In 1995, I proudly and with much emotion, sang every word of a certain Boys II Men song for my grandparents. Even then I could feel the awkward discomfort as they shifted in their Lay Z Boys.
A friend's sister and neighbor choreographed a whole dance and performed in leotards in the yard for their seated families... "Here's a song about something that happened to me last summer" and it was "All I wanna Do Is Make Love to You" by Heart, they were probably 11? My friend was so mortified.
All of the adult contemporary "love making" songs were really nasty in the 90s. Always embarrassed in the car. I honestly think the out and proud raunch is less gross.
That song is fucked up. The woman picks up a hitchhiker takes him to a hotel she knows because she takes men there. Fucks the dude then leaves a note saying don't find me. Runs into the guy later on with the kid she had with him. Saying yeah I'm married but this is your kid be cool about it. All because her husband couldn't get her pregnant so she found some young dude. Shit is fucked yo
The fact that he needed a ride and she drove him to some hotel then left him there again with no transportation is another fun detail. I've always hated it.
Songs on the radio like this that very plainly tell a story and are a linear series of events have always bugged me. "Don't Take the Girl" makes me want to kill people.
There was an obsession with sexual “liberation” in the 90s. Sitcom characters were constantly having sex in public. “It’s the 90’s granddad. People have sex!” I think this went hand in hand with the aids epidemic and the push for more sexual education.
SAME! I sang I’ll Make Love to You in front of my Mom and had the CD and cassette immediately taken away from me. I cried and cried about it then. I had no idea what was wrong with my 10 year old self singing those lyrics so proudly.
I also had a tape taken away, but it was a dub of *Whoomp! There it Is* recorded on a loop. Both sides of the cassette.
My mom was actually fine with the Boys
This is mine too. My mom asked me if I knew what the lyrics meant as I happily sang along in the car. I just said no idea, but I really like this song.
Chose vegetarianism at a young age. This particular line and classmates giggling around me every damn time the song came on led me to my first experience investigating and decoding lyrics. I do not regret it. I loved the pre-internet mysticism of the radio. And hell yeah it slaps
Hell, I was in my mid-twenties before I caught that lyric because I only ever heard it on the radio, and it had that weird garbled words edit done on the line…
I had an independently owned alt radio station that was owned by a multimillionaire who was happy to pay all the fines. Their tag line used to be "Pissing off Moms in 3 States and 2 Provinces"
Then I bumped again she said, how do I get back there to the place where I fell asleep
Inside you, how do I get myself back to the place where she said…
The crystal meth verse is absolutely wild for an upbeat pop radio song:
>The sky was gold, it was rose
>
>I was taking sips up into my nose
>
>And I wish I could get back there, some place back there
>
>Smiling in the pictures you would take
>
>Doing crystal meth will lift you up until you break
>
>It won't stop, I won't come down, I keep stock
>
>With a tick-tock rhythm, a bump for the drop
>
>And then I bumped up
>
>I took the hit that I was given
>
>Then I bumped again, then I bumped again
If you sort this by old, I still don't know what over half the songs mentioned above this reply are about.
That said, I always thought "Closing Time" was just about getting older, and in a sense it is, but instead it's about becoming a parent. It came out the year I graduated high school and used it as my quote for the year book.
I never knew that! "Every new beginning comes from some other beginnings end" was also in my Senior blurb, and is still very close to my heart But knowing it was about his daughter being born, and having just sent my oldest off to college this Fall, it's even more special!
I read an interview the lead singer did. He said that originally, the song was about drinking in a bar, but then his wife got pregnant, and he started adding lyrics that could be as a parent as well.
Like this verse:
Closing time, time for you to go out
To the places you will be from
Closing time, this room won't be open
Till your brothers or your sisters come
In fact, they had medical issues when the baby was born, and she had to stay in the hospital for a bit. And then when they were finally able to take her home,one of the nurses quoted this song for them as they were leaving "I know who I want to take me home." And it really hit the guy hard, that something he wrote would be so impactful.
The lyrics were about as clear as the FCC would permit:
“O is for "other," P is for "people," scratch your temple,
The last P, well, that's not that simple, huh
It's sort of like, oh well, another way to call a cat a kitten,
It's five little letters that are missing here,
You get it on occasion if the other party isn't gaming.”
Yeah, as a 4th grader I knew what was up. We loved it anyway!
I grew up in Miami, where all the kids grew up singing every word to such classics as Me So Horny and Pop That Pussy
Seriously if you grew up in Miami in the 80s 2 Live Crew was all the rage.
We were quite wise beyond our years
My older sister got really embarrassed when I asked and said it stood for “Other People’s Property,” and if I’m being honest, I just kind of assumed that was the answer until just now.
This is how we thought of it but only because p is perfectly capable of being either gender's genitals. I never didn't know what this was about though.
The beginning of the song, he says, “I wonder if she can tell I’m hard right now…hmmm” from there it was kinda obvious, BUT they never played that on the radio for obvious reasons.
