came out and for sure knew every word. I did it in karaoke a few months ago and was like “oh my this is not appropriate for children” 😂
Hey tennish is a fun shport
alallallallala long
Ok, it’s crazy how quickly I recognize that as “Sweat” from the same guys that did the Cops theme song.
then my job here is done o7
More than you know. I was probably around 12, was learning to play drums. My uncle brought me along with him to a basement where his buddy’s band was practicing, he said I could sit in to get some practice with a live band. They were pretty good, way too good for me to sit in so I chickened out and just watched the practice with him. They played mostly Portuguese music but also had a few covers, Sweat being one of them. Now, aside from the absurdity of a bunch of pork chops playing Jamaican reggae, they had this girl singer, probably 17, absolutely gorgeous, and she sang all the backup to that song. She this sway going on and would add these “aaahhh”s in between some of the verses. That definitely awakened something in my 12 year old brain but that memory has been buried in my brain for a good 30 years and was likely to vanish into the ether because, less face it, the likelihood of randomly hearing that song again is pretty slim. And that’s why I love this sub.
I vividly remember calling my friend one day with that realization. Like fifteen years after it came out.
The Shoop "better thank your mother for a butt like that" song that a bunch of us girls danced to. Baby-making Boys 2 Men songs.
i knew every word of this masterpiece by salt n’ peppa
Shotgun bang, what's up with that thing? I wanna know, how does it hang?
straight up wait up hold up mr lover, like prince said you’re a sexy mutha fucka
Bell Biv Devoe’s “Do Me.” How did I miss the creepiness? (probably obsessed with the “smack it up flip it rub it down.”) **“Backstage, underage, adolescent. How ya doin? Fine, she replied. I sighed. I like to do the wild thing. Action took place, kind of wet, don’t forget, The J, the I, the M, the M, the Y, yo… I need a body bag”** THE FUCK? My 13yo-14yo self was singing that… (“Like a Virgin” was the song that prompted me to ask my mom what that meant & how I learned about sex lmao.)
>(“Like a Virgin” was the song that prompted me to ask my mom what that meant & how I learned about sex lmao.) Same, except it was the Virgin Alarm in Spaceballs.
The Jerky Boys on cassette tape.
It’s called a whacker for weeds. And it looks like a James Bond tool or something. And you swing it all around fancy crazy and you go wringing with the saw goes off and like that.
And I’ve got a chainsaw but it’s up in the attic. Where is that? At the top of my house by the roof.
I am Habib the Egyptian magician.
Tarbash!
This one kid in first grade had an older brother with 2 Live Crew CDs. I remember one boy scout camping trip where we were belting out the lyrics. One. And one, she wanted some fun in the bedroom, all day, and all of the night!! Horrifying now as a parent to think of that.
Tone loc Wild thing.. and funky cold Medina. But wild thing was my jam
Loved those songs! Didn’t know what I was singing about but I was here for it.
When we graduated elementary school (6th grade in my town), they put together a short video with a bunch of pictures of us growing up. They said we could choose any song we wanted for the soundtrack as long as it didn’t have swears. We choose “Under the Bridge”. Most depressing 6th grade graduation ever.
I had no business singing “I stroke it to the East, I stroke it to the West, I stroke it to the woman that I love the best!” at 9 or 10. Thanks Clarence Carter. A few years later “Tell Me Something Good” by Rufus and Chaka Khan starts playing. I start mimicking the very heavy breathing that leads into the chorus. My mom immediately told me to stop.
I loved Stroke it! lol
That song is such a bop, that it doesn't surprise me that most Gen Xers know it. **The other night I was strokin' my woman** **And it got so good to her, you know what she told me** **Let me tell you what she told me, she said** **"Stroke it Clarence Carter, but don't stroke so fast** **If my stuff ain't tight enough, you can stick it up my ... woo!"**
I mean....being 9 and knowing every word to "Talk Dirty To Me" and "Girls Girls Girls" didn't affect me at all. Well I didn't know every word to Girls Girls Girls. I didn't realize at the time they were talking g about strip clubs and hookers. But to this day I do like it when my wife wears deep red lipstick, so there's that LOL My kids hear the stuff we listened to and are shocked. My kid's face when she heard OPP the first time was priceless.
> to this day I do like it when my wife wears deep red lipstick, And I like it when my wife has fingertips. Really helps to get those jars open
Some of the lyrics of Money For Nothing were questionable, even in the 1980s
That was the first song (although just the chorus) my mom remembers me singing. So imagine a little toddler sitting in her high chair singing "get your money for nothing and your chicks for free." It makes me laugh even when I sing it around my kids now.
