Ex-Tabula Rasa

T2

Mrs Fuiru and I were listening to En Vogue the other day and the song Don’t Let Go (Love) came on and one of the lyrics goes “If I could wear your clothes/I’d pretend I was you/And lose control” and I realised that that has to be one of the creepiest lyrics I’ve ever heard.

Like, you imagine some bloke is listening to this song, feeling pretty pleased with himself because some attractive ladies with an excellent grasp of vocal harmony are proposing some lovemaking, heartbreaking and soulshaking, asking him if he wants to be more than just friends et cetera. He’s got to be a bit chuffed, right? Wow, En Vogue are asking me to hold on tight and not let go! Great stuff! Back of the net! And so on.

Then he gets to the ‘wearing your clothes’ bit and he’s got to be a bit confused, right? Like, okay, you’re in my clothes, now…you’re pretending to be me? What, are you walking around like me? Doing an impression of me? Opening a tax-free savings account in my name? What’s going on here?

He hears the third part, and it gets even weirder. You’re ‘losing control’ while pretending to be me?, he thinks. Is that PG radio-friendly shorthand for masturbating? You’re pretending to be me, and masturbating while…thinking of me? Or are you thinking of you? Are you you thinking of me and bashing one off, or are you me thinking of you while giving it the old fingerbodge? Because either way, you’re you, dressed as me, ‘being me’, thinking of yourself in one way or another. There’s all sorts of issues there.

So that was weird. Then I got to one of the b-sides to Free Your Mind where they sing (in perfect acapella) ‘Love you so much/Gonna skin you alive/And wear your skin to the opera/And then I’ll know it’s like to be you while watching an opera/Baby’ and now I can’t listen to En Vogue any more.