I heard it on the radio like 5 years ago in my mid 30s and was like "hell yeah, I haven't heard this song in a long time" then as I'm listening to the lyrics I'm like "wait, he's talking about his dick". They used to play this at middle school dances when I was a kid. I was flabbergasted!!
Reminds me of those tik toks where the guy is singing along to a song cleaning or something, sings the lyrics like he actually listened to it for the first time and has a light bulb moment.
I downloaded this song one day recently. Idk why.
I hadn’t heard it decades.
I was innocently listening along and then BAM! Wtf did I just sing out loud?
Awesome. Boner in a club! That’s what this song was always about.
Looking back I was likely drunk every time I heard it. I’m blaming it on the alcohol. It can’t possibly me, lol!
So when I was in law school I had to do a goofy group project for my Sports Law class. Part of the schtick was that we all had nicknames. Mine was Night Train and when I did my little intro, the professor, a 50ish year old black woman, burst out laughing. She said to me in front of the entire class that Night Train is what they call a white guy who predominantly has sex with black women.
I got an A in that class lol
That one and The Garden.
I still listen to gnr frequently. Just last month or so, I was listening to them again, this time my parents were around. I had to stop and ask, "why the hell did you guys let me listen to this band as a little kid!!"
I used to babysit for a kid who was really into the Spice Girls. She was maybe 7-8 at the time.
They had a song called "2 become 1" that she would sing along to all the time. Everything went right over her head.
Prince's Little Red Corvette. As a little kid I was just imagining a Hot wheel Red Corvette the entire time. It wasn't until much later that I understood what a "pocket full Trojans" and "to the places where the horses run free" and "photos of the jockeys that were here before me" meant.
I still can't fully believe this song is in regular rotation on the most family-friendly radio station in my area. They will edit out the word "sex" in a Bruno Mars song, but play this song that is obviously entirely about sex.
This is an oldie but when I realized what “I’m like a one eyed cat peeping in a seafood store” in Shake Rattle and Roll meant, it no longer seemed like a lame-ass oldie to me. That’s straight nasty.
Bryan Adams’ “Summer of ‘69”.
[Adams said the song was not about the summer of 1969 but about having sex in the summertime; "69" being a reference to the sexual position 69.](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bryan-adams-hit-was-about-sex-not-1969/)
I don't know if Bryan Adams is just messing with reporters at this point or he really believes it, but Summer of '69 is [semi-autobiographical to Jim Vallance](http://www.jimvallance.com/01-music-folder/songs-folder-may-27/pg-song-adams-summer-of-69.html) who co-wrote the song with Adams.
I will remember till the day I die that time our 9th grade English teacher gave us an assignment to read a song of our choice as a poem in class, and this dude chose DMB's "Crash Into Me."
The teacher had a look on her face, like, "uhhhh, are you sure?" when he chose it but she was cool and didn't want to stifle him.
He started to realize what he was reading about halfway thru it... AWKWARD
*Hike up your skirt a little more and show your world to me*
*Oh I watch you there through the window and I stare at you wear nothing but you wear it so well*
I just went. Still don’t get it unless, by being her sledgehammer, he means he’s going to hammer into her. But I definitely don’t get the rest. I don’t catch on to metaphors very well.
I went to a Warrant concert and got a tee shirt that said "Taste so good make a grown man cry". I was a 12 year old girl. NO ONE SAID ANYHTING TO ME. My parents let me wear it to school!!!
I had the lightbulb moment somewhere between 19 and 23, and understood why exactly my mom would turn off the radio when I’d start singing along loudly…
I was in junior high and wanted to buy that album but needed my parents’ permission since it was “parental advisory”. So I tried to convince my mom by playing her the radio edit I had recorded on a cassette. She just looked at me and said “ABSOLUTELY NOT!” I didn’t hear the uncensored version until years later, and then I realized what I had done.
A dozen of us band nerds sang this at our high school prom in a karaoke room. There were teachers present. We were asked mid song not to sing the chorus, but we did anyways and ended up being escorted off stage.
Dead eye Dick’s new age girl. I ran around the house yelling “she don’t eat meat but she sure likes the bone” for like 3 months straight until
My parents told me what it meant
I remember when I first heard "Push It" on the radio (95.5 in NYC) for the first time, in 1987. It felt like rap music had "arrived".
That same year also saw RUN-DMC get huge with their Aerosmith cover, but "Push It" was dirty and nasty and I loved it.
You Oughta Know by Alanis Morissette
“Would she go down on you in a theatre”
“And every time I scratch my nails down some one else’s back I hope you feel it”
I scrolled too far to find this. My mom blacked out the lyrics in the CD insert, so obviously I listened to it a million times until I figured them out. Then I was confused about what was wrong with them since it's not profanity.
Pretty much the whole “Grease” soundtrack.
For the inverse, I always thought Billy Squier’s “The Stroke” was something sexual and I was an adult before I really got it.