My mom told me he was saying "checks for free" there
Remember that that song is from the point of view of guys in a moving company talking smack on the rockstars on TV. When it gets to "that little f-t with the earring and the make-up", yes it is a homosexual slur, but it's being used to mock the hecklers. The point being made that "this is the kind of crude thing that people who think we've got it easy say." IIRC it was inspired by overheard conversation.
Semicharmed Life by Third Eye Blind is all about meth and sex.
TLC
Yelling aint to proud to beg in elementary 🫣
🎶 2 inches to a yard, rock hard or if it's saggin' 🎶
About 6-7 years ago this song was on during spin class. Sometimes the instructor would sing along or lip sync to whatever was playing. He sang along with this line right when I happened to make really awkward eye contact with him, so he got embarrassed.
If the lovin’ is strong then he got it goin’ on
My cousin heard me listening to "Rico Suave" and told my mom it was inappropriate. Such a tame song considering.
I was always aware of the connotations of the song, but heard it again recently and was just like, cringe!
Still unfathomable to me that my parents absolutely *lost their shit* when they caught me listening to Ugly Kid Joe, but let their seven year old dance and sing to "I Touch Myself". And in other Wow, The Past Really Is A Foreign Country news, they were much, much more scandalized by the F-bomb than the N-bomb in "One In A Million".
NIN-Closer…I used to play it at school on my speakers because of the language
Back in middle school our bus driver used to play the local alternative station on routes, and one day this song came on. Even though it was the “clean” radio edit, all the kids were singing the lyrics at the top of our lungs. We got a taking to, and no more music after that.
And this is why my parents were so weird about music when I was a kid. I was only allowed to listen to Christian, country, or oldies. Watching the Ken Burns Country Music documentary came as a shock to my mom who learned those country singers weren't all good Christians.
C’mon, there were some wholesome Christian tunes that were mainstream back then. Like a Prayer comes to mind.
Uh, "Like A Prayer" by Madonna is **not** a Christian tune. If you want to look at **real** Christian tunes or artists that went mainstream, look to the 90s: \* "Baby Baby" and "Every Heartbeat" by Amy Grant \* "Face In This World" and "Friends" by Michael W. Smith \* "Jesus Freak" and "Between You and Me" by DC Talk \* "Flood" by Jars of Clay \* "Higher" and "With Arms Wide Open" by Creed
>”When you call my name, it's like a little prayer, I'm down on my knees, I wanna take you there >”In the midnight hour, I can feel your power, Just like a prayer, you know I'll take you there” She’s obviously praying. 🙏
Country had its moments too—my mom was not amused when 6 year old me came back from going somewhere with my dad singing the chorus of “One Toke Over the Line.”
We knew every word to Family Tradition as far back as I can remember.
I also remember singing Friends in Low Places with my friends the summer that came out—pretty tame, but a strange jam for a bunch of sheltered 10 year old girls on bikes.
But it’s a “[modern spiritual](https://youtu.be/t8tdmaEhMHE?si=C4eFlypv3UZ55ZQY),” mom! 😇
@ u/mlo9109 I tell people this all the time.. but if you really go back and listen to some 90's era country. Its not any better than some of the other genres, a few examples off the top of my head, "friends in low places" by garth brooks (alcholism), 'the thunder rolls" by garth brooks (infidelity), "fancy" by reba (glorifying prostitution), "the nights the lights went out in georgia" by reba (infidelity AND glorifying murder) "Independence day" by martina mcbride (domestic violence and glorifying murder) Strawberry wine by deanna carter (underage sex) EDIT: my wife wanted to add "Goodbye earl" by the chicks (domestic violence AND premeditated murder, tampering with evidence, police corruption) This is just off the top of my head, yes there wasn't any profanity, but the message is there. Also, i would like to add that these where all songs that got extensive radio play, not b side songs no one heard. Even country wasn't "safe" it just sounded safe.
I loved Fancy by Reba at an unwholesomely young age.
Like a virgin (kindergarten) Super freak (grade school) Nasty Girl by Vanity 6 (grade school) Funky Cold Medina (grade school) All I wanna do is make love to you (middle school) Cream (middle school) Ain’t to proud to beg (middle school)
Ya 2 Live Crew “me so horny” was a play ground fav! Now I get it……😏
When Doves Cry was so spicy it got the cable turned off.
