Good Or Shit: Sexy Queens Of The Stone Age

“All my life I've heard that white people can't dance,” Dave Chappelle says to the camera in the beginning of his sketch - White People Dancing. He doesn't believe it though, he believes white people can dance, they just prefer a certain musical instrument - the electric guitar. In order to explore his theory further, he takes John Mayer on a safari-like expedition through boardroom meetings and posh restaurants filled with white people - “a lot of Bush votes in the room” - and instructs Mayer to play his electric guitar.

The results are immediate. As soon as the greasy cat's meow reverberates over the white people, they drop their pens and their forks, rise from their seats, and move their bodies in either a Woodstock-esque weaving through the air or bang their heads around while smashing crockery. “[Electric guitar] speaks directly to the soul of the white person,” Chappelle says. “They find it irresistible.”

I watched this sketch many years ago but I was reminded of it recently while listening to Queens of the Stone Age's new album ...Like Clockwork. I put it on at work, turned down as low as I can bear to turn it down but enough so that my colleagues can't hear it, and oppress my body's urge to move in time to the music. I listen to it on the train and suppress the urge to sit forward in my seat, rest my arms on my parted knees and stare seductively/menacingly at commuters. I listen to it on the walk to the station and try not to walk in a slow motion while combing my hair off my face in an obviously cool manner. At home, as soon as I press play, as soon as that grotty, slimy sounding electric guitar streams through the speakers I am overcome, almost hypnotically, by an urge to start swaying, slowly, hands running up my thighs and into the air, my body moving in a snakelike fashion, gyrating on my poor boyfriend who just wants to read his Game of Thrones book in peace.

Queens of the Stone Age makes me feel sexy.

But when I asked a bunch of other people what made them feel sexy, hip hop and RnB were the forefront genres. They listed Biggie,  The Weeknd, Frank Ocean, Miguel, James Blake, Erykah Badu, D'Angelo, Massive Attack, Portishead, a couple of people lost their virginity to Air, I gave ten points to the chick who dropped The Doors and no points to the chick who dropped Vanessa Amorosi (wtf? No judgement but, wtf?). Kool and the Gang, Barry White “everyone loves Barry white” said one friend. Three people backed me on Queens of the Stone Age, but overwhelmingly people found that hip hop, rnb and soul music made them feel sexy. Made them feel cool, good enough about themselves, to feel appealing. Inspired them to take someone's hand and lead them off to the bedroom where silky songs about love and sex or angsty achy-breakies set the mood. Yuck.

I enjoy all these genres, but personally I find them very unsexy. I like to sing along where fitting, I love going to hip hop shows, I like to dance in these environments, and maybe even in a sexually suggestive way. But I realise now, all my years listening to say, for example RnB, my seemingly sexy-feeling-results have been a little mockery. A game. A bit of fun. Not a genuine feeling. More like a non-Greek at a Greek wedding getting involved in the traditional dancing. I'm familiar with the steps, and I'm legitimately enjoying myself because it's all part of many fabulous things on offer in life to be embraced and enjoyed. But if someone were to put on hip hop, RnB, soul or moody electronica and gaze into my eyes, I would puke.

I have created a healthy un-relationship between sex and intimacy. They're both closely related to the V Word - vulnerability. Combining the two is like the ultimate metaphysical-physical nakedness and it really icks me out. I don't mind revealing my inner self while gazing into the eyes of a lover accompanied by slow jams - but it won't make me feel sexy. When asked why Queens of the Stone Age does make me feel sexy the only adjective I could think of was “dark”. Which lead that person to declare it was a narcissistic imagining of myself through lyrics like “time wounds all heals” - oh and doesn't it? Doesn't it just? - but that's not it at all. I hadn't really been listening to the lyrics and only Googled them recently to make to make sure I wasn't feeling sexy to words like “sink all the refugees, Jesus doesn't want them here”.

For me, it's all about the dark vampiric hunger conjured by a searing electric guitar in certain rock and blues bands. Dangerous. Connecting but keeping one foot firmly planted on particular cards you don't intend to flip, and with a sly smile on your face as you do so.  

A lot more...

And never...

None of this is absolute. But in general, when it comes to me the individual - who also happens to be white - the electric guitar speaks to my soul. I find it irresistible. I find it really sexy.