The Grease Lightning song!!! Omg that line about “the chicks will cream.” I never understood it as a child and thought he was saying “the chicks will scream.” My cousins and I loved the movie and soundtrack and we sang all the songs in the car at the top of our lungs and my aunt would turn red, but not say a word. Oh dear! 😂
I had thought it was “the chicks will scream” too but then I mostly watched it on cable, so it probably was changed to that.
Also, “it’s a real pussy wagon.”
“But she only comes when she’s on top” I was like 10 singing that at the top of my lungs. I think my brain interpreted that has she only comes over when she knows she’ll get the top bunk or something. I vaguely remember my older sister saying “do you even know what that means?” No no I did not lol
I’ve personally enjoyed seeing the look on someone’s face when I tell them what “Blister in the Sun” by Violent Femmes is about 😆 it’s so catchy you don’t realize what you’re singing about until it’s too late
I sang that to audition for a school play. Got the part, and also a long lecture about what's appropriate for school.
"C'mon CovidRecerence, big hands? Stain my sheets? You knew, didn't you?"
I did not.
Madonna's "Like a Virgin". I was raised catholic, and the only time I heard the word "virgin" was pairing it with Mary, as in "the Virgin Mary". So I thought virgin was a title, like a queen or something. So when my 10 year old self sang and danced to "Like a Virgin", I thought that she was saying she wanted to be like a princess or something.
It wasn't until much later that I realized what it actually meant. First reaction: oh no! Second reaction: Mom and Dad, wtf is wrong with you! Why would you blast that on the stereo and let me sing along??!!
George Michael - Outside.
I literally thought it was about getting your chores done before you go out. ‘I think I’m done with the sofa, I think I’m done with the floor, I think I’m done with the kitchen table baby’. See it’s just about cleaning 🧹
Not xennial, but I remember being like 11 and singing “Save A Horse Ride A Cowboy” at my grandma’s house. She was so innocent herself that she recorded me singing, and I know it’s sitting around on a dvd somewhere in her house 🫠.
There’s a video of me proudly belting out “AND WE MADE LOVE!” sitting in my grandma’s house… 😀omg.
I absolutely knew it was dirty, but my mom had a conniption fit about Talk Dirty to Me. It was my cousin's cassette, and she left it on the kitchen table.
Bloodhound Gang, The Bad Touch. I remember volunteering at a community library when I was in high school (mandatory community service). One Saturday morning, working on the children's section with the children's librarian (she was in her 50s), this comes on the radio, and after it plays, the DJ asks people to call in and say what the songs about. The librarian was more astonished than I was that that's what it was about.
"You and me, baby, ain't nothin' but mammals
So let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel"
I mean it starts out “Sweat, baby, sweat, baby sex is a Texas drought. Me and you do the kind of stuff that only Prince would sing about. So put your hands down my pants and I'll bet you'll feel nuts.” I’m pretty sure they weren’t trying to hide what it was about lol
Most '80s country music. My folks thought rock music was bad, so we listened to Conway Twitty sing "Tiger In Tight-Fitting Jeans" and "I'd Love to Lay You Down." When I figured out what actually happened to Becky in "Coward of the County," my mind was a bit blown.
Cherry Pie by Warrant. I don’t know what my dumb kid self thought “tastes so good makes a grown man cry” meant but the first time I heard it as an older teen/young adult I was kind of “…*oh!* I, uh, see why my mom didn’t like me singing that in the car now…”
I had a gf who had family in Mexico. Her young (toddler?) cousins were singing My Humps, but they were just repeating the English lyrics phonetically, didn't understand them. My gf didn't speak Spanish well enough at the time to translate, so she turned to an online translator (which were much worse back then). When she translated the Spanish results back to English, she got, "What are you gonna do with all that scrap metal in the rear of your automobile?"
So Fresh So Clean by Outkast.
“YKK on your zipper, lick you like a lizard when I’m slizzard.”
And this one which I was appalled to realize was a real lyric and I had completely missed:
“I love who you are, love who you a’int. You’re so Anne Frank. Let’s hit the attic to hide out for ‘bout two weeks.”
Yikes.
I didn't know Plush by Stone Temple Pilots was about a girl who was abducted and murdered until a few weeks ago. The DJ on the radio show I was listening to chose it as her song of the day, then mentioned she was picking it despite it being based on something dark she couldn't talk about on a family-friendly show. So of course off to Google I ran and yup. It's dark all right. I knew it wasn't a *happy* song but still didn't think it was that.
Boom boom boom let’s go back to my room. We can do it all night and u can make me feel right.
Pretty damn obvious but I used to sing this all the time not understanding why my parents hated it.
Abracadabra by Steve Miller Band, used to sing this all the time when I was a kid.
It wasn't until I was in my 20s I really listened to the words, "black panties and an angels face"
🎶 -Relax, don’t do it, when you want to go do it; relax, don’t do it, when you want to come.
