By Abby Burrows, Jen Capriola, Elaine Mei
Art by Isabel Burke (@the.flightless.artist on Instagram)
This is not a sex playlist; this is a playlist about sex. Lucky for us, there’s no one way to write a song about “it.” Like sex itself, the sonic landscape of this playlist is varied in tempo, in rhythm, dynamics, duration. Everyone’s personal sex discography is varied, incongruous at times, and ever-evolving — our collection of songs will be no different.
The sex of Fiona Apple’s “I Want You to Love Me” is obsessive and desperate as she demands that simple yet elusive thing — love. While Apple’s plea is as unrequited as her love, Danny Brown’s “I Will” and Doja Cat’s “Go to Town” form a conversation about sex that is reciprocal: there is pleasure in giving as well as receiving. “Montero” is maybe the most complex conversation of all: a conversation within himself. For Lil Nas X, the interplay of queerness, masculinity, Blackness, and religion manfiests in a relationship with sex that is equally as fraught as it is liberating.
The artistry contained in these songs reflects the idea that sex itself is a creative process — as an invitation for individuals and partners to reimagine pleasure as a space where the rules and regulations enforced by the outside world no longer apply. So what do we do with this imagination, if our vocabulary around sex is so often inherited through violence and trauma? Maybe these artists can offer some solutions through lyrics that rewrites sex as ours: as messy, as awkward, as loving, as demeaning, as passionate, as outrageous, as lonely, as empowering, as all of the above.
What about the rest of Spare Rib?
We asked the members of Spare Rib for their favorite songs to have sex to –– here's what they told us.
Spare Rib's Crowd-Sourced Sex Songs:
Pynk by janelle monae
Pink matter by frank ocean
The night me and your mama met by Childish Gambino
Smooth by Orion sun
Bite by Troye Sivan
Shea Butter Baby by Ari Lennox
Dress by Taylor Swift
poplar st. by glass animals
hello! by role model
you showed me by the turtles
Body Gold by Oh Wonder
Holy by King Princess
All the good girls go to hell by Billie eilish
let it happen by tame impala
505 by arctic monkeys
robbers by the 1975
can i by kehlani
water by kehlani
drown by baekhyun
touch me by victoria monet ft kehlani
pussy fairy by jhene aiko
light a flame by seventeen
telepatia by kali uchis
tail by sunmi
singularity by bts
one of these nights by the eagles
sabrina claudio by unravel me
Motivate by Little Mix
Freak by Little Mix
Kiwi by Harry Styles
Mind Over Matter by Anthony Ramos
Corazón Delator by Soda Stereo
Apocalypse by Cigarettes After Sex
Motivation by Normani
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/6TqJwrei1LmLryiA7iBE4i?si=24cf0d37362148cb
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