by FEMINISTA JONES/Medium

Music is a medium through which many find ultimate release — release being an exorcism of stress, pain, anxiety, grief, and whatever remnants of lost love and terrible mistakes linger. A melody can reveal dark secrets, a steady rhythm may expose difficult truths, and the syncopation of a pulsing beat can tell us more than we ever expected to know. What makes music magical is how it is often a transformative experience that brings about healing for those performing and consuming it.

When we allow ourselves to connect with an artist’s vulnerability, we may find ourselves experiencing our own catharsis. There is something powerful in bearing witness to another person’s awakening; we feel less alone. Perhaps there are a few lines that speak directly to our lived experiences and we feel affirmed when someone else expresses our truths so eloquently. I’ve occasionally found myself replaying a line or two when the words were unexpected, but the surprise was pleasantly welcomed.

One of those experiences is in hearing Black women sing about kink or BDSM (Bondage, Discipline, Dominance/Submission, Sadomasochism) in overt or subtle ways. Many of you know that I take part in the BDSM Lifestyle and am actively involved in the kink community. My popular 2015 novel, Push The Button, is an erotic tale that centers a Black couple that lives the Lifestyle. I’ve written extensively about Black people’s connection to kink, I’ve presented and lectured about it, and it’s safe to say that I’m a respected voice when it comes to this topic.

It isn’t that I haven’t heard sexy lyrics before, in both traditional Rhythm & Blues (R&B) music or in Hip-Hop; these songs often range in content from subtly suggestive seduction to gratuitously graphic gratification. Even when I was too young to hear those words, I could sing them, verbatim, not fully knowing what they meant but loving how they sounded. I realized later on, however, that there were some lyrics that were edgier and indicative of a different type of intimacy, revealing an alternative, occasionally darker side to the artists’ sex lives.

At the suggestion of a good friend, I decided to explore Black women’s kinkier tunes and what they might suggest for their own experiences with and connection to sexuality. Since I can’t exactly unhear these things, be they innuendo or blatant banter, I figured I’d share some of these songs with you and delve a bit into their contextual significance (or at least my reading of alternative meanings).

Patti LaBelle, “Somebody Loves You, Baby (You Know Who It Is)” (1991)

“I’m under your spell
I don’t want to break free
You can make a slave out of me
I worship you and nobody else
I pledge my love to you forever”

In the first verse, Patti says she was longing for a replay of yesterday. I’m thinking they had a really good, intense lovemaking session that may have taken her to new heights. Now, those in the know, know that identifying as a “slave” is part of some people’s dynamics. It’s a role of complete submission, intense trust, and a commitment to compliant service to one’s master. It is a pledge to one person, generally, and here, Patti is telling her lover that she is offering that level of submission to him. Many “slaves” do make official pledges to their masters, so this verse struck me as definitely being kinky.

Kelis, “Blindfold Me” (2006)

“When he want it, he blindfolds me
Then I get sexy on him, sexy on him”

What I love most about this song is that it features an exchange with her ex-husband, Nas, who performs a rap that enhances her sultry singing. She sings about feeling empowered when she can tap into her kinkier side and enjoying being blindfolded while he raps about teasing her and getting off on being a Dom with the power in their dynamic (“The bed is the Bentley/I’m doing the steering”). Theirs is an interesting role reversal, as she starts the song out talking big talk about what she is gonna do to him, only to have him be the one to take over and leave her strung out. And from what we know about their tumultuous relationship, we can definitely infer that there was certainly a lot of spice and sparks flying when Queens invaded Harlem.

Rihanna, “S&M” (2010)

“Love is great, love is fine
Out the box, out of line
The affliction of the feeling leaves me wanting more

’Cause I may be bad but I’m perfectly good at it
Sex in the air, I don’t care, I love the smell of it
Sticks and stones may break my bones
But chains and whips excite me”

What I enjoy most about this song is that Rihanna suggests that love and kink can coexist. She expresses desire for a love that is “out of line” with the norm — a woman can be beaten with whips and chains and still be completely loved by the person doing the beating. While many in the Lifestyle have play partners with whom they are not in romantic or long-term committed relationships, there are those of us for whom kink is an enhancement to our romance and our sex lives… and that’s perfectly good.