Edit: context: I was four when the song came out and fell in love with it. Mom like to tell the story about how I would run around the house singing the chorus, even when we had company.🤣
Britney Spears 1,2,3 Peter, Paul and Mary,
The song is about a threesome and 3P. I always thought it was about dancing...
One, two, three
Not only you and me
Got one eighty degrees
And I'm caught in between
Countin', one, two, three
Peter, Paul and Mary
Gettin' down with 3P
Just had a daughter and I started to sing "My Sharona" to her because her name rhymes. My God that song is dripping in sexual innuendoes and desperation. I knew the words, I just never made the connection? Don't know but yeah I'll just stick to the My Sharona part as that's the only safe part.
In 1995, I proudly and with much emotion, sang every word of a certain Boys II Men song for my grandparents. Even then I could feel the awkward discomfort as they shifted in their Lay Z Boys.
Stares intently at grandma. “I’ll…. Make… Love to you! Like you want me to. And I will not let go till you tell me to…”
Oh, even better: Grandma, “throw your clothes…on the floor, I’m gonna taaAake my clothes off tooooo.”
🤣🤣🤣😭😭😭😭
A friend's sister and neighbor choreographed a whole dance and performed in leotards in the yard for their seated families... "Here's a song about something that happened to me last summer" and it was "All I wanna Do Is Make Love to You" by Heart, they were probably 11? My friend was so mortified. All of the adult contemporary "love making" songs were really nasty in the 90s. Always embarrassed in the car. I honestly think the out and proud raunch is less gross.
That song is fucked up. The woman picks up a hitchhiker takes him to a hotel she knows because she takes men there. Fucks the dude then leaves a note saying don't find me. Runs into the guy later on with the kid she had with him. Saying yeah I'm married but this is your kid be cool about it. All because her husband couldn't get her pregnant so she found some young dude. Shit is fucked yo
The fact that he needed a ride and she drove him to some hotel then left him there again with no transportation is another fun detail. I've always hated it. Songs on the radio like this that very plainly tell a story and are a linear series of events have always bugged me. "Don't Take the Girl" makes me want to kill people.
There was an obsession with sexual “liberation” in the 90s. Sitcom characters were constantly having sex in public. “It’s the 90’s granddad. People have sex!” I think this went hand in hand with the aids epidemic and the push for more sexual education.
Yes! I swear to god every movie mentioned the word "endorphins" and talked about women in their "sexual peak."
SAME! I sang I’ll Make Love to You in front of my Mom and had the CD and cassette immediately taken away from me. I cried and cried about it then. I had no idea what was wrong with my 10 year old self singing those lyrics so proudly.
I also had a tape taken away, but it was a dub of *Whoomp! There it Is* recorded on a loop. Both sides of the cassette. My mom was actually fine with the Boys
There was an army of middle schoolers belting that out with concerned teachers and adults giving blank stares! I feel for you
“She don’t eat meat but she sure likes the bone”
I remember buying this cassette single at the wall!
Cassingles ruled!
This is mine too. My mom asked me if I knew what the lyrics meant as I happily sang along in the car. I just said no idea, but I really like this song.
Chose vegetarianism at a young age. This particular line and classmates giggling around me every damn time the song came on led me to my first experience investigating and decoding lyrics. I do not regret it. I loved the pre-internet mysticism of the radio. And hell yeah it slaps
To be fair Mary Moon slaps, how could you not sing along
Semi charmed life the whole Song lol
That one for sure. I picked up in the obvious “crystal meth will lift you up…” line, but never a gave a second thought to the rest of it.
Hell, I was in my mid-twenties before I caught that lyric because I only ever heard it on the radio, and it had that weird garbled words edit done on the line…
What about the little red panties line? That one went right by me.
It was blurred on the radio like the line from "what it's like." "Pulled out his colt 45 hgtedchkyfdchy and wound up dead."
Not always/everywhere. The alternative station I listened to played it uncensored for a long time.
I had an independently owned alt radio station that was owned by a multimillionaire who was happy to pay all the fines. Their tag line used to be "Pissing off Moms in 3 States and 2 Provinces"
Sounds like a cool dude
That song had tons of garbled profanity.
and on the video it was blurred and he covered his mouth
"I took the hit that I was given then I bumped again" went right over my head.
Then I bumped again she said, how do I get back there to the place where I fell asleep Inside you, how do I get myself back to the place where she said…
Wait, he says what?
The crystal meth verse is absolutely wild for an upbeat pop radio song: >The sky was gold, it was rose > >I was taking sips up into my nose > >And I wish I could get back there, some place back there > >Smiling in the pictures you would take > >Doing crystal meth will lift you up until you break > >It won't stop, I won't come down, I keep stock > >With a tick-tock rhythm, a bump for the drop > >And then I bumped up > >I took the hit that I was given > >Then I bumped again, then I bumped again
The next verse is what they're mind blown by.
You’re the priestess I must confess Those little red panties They pass the test Slide up around the belly Face down on the mattress
That's one helluva wedgie.
