Inventing new ways just like a scientist

Image: National Cancer Institute via Unsplash

• Track: Talk Like Sex
• Artist: Kool G Rap & DJ Polo
• Album: Wanted: Dead or Alive
• Year: 1990

This track is notorious. Earlier this year I thought about making this a joke Valentine’s Day post, as this track is basically the antithesis of romance. My last post certainly contained some vulgarity, but boy oh boy it’s nothing compared to this.

In case the track title wasn’t enough of a warning, if you’re prudish or a child stop reading now. I’d worry about my mum reading this one, but she hates this blog. When I suggested she might like to subscribe, she replied that she didn’t want the spam. Nice vote of confidence for your only son there.

The simile used for the post title is pretty much the only one that isn’t obscene. Take the hint: this song is not for the faint of heart. This post therefore comes with pretty much every trigger warning you could care to imagine.

Kool G Rap was born Nathaniel Thomas Wilson, who sounds more like the chair of the school chess club than a sex god. He grew up in poverty in – get this – Corona, a suburb of Queens. I bet the residents are having a right old laugh at the moment.

Kool (can I call him that? I’m going to) was in his late teens when he penned these lyrics. But they come across like a thirteen-year-old avid masturbator claiming that he’s having sex with a girl from another school. According to Genius, Kool wrote the track after realising he’d never written a track about sex. The result is less of a love letter to lovemaking and more of a confession of a dangerous criminal.

Of course I have reservations about featuring tracks like this. But we mustn’t pretend the unpleasant side of hip-hop doesn’t exist. It’s not all cupcakes and Jesus juice. Sexism, homophobia and racism crop up with depressing frequency. This is not to say I enjoy or condone tunes like this, I’m just trying to be an impartial observer. I want to catalogue all hip-hop simile, and this means dealing with some disagreeable subject matter. Such is the lot of the dedicated simile cataloguer.

It’s an uncomfortable truth that a lot of early hip-hop features such blatant misogyny. Though we’ve come some way in the three intervening decades, it’s nowhere near far enough. The music industry still treats women, by and large, like sacks of meat.

But allow me to play Devil’s advocate for a second (*twists moustache conspiratorially*). You wouldn’t describe this as a typical Kool G Rap track. He’s known for his story-telling and lyrical dexterity. This may be him seeing what he could get away with. After all, 1990 was the year of the infamous 2 Live Crew obscenity trial. As rap entered the mainstream, hip-hop artists were under the sort of scrutiny they’d never experienced before. Perhaps this track is a firm two-fingered salute to the establishment? Following 2 Live Crew’s acquittal, a 65-year-old female jury member told the LA Times she saw their lyrics as ‘comedy’. Is it meant to be funny? Am I being too sensitive? I don’t find any of this nonsense amusing, though a 13-year-old me may have.

Notably, this is the first track in the database to have a simile as the title, sort of. If ‘talk like sex’ is a simile, it’s not a particularly good one, bringing to mind sweaty grunting instead of clever rhetoric. Not quite as notably, this is the second artist in a row to have cool spelt with a ‘k’ in their name.

Chris Rock artfully parodied this track for his 1993 comedy CB4. It also spawned an unlikely sequel when Kool G Rap featured on 2001’s Smut Peddlers album Porn Again. It’s every bit as charming as you might expect. Smut Peddlers seemed to exist to fill an likely unlikely demand for people who needed a hip-hop/pornography crossover in their lives. I wouldn’t know because I’ve never listened to them. Honest mum.

Anyway, take a deep breath because we’re diving in. So to speak.

The lyrics

View full annotated lyrics on genius.com

[Chorusy-type thing]

Can’t ya diggit, Honey?
Rated XXX

[Verse 1]

For the ladies, one hundred and ninety-five pounds of beef
Chinky eyes, curly hair and gold teeth
Swinging with this here stud, you need practice
I’m leaving floods of blood on your mattress
I’ll leave you holding your swollen backside and rolling
Filling all three holes just like bowling

I’m afraid it’s like this all the way through. Kool G Rap’s not mucking about here is he? I don’t like to see the good name of ten-pin bowling dragged through the mud, but I suppose we can at least appreciate the inventiveness of this simile. 