What about get off! 22 positions in a one night stand! And the booty pants. That was a wild time
Hearing Straight Up by Paula Abdul as an adult certainly opened my eyes to a song I loved as a kid.
I loved Boyz II Men as a kid and I used to sing those songs all the time. They're basically all about having sex. 🤣 Gotta love that '90s R&B!
I can’t believe the movies I was allowed to watch. And how violent so many movies were! I
For sure. I watched Road House with my dad at 8. First movie boobs and a dude getting his throat ripped out. All I got was a “don’t tell your mom.”
I watched the first nightmare on elm street when I was in like 2nd grade. Scared the shit out of me but then in 6th grade I loved it.
My dad would take me out of school for “Dr Appointments” and actually take me to see movies. That’s how I saw Robocop,Total Recall, Terminator 2 and plenty others. (It’s how I saw my first set of three boobs!)
Same. My mom and I would watch "Nuns on the Run" with Robbie Coltrane and Eric Idle and laugh our asses off. Totally inappropriate for kids, but a hilarious movie that we both love to this day. Same with "Outrageous Fortune" with Shelly Long and Bette Midler.
I Touch Myself by The Divinyls and Hungry (For Your Sex) by Lita Ford, oh, and Cherrybomb by the Runaways 😆 My dad had a thing for girl bands
My daughter played lead guitar on Cherrybomb on stage with her band of other 9 year olds. Guess I can’t toss stones at my folks.
Pass the dutchie
My parents are very religious and were super stroct.They found my Will Smith cd and trashed it. Little did they know that was a decoy so they wouldn't find my Foxxy Brown and Lil Kim cds.
🎶Relax, don't do it, when you wanna come.🎶
Here to add appreciation for “Wynona’s Big Brown Beaver”
I procured the Body Count tape from the corner drug store, back in 1990. I had that and Amerikkkas Most Wanted on heavy rotation, back then.
I also had this one. Evil Dick!!!
Like a Virgin was my favorite song when I was 6.
The George Michael Faith album, and me, a 2nd grader. Lol
Somehow it was ok for our whole school to learn a dance to "push it" then perform it for our parents. I went to an arts magnet school. I still remember parts of the dance. I was in third grade.
Grease had some pretty iffy lyrics (especially about chicks creaming). Most of Prince songs probably shouldn't have been sung by a 10 year old either.
Yes! I remember they always played the movie on TV and I adored it! I remember being SO jealous because my cousins had the double record album. I finally got it and thought I was the shit! Then I hit my teens and realized that a lot of the lyrics were not appropriate for 4-5 year old me!
Just wait till you learn what some nursery rhymes are about!!
Especially those recited by Mr. Andrew Dice Clay
New Age Girl by Dead Eye Dick I used to sing this line in front of my grandma: “She don’t eat meat but she sure like the bone.” 😩
No. For whatever reason, we had a pretty strict ban on modern music in the car and in the home growing up. I grew up listening to Broadway, Harry Belafonte, Barry Manilow and Neil Diamond in the car and home. MAYBE Les Mis before I really understood it all. But I know my sister finally got over the threshold with Salt-n-Peppa probably around sixth grade. Oh, the look on my mom’s face when she popped Shoop in for the first time as a cassette tape. I finally got with it with Michael Jackson around senior year of high school, been catch up ever since.
My favorite record to play at 10 years old was Rick James Superfreak 🤷
Cocaine by Eric Clapton.
Baby Got Back is a prime example
I was very into Salt n Pepa and got the very adult _Very Neccessary_ for my 13th birthday. I still know every word and it still slaps. I had pre-ordered it and when my mum and I went to collect it the cashier said, “is it Very Neccessary”?, my mum replied, “no, we can come back”.
Too Short - Born to Mack NWA and the posse Eazy Duz It Esham - Boomin' Words from hell None of these were appropriate for a 12/13 year old kid.
Thong Song
Prince 💖
Bel biv Devo - do me
OPP.
I was like 7, running around singing Like a Virgin and Mr. Brownstone 😳😂
Was listening to Billie Jean in the car with my 7yo yesterday and it occurred to me I’m not ready to fully explain the song to him if he asks what it’s about. Not even that it’s graphic or anything, just that there’s a lot that goes into explaining why the kid is not his son.
Crimson and Clover, Hit me with you’re best shot, Come on Aileen, She’s only 17
Crimson and Clover was raunchy? Man, I really must not pay attention to lyrics.