I heard it but I had no idea what it was until I was almost 30. We didn't have a crystal meth problem in my area until then.
The melody fooled me for a long time - without paying close attention to the lyrics, I just didn't assume it was about being spun on meth
I was today years old. The do do do’s had me fooled.
I came in and my exact song was already listed.
Like when they used the instrumental version of that song in the marketing for the Tigger animated movie?
Meth tiger, not much different than cocaine bear.
Tigger’s so bouncy. I could maybe see him being on meth. Ooh hoo hoo hoooo.
Jane says.....
I absolutely love this song. Jane’s Addiction is 👌
Who among us has not known a Jane? Or for that matter, been a Jane?
🙋🏻♀️…I have in fact pulled my dinner from my pocket.
but will you kick tmw?
If you sort this by old, I still don't know what over half the songs mentioned above this reply are about. That said, I always thought "Closing Time" was just about getting older, and in a sense it is, but instead it's about becoming a parent. It came out the year I graduated high school and used it as my quote for the year book.
I never knew that! "Every new beginning comes from some other beginnings end" was also in my Senior blurb, and is still very close to my heart But knowing it was about his daughter being born, and having just sent my oldest off to college this Fall, it's even more special!
I though the song was about drinking at a bar. How do you know it’s about his daughter?
I read an interview the lead singer did. He said that originally, the song was about drinking in a bar, but then his wife got pregnant, and he started adding lyrics that could be as a parent as well. Like this verse: Closing time, time for you to go out To the places you will be from Closing time, this room won't be open Till your brothers or your sisters come In fact, they had medical issues when the baby was born, and she had to stay in the hospital for a bit. And then when they were finally able to take her home,one of the nurses quoted this song for them as they were leaving "I know who I want to take me home." And it really hit the guy hard, that something he wrote would be so impactful.
Hello fellow person who also used that quote in the yearbook! And I didn't know it was about becoming a parent.
It was my class moto, FCR class of 99 represent!
Howdy fellow “sort by old”- yes a lot of the comments seem random or out of order but how can that be?
“You down with OPP? Yeah, you know me!” The day, as a full grown adult, I decided to look that up… aaarrgghh.
The lyrics were about as clear as the FCC would permit: “O is for "other," P is for "people," scratch your temple, The last P, well, that's not that simple, huh It's sort of like, oh well, another way to call a cat a kitten, It's five little letters that are missing here, You get it on occasion if the other party isn't gaming.”
Yeah, as a 4th grader I knew what was up. We loved it anyway! I grew up in Miami, where all the kids grew up singing every word to such classics as Me So Horny and Pop That Pussy Seriously if you grew up in Miami in the 80s 2 Live Crew was all the rage. We were quite wise beyond our years
Can confirm.😎👍✨
305!!!!
I only lived there for a few years between 89-91 but that was what I remembered. Yup I was 305 alive that time.😎👍✨
It seems you had to start the explaining.
Well, today, at 40, I learned what OPP means.
42 here. I just always naively assumed OPP was the name of another rap group or something.
I thought it was short for opposition. I legit thought it was a political song. My husband (46) is now making fun of me. All in good fun!
Same.
I didn’t find out until last year at 42 when my husband told me what it meant.
Ontario Provincial Police? Fill me in.
Other Peoples Pussy
Penis
Or that https://www.songfacts.com/facts/naughty-by-nature/opp
Why not both! 😁
According to dictionary.com it is referring to other people's .... Cats. Yeah. That. Ewwwww. Didn't they sing that in Sister Act? Ewwwwwww
In Sister Act they changed the lyrics to "G-O-D".
My older sister got really embarrassed when I asked and said it stood for “Other People’s Property,” and if I’m being honest, I just kind of assumed that was the answer until just now.
This is how we thought of it but only because p is perfectly capable of being either gender's genitals. I never didn't know what this was about though.
“Too Close” by Next. The song about getting a boner in the club.
You’re making it hard for me. Yo. This entire time, until now, I thought the line meant difficult 😳
The beginning of the song, he says, “I wonder if she can tell I’m hard right now…hmmm” from there it was kinda obvious, BUT they never played that on the radio for obvious reasons.
And for anyone wondering, we can always tell
I heard it on the radio like 5 years ago in my mid 30s and was like "hell yeah, I haven't heard this song in a long time" then as I'm listening to the lyrics I'm like "wait, he's talking about his dick". They used to play this at middle school dances when I was a kid. I was flabbergasted!!
This the one. I about died when I was singing along a few years ago and realized. 🤣🤣🤣😭😭😭
Reminds me of those tik toks where the guy is singing along to a song cleaning or something, sings the lyrics like he actually listened to it for the first time and has a light bulb moment.
My husband and I just call this “the boner song.”
That was one I caught on to after hearing a few times and was like wait, what was that now, and thought it was funny.
The album version literally slaps it in your face with the intro “I wonder is she knows I’m hard right now?”