Years ago, I briefly lived with a former UK under 16 bowling champion. By the time he was about 20 he refused to go or even talk about bowling. I often wonder what happened to make him that way. Maybe he had a traumatic run in with Kool G Rap down at Nantwich Hollywood Bowl.

Don’t ask me what the price is
But it’s more than your battery-operated devices

This lyric suggests that Kool G Rap expects payment for his rutting services. I’m not sure how much vibrators go for these days, but I wouldn’t have thought they were that much. He’s underselling himself if anything, it sounds like the experience would be most unpleasant.

And I come fully equipped
With a temperature adjustment to heat up the tip
For demonstrations, watch me slam her
You’ll notice the sound of steady pounding
Like a jackhammer

Throughout this tune, it’s worth bearing in mind that Kool G Rap is supposed to be bragging about his bedroom prowess. Is a pneumatic drill action something you’d aspire to between the sheets? It sounds like Kool G isn’t finished with a partner until they develop vibration white finger. Though after a few lines I’m starting to wonder if Kool is that bothered about his partner’s experience. But at least he possesses a mechanism for heating his bellend, so that’s…something.

Once on it, you can’t cop out
I’m pounding you down until your eyeballs pop out
I’m not your ordinary playa
Because you’ll leave in a wheelchair, dear, after I lay ya
Get a grip on your headboard and hold on to it
Or get sent right through it
Bite your nipples when I lick ’em
Not gentle when I stick ’em, huh
I’ll leave ’em lookin’ like a rape victim

Jesus Christ. If you can bear to, read that section again. If Kool has set out to be offensive (and I have a sneaky suspicion he has), then he’s certainly fulfilled his remit here. It’s like a teenage psychopath has spent too long on a particularly unsettling corner of PornHub.

Any girl who steps to it
Ends up getting their stomach pumped like Rod Stewart

This charming simile references an urban legend that is still doing the rounds today. Snopes.com has taken an unexpectedly interesting look at several reasons why this is impossible. Click that link if you’ve ever wondered how long it would take to ingest a gallon of semen. 

I do a damn good job
That’s why chicks are on my dick like a human shish kebab

I suppose this simile just about works as a piece of interesting imagery. If the image Kool is going for is a series of limp chunks of meat on a thin piece of metal.

Only nineteen and over permitted
No matter how much young girls want to be with it
You ain’t ready for the bed
You still got a pussy like Isaac Hayes’ head

It’s good to know that Kool has some standards.

Come back in five years
When you grow some hairs and when ya started drinking beers
I’m hitting hookers by the dozen
Making you wetter ‘cause I fuck better than your husband

Here we find ourselves hovering in the grey area between what constitutes a simile and what constitutes a comparative. This is arguably neither, but I’m allowing it.

Giving your girl back spasms
‘Cause G Rap has ’em – orgasm after orgasm
Change the sheets? You must be kidding
You got to change the whole box spring, I ain’t bullshitting
You get hit with hysteria
‘Cause I’m a bury a big one inside your private area
All hell is in your tush
When Kool G. Rap push pushes inside the bush
Another homegirl flinches
But I got inches for all you little wenches
The letter G is better when it comes to letter X
And I’m a talk like sex

Can you believe we’re only a third of the way through? Do read on if, like me, you’re curious as to the depths that Kool can sink to from here.

As mentioned above, this simile title-drop is a first for us, though we’ve seen half a negative simile before. One verse in and I’m no closer to understanding what he means by it. From what we’ve seen, sex with Kool G Rap is likely to end in a trip to A&E and a period of incarceration for him. Who talks and has sex like this, other than a deranged sex offender?

[Chorusy bit]

Can’t ya diggit, Honey?
Rated XXX

[Verse 2]

If the first verse set the scene for this disturbing journey through Kool G Rap’s priapic mind, the second verse certainly carries it on. But you’ll be pleased to know it’s not quite as gross. Which means it’s still gross. But the similes come thick and fast (like Kool himself…sorry, it’s clearly rubbing off on me). There’s even an admirable bit of rhyming in there. Just ignore the sentiment if you can.