Janet Jackson, “Discipline” (2008)

“I misbehaved, done some things I know I shouldn’t do
I touched myself, even though you told me not to
You commanded me to wait for you (I tried)
But I can smell you on my sheets
Taste you on my skin so vividly
Daddy, I disobeyed ya
Now I want you to come punish me”

The use of the word “Daddy” as a proper noun for a man in a woman’s life, who exists as a romantic partner, extends beyond the Lifestyle. Black women have longed call their male partners “Daddy”, and this dates back long before we experienced any type of “freedom” in this New World. You may have heard your grandmother or your aunt (or even your own mother) refer to her old man as “Daddy” in casual conversation. It isn’t necessarily kink-related, but there are often elements of a D/s dynamic in their relationship.

In the Lifestyle, it often refers to a Daddy Dom/ little girl dynamic — a partnership in which each person assumes a clear position and assumes certain characteristics of that dynamic. ‘Daddy Doms’ are known for being more nurturing towards their submissives, and many ‘little girls’ are known for engaging in age-play. Here, Janet has intentionally been a “bad girl” and knows she deserves some type of playful punishment for her infraction, and she calls on her Daddy to deliver it. This song is a formal request to be handled in a sexy, disciplinary way that will ultimately help her get off sexually.

Jill Scott, “Until Then (I Imagine)” (2011)

“Talk strong, Daddy
Control your girl
Oh, yea you got it
You’re so thorough
You leave me in a frenzied state
And I can’t wait until then I imagine
I imagine myself on my knees
Waiting for you to come over and see me”

When I first heard this song, I knew the entire thing was about a sub longing for her Dominant to return and begin another session of pleasure and pain. The whole song. Every line. I connected with it, immediately, and remember thinking this was the first time I felt that kink was explored in a space that wasn’t focused on it (like Jackson’s “Discipline” album) and in ways that were both subtle and overt, if that makes sense. To a veteran kinkster, it’s clear what the “frenzy” is:

“During submissive frenzy, you may feel a desperate need to have your desires fulfilled. Many of the activities in BDSM can be considered addictive and frenzy is much like a withdrawal stage.” Source

To the unknowing, however, it might be heard as just another line. Sub frenzy is a very real thing, and I wonder if Scott is newer to the Lifestyle, as it is something newer subs experience more frequently, and since she hasn’t sung explicitly about this before, maybe she is exploring it and inviting us to join her on the journey.

Later in the song, she talks about blacking out and coming back to consciousness which, for me, spoke to possibly being choked out in an act of erotic asphyxiation. My favorite act, I perked up like a puppy waiting for a new bone. It was exciting to feel so connected to a song that seemed to be written about and for me, and I know others connected to it in the same way when it was released.

Nicki Minaj, “Get On Your Knees” (2014)

“Get on your knees, get on your knees, get on your knees
Baby, just get on your knees (get on your knees)
Say pretty please, say pretty please, say pretty please
Baby just say pretty please

I’ll be back at 11, you just act like a peasant
Got a bow on my panties because my ass is a present
Yeah it’s gooder than Meagan, you look good when you’re beggin’
I appreciate the gifts like the whips and them bezzles
Now it’s bells and the whistles, now I’m makin’ it sizzle”

Really, really love how Nicki exerts dominance and control as a Domme in this song. Ultimately, the song is about facesitting on a man, prone in a submissive position (on his knees). In this part, she makes him beg to perform cunnilingus on her, makes him wait for it, and talks about her appreciation for his tributes to her which will likely be used on him at some point. It’s a very sexy turn on women taking control in the bedroom and appreciating men who submit to their sexual whims.

FKA Twigs, “Papi Pacify” (2013)

“Mmmmmh, papi pacify
Pacify our love
Mmh, mmh, mmh, mmh, won’t you clarify
Clarify it hurts”

“Papi” is often used in the same context as “Daddy”, both in vanilla relationships and in the Lifestyle. While the song is sparse in lyrics, it’s the video that really drives the connection to kink home. What I appreciated about this is how young Twigs was when this was released (25) because those of us in the Lifestyle know our ages skew older; it takes most of us a while to become comfortable enough with our kinky, alternative desires and even longer to be comfortable with publicly expressing them. At most munches, the average age is between 35–40, with more participants in their 40s and 50s than in their late teens and 20s. That’s changing, though, and The Next Generation (TNG) is creating a strong presence that will, hopefully, encourage younger kinksters to come out of their shells and revel in their pleasures in safe community spaces.

Brandy, “What You Need” (2012)

“Fire, fire, candle, candle, I burn
Just enough to make it hot
You wanna shoot me to the moon
I wanna shoot you there first
Take off
All my clothes in exchange for yours
Saying sexy words in Spanish yo quiero tu
Yeah baby boy you’re so mannish
So go and lay your head back
Let me blow this on for you”

Fire play? I think so. Known for her “wholesome” image, many wouldn’t immediately think that Brandy would be into the sexier side of life in the ways that she is. I remember listening to the underrated “Two Eleven” album some years back and craning my neck when this song played. Was Brandy going there? Yes, yes she was. At first the chorus refrain, “I’ll be in the kitchen in your favorite position” had some submissive undertones, so when I listened further, I realized there was more to this.