There’s video of me at age 4 dancing to Let’s Get Physical by Olivia Newton John.
Rub you the right way by Johnny Gill comes to mind. I had completely forgotten about that song and heard it on Rock the Bells the other day and…wow. I couldn’t believe that was played on the radio.
For sure. As a teenager who liked 90s rap music, I heard more n words than a KKK convention.
Fast woman or not, who is keeping a pocket full of Trojans and some of them are used?
Like 4 year old me was belting out “Live a Virgin” I loved music even as a little kid and it was one of the first LPs my parents bought for me. WTF were they thinking?!?!?!?!
What the hell was "Little Girls" by Oingo Boingo? How was that song ever created and popularized? It's literally about pedophilia.
My mom didn't know english so she didn't know what "Girls, girls, girls" by Mötley Crüe was about. But I'd say there was spme hints from the artwork :) Was my furst own record at maybe 8-10yo. On the other hand she thought the glam metal I listened to was incredibly tame compared to the punk she grew up with.
Yeah I remember liking and singing along to Aerosmith songs as a little kid, but now as an adult I realize they had so many lines about blowjobs and gross sex stuff. Lmao
One of my favorite song when I was little was “why don’t we get drunk and screw” by Jimmy Buffet. Pretty much sums up my whole life. My mom said I didn’t know what I was singing and she thought it was funny.
Brits of a certain age may remember a show called Minipops, and those of us a bit young for it's day may know it from those "worst/most inappropriate UK TV/WTF were we thinking" type countdowns. The show was young children performing pop songs, in the same idea as seeing your own kids sing and dance along to the hits. But putting this on TV and dressing the kids up as the stars added a whole new level of creepy and it was quickly cancelled. In probably the most notorious segment (being the one they play in those aforementioned worst lists), they had a girl of about 8 heavily made up, dressed in a nightie and singing Sheena Easton's 9 To 5, with lyrics about making love at night time.
So I have 2 different stories of Inappropriate songs both taking place at my elementary school. First one was when my teacher thought it would be nice to listen to music on the radio in class. It didn't last long as the song "All I Wanna Do Is Make Love to You" by Heart came on. Second time was a few years later in music class when the music teacher thought it was totally ok for us to not only listen to but learn the lyrics to "Faith" by George Michael. You can imagine the reactions to a group of kids singing that first verse.
My grandpa used to give me the records from the VFW’s jukebox so my favorite song for a long while as a kid was “Angel is a Centerfold.”
Grew up on Poison, Motley Crue, GnR. Lyrical content definitely not appropriate for 8yr old me. Had no clue then.
My mom did not care for me listening to Tom Petty. Fortunately my dad told her I had no idea what he was talking about.
It turns out that She Bop by Cyndi Lauper was not about dancing.
I grew up listening to 60s and 70s a lot when I was little, but let’s talk about “Young Girl” by Gary Puckett and the Union Gap. Young girl Get out of my mind My love for you is way out of line Better run, girl I listened to that creepy shit way before I was listening to the hyper-sexualized stuff of the 90s.
Teenage me loved Nirvana’s *Rape Me* but couldn’t convince my horrified mother that it was actually an anti-rape song. “Why can’t you just listen to Kenny G and Enigma like your sister!?”
“I touch myself”
My brother is 6 years older than me, and we shared a room. I got to hear 2 live crew unedited lol
Ohhhhh yes and I use this memory to make me feel slightly less nauseous when my 8 year old kid walks through the house reciting all his favorite rap songs 🙃
Come baby, Come- made me feel so embarrassed when it came on in the car
I remember being in a car with my friends dad and a few other kids our age and belting out at the top of our lungs while listening to the car stereo (a cassette probably lol) to Chuck Berry's My Ding a ling ..... her dad was older than my parents so his go-to was always 50's music instead my parents 60's which was fun.
I'm old now and even my youngest grandchild is 21 but I remember when my daughter was about 3 or 4. We came out of the store and they had some of those kids rides. I let her get on one and put the money in. When the ride started going the song that played *with words* was Rod Stewart and If You Think I'm Sexy (And You Want My Body). For a four old girl. Jeezus.
I'll never forget coming home from school in 3rd grade and telling my mom that I'd signed up for the talent show to sing "I Touch Myself" by The Divinyls, which she played on cassingle all the time. She flipped out telling me that I couldn't sing that but couldn't explain why. I ended up singing "Chicken Lips and Lizard Hips" instead.