YEAH, THAT'S RIGHT: BUTT-FUCKING

Three Great Simulated Gangsta Rap Sex Scenes

This article was originally published as "The Negro Speaks of Sodomy" (after Langston Hughes) in The Atlantic monthly.

Simulated sex is part of our culture. We routinely watch actors and actresses pretending to fuck each other on television and in the movies, and if we're lucky we see some nudity while we're at it. Nowadays, even the tamest entertainment features simulated sex, from Brazilian sexpot and educator Xuxa's scenes with a twelve-year-old boy to prime time television programs featuring the infamous "sock." So-called "gangsta" rap--arguably the best kind--is no exception: there's simulated sex in it. I present here my three favorite simulated sex scenes in rap music:

"The Pimp"
Mr. Scarface
Mr. Scarface is Back

Mr. Scarface Outdoes Himself might have been a more apt title for this recently back-in-print masterpiece, as it remains, despite seemingly countless follow-ups, Scarface's greatest solo achievement. Crucial songs like "I'm Dead," "Your Ass Got Took," and the inexplicably-titled "Good Girl Gone Bad" (not about a girl) affirm MSIB's standing amongst its contemporaries, Little Big Man (Bushwick Bill) and Controversy (Willie D), both of which are awesome. However, even on an album filled with excellent tracks, "The Pimp" stands alone in poignancy and relevance; it surpasses the listener's expectations and leaves him disoriented in an emotional dumpster of prurient sex-talk and cold-blooded hostility toward women that requires repeated listening to fully believe.

"The Pimp" reaches new lows. Mr. Scarface gleefully chortles his way through such lines as "Yeah, that's right: butt-fucking/then [ugh] a real good dick sucking," and unlike fellow Geto Boy Willie D, whose lighthearted "Pussy" provides a sort of paradigm of genial misogyny, Mr. Scarface comes across as being totally serious, even humorless, despite his jocose delivery. With this in mind, it is easy to imagine the impact of such lines, delivered almost conversationally, as "loosen up and it won't hurt so bad," referring to anal intercourse.

As in similar songs, "The Pimp" features a woman performing what could perhaps be called backing vocals while the principal performer raps over her moderately realistic panting and whinnying. The simulated sex heard in "The Pimp," however, is unusual in that, unlike as in most other examples from the genre, the male participant (presumably Mr. Scarface himself) is clearly audible: deep, masculine groans continue through the latter half of the song, while Mr. Scarface makes repetitive and largely unimpressive claims like "my next-door neighbors even heard her" and talks about his dick more than a high-school athlete. One wonders if the afore-mentioned neighbors (who probably hear regular things, like Scarface's TV, through the presumably wafer-thin walls of his Fifth Ward tenement) were as put-off as I was upon hearing his passionate cries. He sounds like Conan the Barbarian, and the noises in "The Pimp" are more like something one would expect to hear at the zoo than in the bedroom. I once knew a girl who said she and her boyfriend "fucked like black people." I certainly hope she didn't mean this.

"Suck Down" and "Get a Lil Head"
Mack 10 featuring Boo Kapone, Techniec, Binky, and CJ Mack*
The Recipe

The Recipe is, by any account, an abysmal album. Despite his apprenticeship with Ice Cube, Mack 10 has been responsible for some of the worst, least imaginative raps I've ever heard, and The Recipe is no exception. Over the course of eighteen tracks, Mack's adolescent boasting and standoffish, meaningless threats alternately bore and annoy the listener enough to essentially eliminate the possibility of listening all the way through. I assume this music is played in hell. That said, tracks seven and eight ("Suck Down" and "Get a Lil Head," respectively), provide a welcome respite from Mack's dubious criminal posturing by describing how much he and the guys (the, ahem, "Hoobangin' Affiliates") like getting their dicks sucked. Are the songs meant to satisfy listeners' curiosity? At any rate, the two are companion pieces, with the former serving as a sort of object lesson to illustrate the principles expounded upon in the latter.

"Suck Down" is an "insert" or skit, which (to those unfamiliar with this sort of thing) means it lasts only twenty-seconds and doesn't feature any music. The track begins with sucking noises and Mack urging his "bitch," whose mouth is obviously too full to respond, to "put that shit all the way in." Mack then proceeds to compliment her technique and make a series of strange, warbling noises. Is this the mating cry of the self-described "Chicken Hawk"? "Get a Lil Head" begins immediately after "Suck Down" and allows each of the Affiliates a chance to elaborate on his love of fellatio. Don't expect any surprises--no one speaks against the practice or says he's "more into guys."

Mack 10's fumbling, amateurish delivery elevates the sex-noises heard on "Suck Down" and "Get a Lil Head" above more mediocre examples by providing a unique, trembling quality similar to a nine-year-old's account of a bogus sexual experience. The songs are so hypersexual it seems doubtful anyone, even the Hoobangin' Affiliates (who clearly appreciate the absurd) could take them seriously. "Get a Lil Head" ends with Mack feverishly demanding the fellator (who is never named) to "suck Binky's dick, suck Eiht's dick, suck Techniec's dick..." until, presumably, the whole posse is satisfied. For what it's worth, Mack is usually good for a quick laugh or two, but why does Ice Cube spend so much time with this pervert?

"Fuck Westside Connection" (or "Ice Cube Killa")
Cypress Hill
Unreleased

Okay, so apparently B-Real and Ice Cube used to be friends, but after listening to a "Throw Your Set in the Air" demo by Cypress Hill, Cube allegedly stole the hook and produced a similar song of his own. Naturally, B-Real made a song about the theft, which prompted Ice Cube's Westside Connection to record TWO songs in response to that ("King of the Hill" and "Cross Em Out and Put a K," on Bow Down) filled with rambling and incoherent disses. "Fuck Westside Connection" is Cypress Hill's response to Westside Connection** and never officially saw release, but can easily be found on MP3 trading servers. It features simulated homosexual sounds.

"Fuck Westside Connection" is cerebral stuff. Most of the song is simply B-Real and Sen Dog wheedling and cajoling Ice Cube and Mack 10 to suck their dicks, calling them "faggots" (the double-standard goes unmentioned), and talking about being really tough guys. Eventually, a simulated Mack 10 fellates a real B-Real, and their homoerotic affair is recorded for posterity.

The encounter begins with B-Real impatiently demanding that Mack 10 "start to sucking," which he does. Cypress Hill's friends, who can be heard carrying on in the background, eagerly await their own "suck down" and shout things like "save some for me, esé" (because they're, you know, Spanish) and "save some for me, dog!" The sucking goes on for a while. Thankfully, B-Real's orgasm is merely implied, as it is difficult to imagine a situation in which his high-pitched moans would be palatable. Sex noises aside, the most interesting aspect of this recording is B-Real's homies insisting he "save some for [them]" as if the quantity of simulated dick-sucks available was limited by anything other than their imaginations and the patience of the recording engineer, who must have been tickled pink by this seldom-heard gem.

*This shit was KILLING my spellchecker.
**The girlishness continued to the EDITED version of Bow Down sold in K-Mart, in which a post-post production Mack 10 responds to "Fuck Westside Connection" in language shockingly free of oaths.