By philipphilip99
Cue brass band… when I was a lad, porn was hard to come by (snigger), so we had to make do with the underwear section of our mothers’ Grattan’s mail order catalogues, the shredded copies of Penthouse you might be lucky enough to find in a hedge or the suboptimal sex scenes in the Richard Allen Skinhead books – all of which required finding a way through silk knickers, stockings and suspenders.
Today, we’re a mere web search away from things much more gynaecological, but, just as with pop music, ubiquity is killing the thrill.
So, I’ve come to believe that the best portrayals of sex are like the movie monster – best kept hidden and largely unseen for as long as possible so that the imagination can run riot. Then, if we’re lucky, the big reveal of knickers down won’t be a wonky computer-generated disappointment.
Here, then, are some songs inspired by the tantalizing delights of underwear…
The A-Cup Playlist:
Arctic Monkeys – Knee Socks (Loud Atlas)
When the zeros line up on the 24-hour clock,
When you know who’s callin’ even though the number is blocked,
When you walked around your house wearin’ my sky-blue Lacoste,
And your knee socks…
An underwear cliché to start, the girlfriend throwing on her boyfriend’s shirt and looking sensational in just that and her scanties, but the Arctic Monkey’s do it nicely here.
It’s about time a movie showed a boyfriend getting up from bed and casually throwing on his sleeping girl’s basque and boy shorts to make breakfast.
Bandit Queen – Miss Dandys (UncleBen)
I've watched you bandage up your chest,
Before you put on your Y-fronts and your vest,
Oh, doesn't everyone love a cross-dressed gigolo?
Lots of cross-dressing songs were suggested, but, for me, this one was the peach of the bunch.
Divinyls – Boys in Town (IsabelleForshaw)
I am a just red brassiere,
To all the boys in town,
Put this bus in top gear,
Get me out of here…
I’ve occasionally taught creative writing and always bang on about the importance of the concrete detail, like the one we get here. That ‘red brassiere’ – boom! You can see it, imagine the kind of girl wearing it, and imagine exactly how the boys in town react.
Space – Ballad of Tom Jones (happyclapper)
You stopped us from killing each other,
Tom Jones! Tom Jones!
You'll never know but you saved our lives,
Tom Jones! Tom Jones!
I've never thrown my knickers at you,
And I don’t come from Wales…
Late one night in a swanky hotel bar near Cardiff, I was suited and booted and sitting with MrsPP99, who was in a second-skin cocktail dress, when into the bar walked a very twinkly Tom Jones, Kelly Jones from the Stereophonics, and several Welsh rugby legends. About fifteen minutes later, the barman approached with champagne cocktails, ‘For the gentleman and the lovely lady, compliments of Sir Tom.’
MrsPP99 would’ve thrown her knickers had she been wearing any.
(Song previously zedded for Jones and Joneses but it just had to go on the A-list!)
John Prine and Iris DeMent – In Spite of Ourselves (SkippyisaCult)
He ain’t got laid in a month of Sundays,
Caught him once and he was sniffin’ my undies…
We’ve all been there.
Suzanne Vega – Stockings (OliveButler)
Do you know where friendship ends,
And passion does begin?
It’s between the binding of
Her stockings and her skin…
Back to the creative writing class. You can also bang on about the liminal – the transitional state or zone in which the drama of competing outcomes can be explored. Once asked for a concrete example, I suggested a stocking band. Below the stocking band is coverage and privacy, above the stocking band is flesh and intimacy, and so the stocking band is the liminal space which presents the possibility of moving down from there to rejection or up to sex. Which is sort of what this song is about.
Nina Simone – See-Line Woman (Nicko)
Wears silk stockings,
With golden seams,
See-line woman…
An African-American folk song that was often sung as a harmless, schoolyard ditty and yet is about a line of prostitutes seen standing in a port city and variously attired to attract seamen.
PJ Harvey – Mansize (happyclapper)
Got my girl and she’s a wow,
I cast my iron knickers down,
Man-sized no need to shout,
Can you hear, can you hear me now?
Like a lot of Polly’s songs, this one’s very much open to interpretation, but she’s my kind of gal – as terrifying as she is alluring.
Hang on the Box – There is a City (TarquinnSpod)
Why do you put on makeup?
Because I’m a rock star!
Why don’t you wear a bra?
So my titties are free!
Examine punk with any rigour and you’ll conclude there were only ever two punks – Johnny Rotten and Poly Styrene. Having heard this song, I now have to add Hang on the Box’s lead singer Gia Wang to the list.
(I almost disqualified this song as it’s about the absence of underwear, but listing it is the right and the punk thing to do.)
Fujiya & Miyagi – Knickerbocker (Shoegazer)
Vanilla, strawberry, Knickerbocker Glory…
The Knickerbocker Glory is so called because, like the once fashionable knickerbocker, it has alternating layers of red and white as well as a cherry nestled in its creamy frills.
Okay, Spotted Dick, hand over the filthiest dessert crown.
Fela Kuti - Equalisation of Trouser and Pant (pejepeine)
The trouser be dis,
The pants will be that…
From what I can hear, within this infectious groove is a song about pants being equalising because they are all the same no matter how poor or fancy the trousers are over them. Fela Kuti, it seems, has never walked through the underwear aisles of John Lewis, but we can forgive him that.
Jonny Trunk – The Ladies’ Bras (megadom)
The ladies’ bras,
The ladies’ bras,
The ladies’ knickers,
And the ladies’ bras…
I used to rail against the British, Carry On, end of the pier, saucy postcard view of sex, but then I realised that the French movie vision of sex I preferred was often sorely lacking in laughs, so it was best to have a bit of both – beret and bloomers.
The B-Cup Playlist:
Pulp – Underwear (ToffeeBoy)
Sleazy does it.
Sarah Vaughan – Shiny Stockings (magicman)
Sophisticated and sanguine.
Liza Minnelli – All That Jazz (IsabelleForeshaw)
I’ll be rouging my knees and rolling my stockings down as soon as lockdown is over.
Joni Mitchell - Help Me (amylee)
There’s probably a PhD to be had in looking at the significance of holes in stockings in popular culture.
The National Youth Girls' Choir of Great Britain - A Woman (Wearing Bloomers) On a Wheel (Loud Atlas)
Suffragettes favoured bloomers for practical reasons – an interesting bit of social history.
Bryan Ferry - These Foolish Things (magicman)
‘Silk stockings thrown aside…’ Personally, I’m with Dave Lee Roth, ‘No, no, no, don’t take ’em off, keep ’em on!’
Hoodoo Gurus - Miss Freelove ’69 (IsabelleForshaw)
Do they write anything other than toe tappers?
The Move – Here We Go Round The Lemon Tree (ShivSidecar)
They inhaled while sitting around in magical green underpants.
Sisqo – Thong Song (amylee)
It’s empowering (not really).
Tom Waits – Pasties and a G String (At the Two O’Clock Club) (BanazirGalbazi)
A song so real you’ll smell it, then wish you couldn’t.
The Sports – Black Stockings (For Chelsea) (Nicko)
Olivier Giroud could carry the look.
The Sugarcubes – Birthday (severin)
A provocative and beautiful song that very nearly made the A-list despite its zedding.
Guru’s Wildcard Picks:
The Drifters – Nylon Stockings
Romance and economic realism.
Van Halen – Everybody Wants Some
More romance and economic realism.
And for balance …
These playlists were inspired by readers' song nominations from last week's topic: Can you pull this off? Songs about underwear. The next topic will launch on Thursday at 1pm UK time.
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