I heard a clip of the Glee Cast singing Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream” on the radio the other day and thought to myself, “That’s really a song meant to be sung by a woman.” I can’t even imagine a gay guy singing it to another gay guy. I’m friend with a gay couple here, and I couldn’t imagine even the more effeminate partner singing it. The lyrics just don’t seem to work for men.
So, Gleeks…what is your take? I don’t watch the show, but I’m aware that they like to redo older and newer songs. I like Katy Perry version, and it’s interesting to hear it sung by men, but I can’t seem to get over the fact that the lyrics just don’t fit.
Are all forty, or so, of those guys supposed to be gay? That’s a lot of gay teenagers. And all in the same uniform, so all from the same school? That’s a high concentration of teh gay.
I don’t watch the show, I don’t know anything about the characters. I figure the guy singing lead and the guy being sung to are gay, the singer romancing the guy he’s singing to. But the other 40 guys in the scene? If they weren’t gay at the opening of there scene, I’d say they’re gay by the :30 mark at the latest.
Anyway, I see nothing in the lyrics that makes it something that can’t be sung by a guy. Maybe a little off for a straight guy trying to romance a girl, but for a gay guy trying to romance a guy it works fine.
The opening lyric “You think I’m pretty without any make-up on” might not work, but they cut that lyric. Of the lyrics they kept, what do you think doesn’t work?
It helps to watch the episode to see it in context. Even so, I understand where you’re coming from–it is kind of a weird song for a guy to sing, gay or not. Here’s how it played out on the show:
Kurt (an openly gay student in William McKinley High School’s glee club), sneaks into an all-boys school–the Dalton Academy–to see what it’s like. While there, that school’s glee club, The Warblers, sing the version of “Teenage Dream” that you heard. Kurt had just met their lead singer, and the song plays out as a kind of innocent seduction, if that makes sense. Kurt is enchanted with the guy, and the guy seems to be singing the song to Kurt. In other words, it is pretty gay. Kurt even asks a few minutes later, “So, are you guys ALL gay?” (No, they’re not all gay, not that there’s anything wrong with that!)
Also, in the episode in question, Mr. Shuester (the glee club sponsor at William McKinley HS) splits his singers by gender and tells the guys to sing songs that are traditionally sung by women, and the girls to sing songs traditionally sung by men. The guys end up doing a mash-up of En Vogue’s “Free Your Mind” and The Supreme’s “Stop, In the Name of Love.” The girls do a mash-up of Bon Jovi’s “Livin’ On a Prayer” and The Rolling Stones “Start Me Up.” So the gender-reversal was a theme of the episode.
I wasn’t at all familiar with the song before seeing the show, and since I couldn’t understand all the lyrics anyhow, I didn’t see anything out of place with guys singing it…whether they were singing it to girls or to other guys. I thought it might feel a little odd for the straight guys to be singing it to an audience of only men, but directed towards a girl they were trying to woo…it was very teeny-bopper-ish, but then, they are supposed to be teens.
“Get your heart racing in my skin-tight jeans”
“Let you put your hands on me in my skin-tight jeans”
A straight guy could sing these lyrics trying to woo a girl.
Some straight girls might be turned on by such a suggestion.
Still, if a guy were telling me his plan to woo a girl that he likes and if his plan included those lyrics, I might steer him toward a plan that would less likely make the girl question whether he really wanted her or if he was “just going with girls 'cause he’s s’posed to.”
Knowing the context makes a bit more sense. I only heard a snippet of the Glee version on a radio show I was listening to on the way home from the gym. The announcer was talking about the episode. Without the line “You think I’m pretty, without any makeup on,” the song makes a bit more sense.
But “get your heart racing in my skin-tight jeans” still seems a bit forced, gay or not.
On the show in general, they often present songs (classic show tunes or pop numbers or whatever) in somewhat different perspectives, not just gender but also the implied audience of the song, who is singing to whom, that sort of thing. Sometimes it supports the plot, other times it is simply for the sake of presenting a familiar song in a different way. The show usually doesn’t change the lyrics* too much, which is something I like about it – the premise seems to be that the overall tone or message of the song is more important than one lyric, hence leaving in the “without any make-up on” line from Teenage Dream. In the case of Teenage Dream, I think they were going for “fun, upbeat pop song about teenagers getting it on,” in a way that underscored that gay teenagers want to have fun teen romances just like straight teenagers, not that the male singer was wearing make-up.
well yes, they do sometimes, usually to drop the more explicit lines from pop songs that wouldn’t fly on network TV*, or to shorten the song for time.
**although I was a little surprised they left in the “bluffin’ with my muffin” line from Gaga’s Poker Face last season, which was being sung as a duet between a mother and daughter.
Hmmm…are you a boy or a girl, bienville? Cuz as a girl who grew up in the 70’s, the sight of boys in nice, tight jeans is quite appealing (as long as they aren’t super-skinny emo guys) and is how I ended up married to the first husband. The baggy, saggy styles of today do NOTHING for me. And I really thought that’s why all those straight boys were wearing skin-tight jeans…so we girls would look at their cute little tushes and want to touch them. Ignorance fought, I guess! And isn’t that the first rule of flirting…to try to get someone to touch you? That’s why guys wore flannel shirts at my high school…solely because we girls were prone to want to touch them…
First, let me say that I’m presenting an argument about how I expect it to be received by the public at large, since this is a very mainstream network T.V. show, rather than my own feelings on the matter.
Personally I get where you’re coming from. I just think the presentation is too off from accepted gender roles for popular entertainment.
YES: women who are sexually attracted to men ARE sexually attracted to men and find men’s bodies physically appealing on a sexual level.
YES: a heterosexual woman can be sexually excited seeing (or hearing description of) a man in clothing that shows off a nice body.
BUT: according to popular sexual politics and the “game” as it is expected to be played (not sexual politics or “game” that I personally believe in), it is the WOMAN who gets to be “the pretty one”.
Much as a woman may like the sight of a man, according to the way the “game” is popularly played he is supposed to present himself, to “preen” for her, by playing up his (socially deemed) manly qualities: financial success, athleticism, humor, sensitivity (not traditionally, but in the new climate), and in social settings where sexual talk is accepted he may describe his skills sexually.
The only physical attribute the man can directly put on display for approval would be muscles.
YES: a woman may very much like how a guy’s ass looks in tight jeans, but according to the way the “game” is played: when that guy looking hot in the tight jeans approaches and says, “Hey, doesn’t my ass look hot in these tight jeans?”, as this point he is well outside the arena in which the game is meant to be played.
Again, this is how I see it according to more widely accepted sexual politics.
I, personally, hate traditional sexual politics. I love when people present themselves outside of traditional gender roles. I happen to surround myself with like-minded people. So, if the mainstream wisdom is not as restricted as I imagine it to be I will be happily surprised and consider it social progress.
As far as I’m concerned, a hetero-sexual guy showing off his ass in tight jeans to woo a woman would be great!
Within my own personal social circle, the women would LOVE it.
I just think it’s counter to the way mainstream wisdom says people should act.
I watched the episode (with my girlfriend). It seemed pretty obvious to me. The show was about the gay character’s frustration with being the only openly out student at his school and being picked on by the closeted gay douchey jock. The rationale was that “Teenage Dream” was just about the gayest song a bunch of prep school pretty boys could sing. Like over the top gay. So much so that the gay character is like “Are ALL of you gay?”
The more subtle point was that the school was supposed to be so progressive that not only were students openly gay, but straight students were totally cool with singing a pretty gay song.