It’s no secret that rap music is loaded with sexual innuendo. Some lyrics are more subtle than others; on the one hand you have Snoop Dogg and Akon singing “I wanna fuck you” and on the other end you have…well, I guess most rap is on that end of the spectrum.
Even so, in 2008 Flo Rida emerged on the hip hop scene with a monster of a song called “Low.” It wasn’t over-the-top sexual, but it sure wasn’t appropriate for middle school dances, either. For example, he spoke of a woman’s backside as “birthday cakes” whereas Lil Wayne would’ve likely chosen a more explicit word. The song hit #1 in the nation and spent ten weeks in the top spot, virtually impossible to get away from.
Pages could be written about Flo Rida’s next few years and the singles that beat around the bush (as it were) of sexual deviance, but today we’ll focus on a song that dethroned Carly Rae Jepsen’s “Call Me Maybe” as the #1 song in America. The song, which Wikipedia states is “about oral sex,” is titled simply “Whistle.”
The chorus is certainly sexual enough:
“Can you blow my whistle baby, whistle baby, let me know
Girl I’m gonna show you how to do it, and we start real slow
You just put your lips together, and you come real close
Can you blow my whistle baby, whistle baby…here we go.”
Obviously Flo is giving some oral sex imagery, and why not? He’s asking nicely, he’s not forcing anything on anyone, he’s just suggesting the next steps to an enterprising young (presumably) woman. It’s in the verses that he really steps his game up, though. The end of the first verse goes as follows:
“I’m a damn shame,
Order more champagne,
Pull a damn hamstring
Tryna put it on ya
Bet your lips spin back around corner
Slow it down baby take a little longer.”
First, it bears mention that he rhymes “on ya” with “corner.” Visually it looks wrong, but it actually works, so kudos for that. Second, I think maybe he needs to be stretching more. I’ve had sex before and while I’ve admittedly not had wild-groupie-because-I’m-a-famous-rapper sex, I’ve never even begun to worry about pulling my hamstring. If a position is uncomfortable or difficult, I switch. I’ve discussed sex with friends of mine and never heard anyone mention a pulled hammy either. It’s concerning, frankly. Third, how does one spin their lips? I’m beginning to suspect Flo Rida came up with the chorus for this song and then said, “Ah, screw it, we’ll just put words together between choruses. I’m too popular to screw this up right now.”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NwL98zzdEXo
There’s a lot to unravel in the second verse, but I know you don’t need to hear all of it so I’ll focus on two parts. Here are the first six lines:
“It’s like everywhere I go
My whistle ready to blow
Shawty don’t leave a note
She can get any by the low
Told me she’s not a pro
It’s okay, it’s under control.”
We see she’s not a pro, which means either she’s not very good at performing oral sex or she’s not a prostitute and he doesn’t have to pay her. Suddenly I have questions. Is she just modest? Is he okay with her being a prostitute or is that a dealbreaker? Is that why she said she’s not a pro? I’m glad he said it’s okay, but what’s her deal? I need to know more about this woman.
Before they even had that exchange though, “…everywhere I go my whistle ready to blow.” Does Flo Rida have prolonged erections and/or premature ejaculation problems? For his sake, I sure hope not. My god, this is only six lines. I want to write a graduate-level dissertation about this verse; there’s just so much going on here. WHAT is under control at the end? Is that just his way of saying, “I don’t care if you’re bad at it – there’s no such thing as bad at this” or is he saying “That’s okay. I can get someone who is better”?
Later in the verse he drops this couplet:
“Show me your perfect pitch, you got it my banjo
Talented with your lips, like you blew out a candle.”
Where the F did this banjo come from? Where is this blowjob taking place? Is he in the studio? What part of Flo Rida’s life has a banjo involved? Is he referring to his penis as a banjo? Holy crap. I’m so confused before we even get to the second line where he says she’s talented with her lips because she blew out a candle.
Have you ever blown out a candle? Of course you have. How hard was it? Not hard. It’s part of a kid’s birthday ritual starting at about age three, and that kid has to blow out all three at once and it’s not even a big deal. Flo is saying this girl is talented because she blew out one (one!!) candle! What is his sense of reality? What has fame done to this man that he thinks this is amazing, and for the love of God, what in the hell is the banjo reference?
I’m gonna go listen to this song on loop for the next few days. We need answers.