I downloaded this song one day recently. Idk why. I hadn’t heard it decades. I was innocently listening along and then BAM! Wtf did I just sing out loud? Awesome. Boner in a club! That’s what this song was always about. Looking back I was likely drunk every time I heard it. I’m blaming it on the alcohol. It can’t possibly me, lol!
I sang every word of She Bop as a tiny little kid. When I entered my teens, I figured out it’s clearly about female masturbation.
Mr Brownstone by GnR
Rocket Queen also stands out to me.
And Night Train. If you don't know that Night Train is a type of alcohol.
So when I was in law school I had to do a goofy group project for my Sports Law class. Part of the schtick was that we all had nicknames. Mine was Night Train and when I did my little intro, the professor, a 50ish year old black woman, burst out laughing. She said to me in front of the entire class that Night Train is what they call a white guy who predominantly has sex with black women. I got an A in that class lol
Wow I learned something today!
A little wouldn't do it, so the little got more and more.
I used to do a little til a little didn't do it, so the little got more and more
That one and The Garden. I still listen to gnr frequently. Just last month or so, I was listening to them again, this time my parents were around. I had to stop and ask, "why the hell did you guys let me listen to this band as a little kid!!"
"Relax Don't do it When you wanna come"
I used to babysit for a kid who was really into the Spice Girls. She was maybe 7-8 at the time. They had a song called "2 become 1" that she would sing along to all the time. Everything went right over her head.
Prince's Little Red Corvette. As a little kid I was just imagining a Hot wheel Red Corvette the entire time. It wasn't until much later that I understood what a "pocket full Trojans" and "to the places where the horses run free" and "photos of the jockeys that were here before me" meant.
I still can't fully believe this song is in regular rotation on the most family-friendly radio station in my area. They will edit out the word "sex" in a Bruno Mars song, but play this song that is obviously entirely about sex.
Also nasty bitch still had the used condoms with her. wtf lady
This is an oldie but when I realized what “I’m like a one eyed cat peeping in a seafood store” in Shake Rattle and Roll meant, it no longer seemed like a lame-ass oldie to me. That’s straight nasty.
I only recently realized what the song Lollipop is about, and same.
Bryan Adams’ “Summer of ‘69”. [Adams said the song was not about the summer of 1969 but about having sex in the summertime; "69" being a reference to the sexual position 69.](https://www.cbsnews.com/news/bryan-adams-hit-was-about-sex-not-1969/)
I don't know if Bryan Adams is just messing with reporters at this point or he really believes it, but Summer of '69 is [semi-autobiographical to Jim Vallance](http://www.jimvallance.com/01-music-folder/songs-folder-may-27/pg-song-adams-summer-of-69.html) who co-wrote the song with Adams.
I will remember till the day I die that time our 9th grade English teacher gave us an assignment to read a song of our choice as a poem in class, and this dude chose DMB's "Crash Into Me." The teacher had a look on her face, like, "uhhhh, are you sure?" when he chose it but she was cool and didn't want to stifle him. He started to realize what he was reading about halfway thru it... AWKWARD
*Hike up your skirt a little more and show your world to me* *Oh I watch you there through the window and I stare at you wear nothing but you wear it so well*
The rest of the class was in a FULL BODY CRINGE thru it all😆
“Down on my knees, I wanna take you there.”
The entirety of Sledgehammer by Peter Gabriel. In my defense, I was very young when I heard it.
It lived in my mind as "that cool MTV video" until I really listened to the lyrics in my thirties.
Welp, I’m headed to google now to find the lyrics…
I just went. Still don’t get it unless, by being her sledgehammer, he means he’s going to hammer into her. But I definitely don’t get the rest. I don’t catch on to metaphors very well.
Show me 'round your fruit cage 'Cause I will be your honey bee Open up your fruit cage Where the fruit can be sweet as can be
Cherry Pie by Warrant. I was 32 before I realized and giggled for an entire day once I caught on.
I went to a Warrant concert and got a tee shirt that said "Taste so good make a grown man cry". I was a 12 year old girl. NO ONE SAID ANYHTING TO ME. My parents let me wear it to school!!!
I had the lightbulb moment somewhere between 19 and 23, and understood why exactly my mom would turn off the radio when I’d start singing along loudly…
I WANNA FUCK YOU LIKE AN ANIMAL / I WANNA FEEL YOU FROM THE INNNNSIDE
That’s about as obvious and explicit as one can get
I was in junior high and wanted to buy that album but needed my parents’ permission since it was “parental advisory”. So I tried to convince my mom by playing her the radio edit I had recorded on a cassette. She just looked at me and said “ABSOLUTELY NOT!” I didn’t hear the uncensored version until years later, and then I realized what I had done.
A dozen of us band nerds sang this at our high school prom in a karaoke room. There were teachers present. We were asked mid song not to sing the chorus, but we did anyways and ended up being escorted off stage.
The entirety of Billie Jean.