Some say that I’m nasty plus
Hookers are mad because they can’t outlast me
Girl, you ain’t too small
‘Cause I turn your grip to one size fits all
So if you’re still confused when I’m screwing
Let me explain to you exactly what I’m doing
Exploring your body like a biologist
Inventing new ways just like a scientist
Tagging my name on your buns just like a printist
While I’m hurting your ass just like a dentist
You’re so wild, I feel like I’m a zoologist
Stretching your shit more than a gynaecologist
I’m a twist your ass to death, miss
And when you piss, you’ll see more stars than an astrologist

Casting aside the inherent unpleasantness for a second, this is some gold-standard simileing. The database contains seven profession-related similes so far, and in this verse Kool single-handedly doubles that count. Judging by his attitudes to women, he’s probably doing quite a lot single-handedly.

Obviously he’s let himself down by inventing the word ‘printist’. But ‘printer’ wouldn’t rhyme I suppose. I also think that he should consider finding a new dentist.

G Rap is hot-blooded, freaking horny
Far from corny, come and jump on me
I’m not small at all, I won’t break down or stall
I drive your ass up the wall
Nuts and everything are well in shape
Only thing missin’ on my dick is a cape
Let’s get together, honey, you never know what’s next
And I’m a talk like sex

Thanks Kool, but we’d worked out you were horny after line three. Don’t really need that pointer. Why insert a proposal at this late stage? Presumably any woman in her right mind is several miles away at the local police station by now.

[Chorusy bit]

Can’t ya diggit, Honey?
Rated XXX

If like me, you’re getting a little tired of all this, you’ll be relieved to know that this is the final verse. There are only a couple of similes to check off.

[Verse 3

Big girls try to squash me
But I think with my dick, honey, so come and brainwash me
Hit the sack ‘cause I ain’t joking
‘Cause when I start pumping shit up, I leave it smoking
So you better hold on tight all right
‘Cause my dick is a brown stick of dynamite
I stick a chick and it kills her
I’m probably related to Long Dong Silver
But it gets gooder and gooder
Every time I grab a hooker and I put her on my frankfurter
Kiss your breasts to your navel and then I skip
Because the only thing I’m licking is your ass with a whip
And it’s a real freaky scene
I’m hitting girls with their heads in a guillotine
Why, certainly I’m squirting
I bust a nut and get up and wipe my dick on your curtain
Pushing your head to the pillow
And giving more pleasure than a double-headed dildo

Pleasure. That let sink in for a minute. Up to this point, Kool has given absolutely no indication that sex with him will be anything but an ordeal. And to top it off, he’s going to clean himself up using your curtains.

A big ass gets me hardened
But I fuck bitches with titties like Dolly Parton
Time or place doesn’t matter to me, sweety
I’ll fuck you on the A train while I write graffiti
In a restaurant, taking you straight to heaven
In a cab or the back of 7-11
Whether you’re white and the music you like is rock
You can come and get some hip-hop cock
Consider this dick on your clitoris but never try to flex
‘Cause I’mma talk like sex

First Rod Stewart, and now this. Where will it end? Around about here as it happens, as all we have left is the outro. Just my opinion, but I’d wager that Dolly Parton would eat this chump for breakfast. You can tell Kool G Rap I said that; he’s in his 50s now and I reckon I could outrun him.

Time or place doesn’t matter to me, sweety
I’ll fuck you on the A train while I write graffiti
In a restaurant, taking you straight to heaven
In a cab or the back of 7-11
Whether you’re white and the music you like is rock
You can come and get some hip-hop cock
Consider this dick on your clitoris but never try to flex
‘Cause I’mma talk like sex

[Outro]

Talks like sex

Talks like sex pest more like.

Wow. Well there we have it. I was never going to fill this blog with songs I love, I wanted there to be room for songs that I don’t like too. I think I’ve achieved that, though it’s made me feel a bit grubby now. I feel like I need a shower after that.

Maybe this song is called Talk Like Sex because it makes you grimace and leaves a somewhat nasty taste in the mouth? Next time I’ll try to find a track about bunny rabbits or something. It’s lucky we’re in lockdown, because this tune has put me off sex for a month.

The stats

Similes:	18
Words:	768
Words per simile:	42.67
Length:	5m 09s
Similes per minute:	3.50
Times I rethought posting this:	12