In this part, she appears to be taking a dominant position and using candle wax on her lover to excite and arouse him. She doesn’t shy away from giving him pleasure and asserts herself as wanting to get him off first or maybe simply indulge in her own wax play/ fire play kink. I appreciate her taking the risk and breaking out of the mold to which she’s been so contained for so long. We’ve heard bits and pieces before, but this was clear and open, no room left for confusion.

Beyoncé, “Haunted” (2013)

“You want me?
I walk down the hallway
You’re lucky
The bedroom’s my runway
Slap me!
I’m pinned to the doorway
Kiss, bite, foreplay”

My thoughts of Beyoncé’s music stray from the theme of this piece, interestingly enough. While I could cite examples of how she performs incredibly sexy, kinky lyrics (see above) and supports them with edgier imagery in her costumes and videos, I find it difficult to ascribe many positive connections to these tunes post- Lemonade and Jay Z’s 4:44. What I hear in those albums are tales of prolonged abuse and as a proponent of safe, sane, and consensual, the BDSM mantra, it’s hard to extract a completely willing engagement in such a dynamic while enduring years of abuse. That isn’t what this Lifestyle is about and I can admit that it’s difficult for me to listen to much of her music these days without thinking of the songs I once enjoyed as cries for attention; she seems to be begging and pleading to be treated with the respect and love she deserves by a man who can’t seem to stay loyal to his commitment to her. That isn’t anything like what we condone in this Lifestyle and all too often, people become involved in dynamics that aren’t healthy. I can’t say for certain that theirs has always been problematic, but there’s enough evidence to support that maybe it hasn’t been the best representation of what it is that we do.

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There’s a pervasive idea that Black women “don’t submit”, and it’s rather offensive in that it is rooted in an idea that Black women inherently reject the support of their (Black) male counterparts in ways that somehow weaken men, at least in the eyes of a patriarchal society. Truthfully, with Black women’s historic commitment to religious faiths that mandate their submission to the men in their lives, we have to wonder how this erroneous stigma came to be. There’s a great deal of clamoring for Black women’s submission by men who, for all intents and purposes, struggle with their own ability to “lead” anyone, for various reasons of course. Maybe it’s in the roles Black women fall into in order for them and their families to survive, roles traditionally reserved for men, have people thinking Black women seek to control and dominate everything. Not true, by any means, but we do what we have to do sometimes.

This begs the question: Why must the women be the ones to submit? In the kink realm, women are often dominant and given permission (or begged) to assume control in ways that are traditionally looked down upon in male-dominated societies. Further, I think it’s less about the women assuming control and more about the men who choose to submit to them; the focus seems to be less on why a woman would want to be dominant and more on why a man would submit to a woman.

When we factor in dynamics and relationships that are not heterosexually-rooted, we see even more examples of how a woman’s role, particularly in the kink realm, but even in her vanilla relationships, isn’t (and shouldn’t) always be assessed based on her proximity to men. There are many who argue that women’s participation in BDSM is related to internalize misogyny and that kink is antithetical to feminism. This is a heteronormative lens, of course, and it leaves little room for women’s agency and autonomy, as it defines and assesses women’s sexual urges and behaviors by what’s deemed acceptable to men and what serves men best. It also ignores relationships and dynamics that exclude men entirely, and assumes that those exchanges are somehow invalid without male presence. Queer kinky women and non-binary folks exist and their sexual expressions are valid.

And when it comes to Black women, whose sexuality and bodies have been regulated by others for centuries, any engagement in kink can be viewed as counterintuitive, for lack of a better word. As I touched on earlier, the concept of a “slave” conjures up torturous imagery of a painful history in our experiences throughout the Diaspora. A Black woman willingly calling herself a “slave”, then, may be regarded as lacking self-awareness, being self-loathing, a race-traitor, or psychiatrically disabled. So when a famous artist puts it all out there that she is, in fact, a willing participant in sexual behavior that is often viewed as deviant or oppressive towards women, she opens herself to condemnation. She also gives other women with similar urges, feelings, and experiences permission to be themselves more openly and boldly. And for Black women, those acts of liberation are tremendously important and should be celebrated as often as possible.

Here is the Spotify playlist I made as a companion to this article.

A CANDLE IN THE DARK

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