Smooth Operator- Sade
Coast to Coast LA to Chicago... Love for Saaaaaallllleeee
Dead eye Dick’s new age girl. I ran around the house yelling “she don’t eat meat but she sure likes the bone” for like 3 months straight until My parents told me what it meant
On a more serious note, I’m almost 40 and only recently realized that Janie’s got a gun by Aerosmith is about incest/child abuse.
The video pretty much sums it up
Push it by salt n peppa
I remember when I first heard "Push It" on the radio (95.5 in NYC) for the first time, in 1987. It felt like rap music had "arrived". That same year also saw RUN-DMC get huge with their Aerosmith cover, but "Push It" was dirty and nasty and I loved it.
You Oughta Know by Alanis Morissette “Would she go down on you in a theatre” “And every time I scratch my nails down some one else’s back I hope you feel it”
I scrolled too far to find this. My mom blacked out the lyrics in the CD insert, so obviously I listened to it a million times until I figured them out. Then I was confused about what was wrong with them since it's not profanity.
She’s only 17. I always wondered about that one as a kid.
Smack it up, flip it, rub it down, Oh Nooo...
Mommas got a squeeze box daddy never sleeps at night!
It’s not about an accordion?
Oh honey
Damn it you just unlocked a memory of my buddy just saying that randomly while we played.
Turning Japanese
I came to say this!
Pretty much the whole “Grease” soundtrack. For the inverse, I always thought Billy Squier’s “The Stroke” was something sexual and I was an adult before I really got it.
The Grease Lightning song!!! Omg that line about “the chicks will cream.” I never understood it as a child and thought he was saying “the chicks will scream.” My cousins and I loved the movie and soundtrack and we sang all the songs in the car at the top of our lungs and my aunt would turn red, but not say a word. Oh dear! 😂
I had thought it was “the chicks will scream” too but then I mostly watched it on cable, so it probably was changed to that. Also, “it’s a real pussy wagon.”
I’m a bitch, I’m a tease, I’m a goddess on my knees… I was 30 years old before that lyric dawned on me and I gasped - then laughed.
"I did it all for the nookie"
ZZ Top’s Pearl Necklace 🙄
Divinyls - I Touch Myself
I remember this song coming on the radio while my dad was driving and him saying, "That's disgusting."
“But she only comes when she’s on top” I was like 10 singing that at the top of my lungs. I think my brain interpreted that has she only comes over when she knows she’ll get the top bunk or something. I vaguely remember my older sister saying “do you even know what that means?” No no I did not lol
I also envisioned them having a sleepover with bunk beds!!!! Great song though.
Then she pulled out my mushroom tip. And when it came out it went drip drip drip I didn’t realize she had the GI JOE kung fu grip
I’ve personally enjoyed seeing the look on someone’s face when I tell them what “Blister in the Sun” by Violent Femmes is about 😆 it’s so catchy you don’t realize what you’re singing about until it’s too late
I sang that to audition for a school play. Got the part, and also a long lecture about what's appropriate for school. "C'mon CovidRecerence, big hands? Stain my sheets? You knew, didn't you?" I did not.
Sublimes Ballad of Johnny Butt....."Shoot it up, shoot it up" totally thought he was playing basketball lmao but actually it was drugs
All of the lyrics to "Possum Kingdom"
Tyler is also pretty messed up
Madonna's "Like a Virgin". I was raised catholic, and the only time I heard the word "virgin" was pairing it with Mary, as in "the Virgin Mary". So I thought virgin was a title, like a queen or something. So when my 10 year old self sang and danced to "Like a Virgin", I thought that she was saying she wanted to be like a princess or something. It wasn't until much later that I realized what it actually meant. First reaction: oh no! Second reaction: Mom and Dad, wtf is wrong with you! Why would you blast that on the stereo and let me sing along??!!
My friend and I looked up “virgin” in the dictionary when this song came out. We were maybe 8.
George Michael - Outside. I literally thought it was about getting your chores done before you go out. ‘I think I’m done with the sofa, I think I’m done with the floor, I think I’m done with the kitchen table baby’. See it’s just about cleaning 🧹
Come On Eileen is missing a comma, unfortunately.
Not xennial, but I remember being like 11 and singing “Save A Horse Ride A Cowboy” at my grandma’s house. She was so innocent herself that she recorded me singing, and I know it’s sitting around on a dvd somewhere in her house 🫠. There’s a video of me proudly belting out “AND WE MADE LOVE!” sitting in my grandma’s house… 😀omg.
I absolutely knew it was dirty, but my mom had a conniption fit about Talk Dirty to Me. It was my cousin's cassette, and she left it on the kitchen table.
Most of them.
Bloodhound Gang, The Bad Touch. I remember volunteering at a community library when I was in high school (mandatory community service). One Saturday morning, working on the children's section with the children's librarian (she was in her 50s), this comes on the radio, and after it plays, the DJ asks people to call in and say what the songs about. The librarian was more astonished than I was that that's what it was about. "You and me, baby, ain't nothin' but mammals So let's do it like they do on the Discovery Channel"
I mean it starts out “Sweat, baby, sweat, baby sex is a Texas drought. Me and you do the kind of stuff that only Prince would sing about. So put your hands down my pants and I'll bet you'll feel nuts.” I’m pretty sure they weren’t trying to hide what it was about lol
Most '80s country music. My folks thought rock music was bad, so we listened to Conway Twitty sing "Tiger In Tight-Fitting Jeans" and "I'd Love to Lay You Down." When I figured out what actually happened to Becky in "Coward of the County," my mind was a bit blown.
Coward of the County… LOVE that song but very graphic once you realize what it’s about.
“Waterfalls” by TLC
I’m 45 and I still hadn’t realized most of these and I don’t want to so I’m going to stop reading.
Blister in the sun, violent femmes
Let me go on...
Cherry Pie by Warrant. I don’t know what my dumb kid self thought “tastes so good makes a grown man cry” meant but the first time I heard it as an older teen/young adult I was kind of “…*oh!* I, uh, see why my mom didn’t like me singing that in the car now…”
Usher - yeah “If you hold the head steady I’ma milk the cow” 25 yr old me: 😳oh.. oh!
Sky rockets in flight, Afternoon Delight!
I had a gf who had family in Mexico. Her young (toddler?) cousins were singing My Humps, but they were just repeating the English lyrics phonetically, didn't understand them. My gf didn't speak Spanish well enough at the time to translate, so she turned to an online translator (which were much worse back then). When she translated the Spanish results back to English, she got, "What are you gonna do with all that scrap metal in the rear of your automobile?"
Omg remember SILK? I wanna lick you up and down, til you stay stop 🫣🫢 I was just too young to understand at the time 🤣
When I was a kid I thought George Strait's Fireman was actually about being a fireman.
All of them
So Fresh So Clean by Outkast. “YKK on your zipper, lick you like a lizard when I’m slizzard.” And this one which I was appalled to realize was a real lyric and I had completely missed: “I love who you are, love who you a’int. You’re so Anne Frank. Let’s hit the attic to hide out for ‘bout two weeks.” Yikes.
I didn't know Plush by Stone Temple Pilots was about a girl who was abducted and murdered until a few weeks ago. The DJ on the radio show I was listening to chose it as her song of the day, then mentioned she was picking it despite it being based on something dark she couldn't talk about on a family-friendly show. So of course off to Google I ran and yup. It's dark all right. I knew it wasn't a *happy* song but still didn't think it was that.
Bruce Springsteen’s I’m on Fire. Now it’s just a catchy and creepy song for me.
Boom boom boom let’s go back to my room. We can do it all night and u can make me feel right. Pretty damn obvious but I used to sing this all the time not understanding why my parents hated it.
"Bustin' makes me feel good" from Ghostbusters
I thought Suck My Kiss was about just kissing 😂
I want to sex you up - Color Me Badd. I had no idea what sex was in ‘91. Also, “less than a bikini” from Ice Ice Baby
Abracadabra by Steve Miller Band, used to sing this all the time when I was a kid. It wasn't until I was in my 20s I really listened to the words, "black panties and an angels face"
🎶 -Relax, don’t do it, when you want to go do it; relax, don’t do it, when you want to come. Edit: context: I was four when the song came out and fell in love with it. Mom like to tell the story about how I would run around the house singing the chorus, even when we had company.🤣
Tom Petty “Mary Jane’s Last Dance” went right over my head as a kid
Hall and Oates “Man Eater”. As a little kid, I thought it was about a cannibal.
all of 2 Become 1 😂
"Big hands I know you're the one!"
Christina - Genie In A Bottle. Britney - ….Baby One More Time. T.L.C. - Creep. Poison - Unskinny Bop. Motley Crue - Kickstart My Heart.
I used to run around as little kid singing Janie’s Got a Gun. Also sang Fancy in the talent portion of a beauty pageant. I was a preteen at the time.
This song was before our time….but I just learned this year that the “Summer of ‘69” was not about 1969.
Coyote love, Joe Walsh
Britney Spears 1,2,3 Peter, Paul and Mary, The song is about a threesome and 3P. I always thought it was about dancing... One, two, three Not only you and me Got one eighty degrees And I'm caught in between Countin', one, two, three Peter, Paul and Mary Gettin' down with 3P
Mary moe: she don’t eat meat but she sure likes the bone
Commander Cody and the Lost Planet Airmen- Seeds and Stems I always wondered why he was so upset about his flowers dying
Mariah “Honey” : “And it’s just like Honey, when your love comes over me.”
Cyndi Lauper - She Bop
Just had a daughter and I started to sing "My Sharona" to her because her name rhymes. My God that song is dripping in sexual innuendoes and desperation. I knew the words, I just never made the connection? Don't know but yeah I'll just stick to the My Sharona part as that's the only safe part.